Nitin Mahajan
Posted online: Sunday, May 06, 2007 at 0000 hrs IST
Raipur, May 5
A day after this newspaper reported that the killing of seven tribals in an “encounter” on March 31 near Bijapur in Chhattisgarh was kept under wraps, the state’s top police officer today announced a probe saying the bodies will be exhumed for autopsy. A police team is also on its way.
Local police have been asked to register a case of murder “against unknown persons”, said Director General of Police O P Rathore. “The bodies will be exhumed and if evidence is found they were killed by security personnel, legal action will follow,” said Rathore. This is in sharp contrast to what he told The Indian Express just days ago: “Gujarat ki bimaari sab jagah phaila rahein hai log. The Naxalites are savages, we are not into these things.”
This newspaper had reported yesterday that according to villagers, seven tribals from Ponjer village, who the police claim were Sangham members (Naxalite sympathisers), were picked up by Chhattisgarh Armed Police and Salwa Judum, taken to nearby Santoshpur, and killed.
“These were Sangham members and we had gone to these villages to conduct a search mission. There was an encounter and we were forced to act,” a senior district police officer had said.
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