Taking cover under the pretext of jurisdiction, police from Patan Bori in Yavatmal district of Maharashtra refused to retrieve the body of a murdered man which was thrown into Penganga river located on the inter-State Telangana-Maharashtra border on NH 44 in Jainad mandal.
The body, which was apparently dumped into the river sometime during the intervening night of December 7, remained there until about 11 am on Tuesday when Jainad police headed by Adilabad Rural Inspector P. Srinivas recovered it.
The Penganga flows on the northern border of Adilabad for over 100 km and the problem of jurisdiction arises whenever such incidents take place. Neither side is prepared to claim bodies especially in cases of suspected murders.
“For any side which happens to find the body first, the standard practice was to surreptitiously push it closer to the bank on the opposite side. No side even to this date prefers to handle such issues,” says B. Sanjiv Reddy, a former sarpanch of Kamai gram panchayat located on the banks of Penganga.
Koreti Lachanna, sarpanch of Pippalkuti village on Maharashtra side of the river bank was very critical of the administration in Yavatmal district when it came to acting in a responsible manner. He said bodies were left to rot in many cases.
A sand transporter from the same village across the border, Sama Deva Reddy, pointed out that Yavatmal district authorities collected seignorage even on sand mined on the Telangana side of the river bed. “When it comes to responsibility, our authorities do not show up.
Jainad Tahsildar K. Sanjay told The Hindu that there ought to be no confusion so far as the border is concerned. “The river lies 75 per cent on Maharashtra side and 25 per cent on ours,” he revealed quoting official position.
“Despite knowing that it is their jurisdiction we brought out the murdered man's body on humanitarian grounds. We will also take the investigation to its logical conclusion,” he asserts.
