A five-year-old boy, identified as Naga Chaitanya sustained head injuries and was rushed to RDT Hospital at Bathallapalli in a grave condition when a team led by the Dharmavaram Revenue Divisional Officer tried to demolish houses at Marrimakulapalli in Tadimarri mandal of Anantapur district on Friday afternoon.
Marrimakulapalli is one of four villages getting inundated in the district with the government deciding to store 9.5 tmcft of water in the Chitravathi Balancing Reservoir on the Anantapur-Kadapa district border. Around 180 oustees were agitating for compensation for their houses that they were going to lose, and did not allow anyone to enter the village till late Friday afternoon.
At noon, the Revenue Divisional Officer and the Mandal Revenue Officer pacified the agitating youth and told them that they would take the issue to the notice of the higher officials and that a resolution would be done by Monday. Following their assurance, people had their lunch at the entrance of the village and left for their houses.
Later in the afternoon, the Revenue officials allegedly came back with an earthmover and demolished the walls of one of the houses, which led to the damage of adjoining house in which the five-year-old boy was having lunch. The boy sustained a grave head injury and was shifted to hospital in the Revenue Department vehicle.
The villagers immediately damaged the JCB and chased away the police and Revenue officials, and threatened to organise a mass sit-in in front of the Tadimarri Mandal Revenue Office on Monday if the issue was not resolved by then as the houses were getting slowly inundated in the backwaters of the Chitravathi Balancing Reservoir. The agitating youth also threatened to lift the gates of the reservoir and release water if the officials did not respond in time.
