HYDERABAD: The country, on Friday morning, woke up to a “bolt from the blue” announcement in the brutal gang rape and murder case of Hyderabad’s young veterinarian, where all the four accused were shot dead in an alleged ‘encounter’ during night ‘reconstruction’ by the Telangana Police.
This is the third ‘encounter’ in Telangana in the last 10 years involving non Maoists.
Mystifying recurrences
The encounter on Friday bore a stark resemblance to a decade ago in the united Andhra Pradesh state and another from 2015, after the bifurcation of the state.
2015 Alair encounter
On April 2015, five under-trial prisoners reportedly associated with SIMI and other organisations were killed in a reported gunfight near Alair in Nalgonda district.
The police at that time alleged that the accused tried to snatch weapons from policemen and flee while they were being brought to Hyderabad from Warangal Central Jail.
The slain under trial prisoners are Viquar Ahmed, 33, Syed Amajd Ali, 27, Mohammed Zakir, 35, residents of Hyderabad. Mohammed Haneef, 37, was a resident of Ahmedabad, Gujarat while Izhar Khan, 33, was from Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh.
The families of the undertrials and the civil rights activists termed the encounter as “fake” and “stage-managed.”
2008 Acid attack encounter
It was on December 12, 2008, the police had killed all three accused in an acid attack case on two engineering college girl students of the Kakatiya Institute of Technology in Warangal.
The official had then claimed that the accused were killed when they attacked policemen while trying to escape.
One of the two women survived recently told Huffington Post that encounter killings are not justice. “If the death of the accused in my case was a deterrent, [the] attack on Nirbhaya or Disha would not have happened,” she said.
The then Congress government headed by Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy had come under criticism for ensuring protection to women.
The alleged killing is reminiscent of 2008 Warangal encounter that taken place under Cyberabad Police Commissioner V.C. Sajjanar. The killing was hailed for the “quick action by the police.”
Who is CV Sajjanar?
Sajjanar was serving as the Superintendent of Warangal district in undivided Andhra Pradesh at the time of the 2008 acid attack encounter.
The Indian Police Service (IPS) officer of 1996 batch was supervising the investigations into the horrific crime.
Sajjanar was hailed as ‘Encounter Cop’ for delivering ”instant justice” in the case.
Sajjanar, an official of the rank of Inspector General of Police, took over as the Commissioner of Cyberabad in March 2018.