“My husband’s death is quite suspicious, as I have seen bruises on his back and blood stains on his nose. There is no doubt, he was subjected to torture by the police,” alleged Reemala Satyavathi (22), after feeding her toddler outside the mortuary of the Government General Hospital (GGH) here on Tuesday.
Her husband Chinna Babu, 26, an autorickshaw driver, was picked up by the Kotananduru police along with five commuters on the charge of ganja smuggling on January 3. He succumbed to “stomach ache” in the GGH here on Monday.
Ms. Satyavathi came all the way to Kakinada from the Kothapalli tribal hamlet of Anthada panchayat in Koyyuru mandal of Visakhapatnam district, along with her relatives, only to see her husband’s body in a terrible shape. She refused to take the body from the mortuary and sought an inquiry into the cause of death.
“The jail officials told us that my husband complained of stomach ache and was being admitted to the GGH on Sunday, but the situation here is quite different and their version is unbelievable,” said the mother of two. Some of her supporters elicited information from the other accused of the ganja case, after obtaining permission from the officials.
“One of the arrested, Kuda Ramulamma, told me that all the six were in police custody at Kotananduru from January 3 to 9. She said that all of them were caned, but Chinna Babu was stripped of his clothes and was beaten up badly,” claimed Pangi Rajababu, sarpranch of Bangarampeta village in Koyyuru mandal.
“The police stopped the autorickshaw coming from Chintapalli at Kotananduru on January 3 and found 30 kg of ganja in the possession of the six tribal people. They picked them up immediately, but produced them in Tuni court only on January 10,” he explained.
Following a complaint, Kakinada Revenue Divisional Officer B.R. Ambedkar visited the mortuary and conducted a preliminary inquiry.
“The specimen of autopsy will be sent to the forensic laboratory in Hyderabad and further inquiry will be conducted once the report is out,” he said.
HRF seeks action
Believing that it was a prima facie case of custodial killing by the Kotananduru police, the Human Rights Forum (HRF) demanded that that police personnel responsible for the death must be prosecuted. “Custodial violence and abuse of police power is a matter of serious concern. The law criminalises torture, but custodial torture enjoys widespread licence in police stations across the State,” said the HRF secretary V.S. Krishna, adding that not less than 10 people were being killed in police custody every year in the State.
