The Kalahandi district police have launched a manhunt for a labour contractor and his accomplice who had allegedly chopped off the hands of two labourers.
The police had identified the accused persons and were searching for the labourers who had escaped from their clutches recently.
The crime came to light after the two injured labourers, Jialu Nial and Dhangada Majhi, reached the government hospital at the district headquarters town of Bhawanipatana in Kalahandi district in a serious condition on Sunday night.
According to the police, the two injured labourers were among the 12 persons that the accused hired from different villages of Kalahandi about a fortnight ago, paying each Rs. 14,000 for work in a brick kiln in neighbouring Andhra Pradesh.
But instead of taking them to Andhra Pradesh, the contractors forcibly took them to Raipur in Chhattisgarh to engage them in brick kiln work. The labourers refused to work in Raipur and 10 of the 12 workers managed to escape. The contractor and his accomplice, who were angry at the escape of the 10 labourers, allegedly tried to bring the remaining two in a vehicle to their respective homes in Kalahandi to recover the money that they had given in advance.
On their way back to Kalahandi, the contractor and his accomplice consumed liquor and chopped off the right hands of the two labourers in a jungle near Belpada.
