Hyderabad: Police brutality youth refuses to pay bribe; Get kidneys damaged

True to the adage “fence eating grass”, the police instead of probing the alleged assault on a youth for refusing to pay bribe to an Agriculture Officer (AO) was beaten up black and blue resulting in his kidney failure.

Though this incident had occurred some time back in Mominpet of Vikarabad district near Hyderabad, it came to light after the victim’s family lodged a complaint with the district Superintendent of Police on Monday.

According to the information reaching here, a B.Tech graduate P. Kanna Reddy of Errapalli village in Vikarabad district, had decided to set up a fertilizer and insecticides firm in Mominpet. Accordingly, he was stated to have applied for required permission to the Mandal Agriculture Officer Neeraja. However, the application was kept pending for nearly two months allegedly because the AO demanded a bribe of Rs 20,000 for issuing the license. The youth approached the ACB authorities and lodged a complaint against the AO. However, the ACB officials had made it clear that they would not be able to do anything in the matter without proper evidence.

Thereupon, Kanna Reddy again approached the AO to get the required license sanctioned. When the AO again demanded the bribe amount, the youth tried to record the same on his mobile phone. Noticing this, AO rang up her husband and then smashed the mobile phone of the victim and also lodged a police complaint alleging that the victim was harassing her.

Based on the complaint lodged by the woman AO, the Sub-Inspector of the Mominpet Police Station took Kanna Reddy to the police station a week back. The youth was allegedly beaten up in the police station in the presence of the AO and her husband. When his health deteriorated after the harsh treatment at the hands of the police, Kanna Reddy got admitted in a private hospital in the city. On examination the doctors were stated to have detected that both the kidneys of Kanna Reddy were badly damaged.

The doctors were stated to have informed that Kanna Reddy in order to get over the severe pain due to the beatings of the police had been taking pain killers leading to his kidney failure. Already the victim had to undergo dialysis twice. The family members of Kanna Reddy explained these factors to the SP Annapurna, who ordered an inquiry into the matter. The Vikarabad DSP, who has been entrusted with the inquiry has already recorded the statement of Kanna Reddy and is expected to submit his report to the SP. (NSS).