Two and a half decades after a brutal carnage was unleashed in Tsunduru village, in which eight persons were lynched and another young man died in police firing, kith and kin of the victims still await justice.
There has been no progress after a bunch of appeals by the Government of Andhra Pradesh and the Dalit associations were filed in the Supreme Court in June 2014.
The delay in the appointment of a public prosecutor after senior public prosecutor M.N. Rao resigned and senior advocate Bojja Tarakam was taken ill, left the appeals pending. Senior advocate Altaf Ahamed representing the Dalit associations has since died and there has been no replacement.
The State Government filed an appeal in the Supreme Court in June 2014 against the A.P. High Court’s verdict acquitting all the 56 accused in the case citing lack of evidence.
Defining moment
It was on April 6, 1991, eight young men fleeing for safety from a raging mob of upper caste men, were lynched with axes, their mutilated bodies stuffed into gunny bags and thrown into the Tungabhadra drain. After protests erupted, one more youth, K. Anil Kumar, was killed in police firing.
The incident marked a defining moment in the struggle against caste oppression and galvinised Dalit organisations across the country.
Under pressure from Dalit and human rights organisations, the A.P. government set up a special court at Tsunduru under SC&ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, and in 2007, the court convicted 21 persons to life imprisonment and 35 others to one year rigorous imprisonment besides a fine of Rs.2,000 each. The A.P. High Court however, quashed the verdict and acquitted all the accused citing lack of evidence. A Division Bench comprising of Justices L. Narasimha Reddy and M.S. Jaiswal turned down the verdict of Trial Court stating that that the prosecution failed to prove the exact time of death, place of occurrence and the identity of attackers.
