Four security personnel of Special Operation Group, an anti-naxalite force, who were accused of beating a person to death in the custody, were sent to jail after their production before Judicial Magistrate First Class, Komna in Nuapada district on Saturday.
The four security personnel were arrested on Friday following recovery of the dead body, Chittaranjan Sahu, who was brutally thrashed in the camp of SOG Unit deployed in Soseng village, Sunabeda Reserve Forest which is a highly sensitive Left Wing Extremism affected area. They were charged with murder and causing disappearance of evidence. Four SOG personnel were lodged in Khariar Sub Jail.
The deceased along with his two friends, who were charged in a theft case, were temporarily kept in SOG’s Soseng camp on night of August 16 last. However, some SOG personnel had assaulted the suspects which resulted in injury to Nutan Naik and the death of Chittaranjan Sahu.
The State government had already ordered a probe by local judicial magistrate and announced to take stringent action against accused personnel including a sub-inspector. Family members of Nutan Naik, who sustained severe injuries, said two of his kidneys were not working properly and he was intermittently vomiting bloods. Nutan, family members informed, is now on dialysis support in a hospital at Raipur in Chhattisgarh.
S. Saini Deputy Inspector General (South West Range) taking moral responsibility of police excess had already tendered apology.
Meanwhile, a fact-finding team headed by Prasad Harichandan, president of Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee, visited home of Chittaranjan Sahu and took stock of the situation.
“The law and order situation in the State has deteriorated. The police organisation is increasingly taking law into own hands. The latest murder of a youth is sequel to attack by police force on general public in Kendrapara, death of couple in highly suspicious police encounter in Kandhamal and custodial death in Kantabanji,” said Mr. Harichandan.
Congress team takes stock of situation in Nuapada district
