The Special Investigation Team (SIT) on Friday launched its probe into the death of five undertrial prisoners, who were killed in a police shootout at Aler in Nalgonda on April 4.
The SIT, which has come under flak from various quarters for inordinate delay in starting its work, visited Warangal district police headquarters to question the escort party involved in the shootout.
In the absence of Sandeep Shandaliya, chief, SIT, four other members of the team questioned the members of the escort team and recorded their statement. Sources said that the SIT asked the policemen about the behaviour of the five undertrials, including Viqaurddin Ahmed, an accused in a terrorism related case, after they were taken out from Warangal Central Prison for shifting them to Hyderabad for a court appearance.
Sources informed that the policemen repeated their claim that near Aler the prisoners tried to snatch their gun and attacked them, forcing them to open fire in self defense killing all the five under trials.
The SIT also seized the records of the weapons carried by the 17 member escort team led by sub inspector Uday Bhaskar, the record of the mini-van used to transport the prisoners and the jail record of the prisoners. The SIT was expected to continue its work in Warangal for one more day and also visit the scene of the encounter.
Contrary to the police claims, the counsel for the under trials and their family members have alleged that it was a case of cold blooded murder as all the five were handcuffed and chained to their seats in the mini-van.
Meanwhile, Mohammed Ahmad, father of Viqaruddin has filed a fresh petition in the Hyderabad High Court, seeking second postmortem of the deceased. Judge admitting the petition, transferred the same to the vacation bench.
Meanwhile the Special Investigation Team formed by the Government of Andhra Pradesh to probe the killing of 20 alleged wood smugglers in Seshachalam forest of Chittoor district has also visited the two scenes of the “encounters” in deep forest area
The visit to Cheekateegalakona and Eethakunta in the forest under scorching summer heat was excruciating that at least two members of the SIT SP
P Palaraju and DSP CID N Yugandhar collapsed due to dehydration. No forest department official accompanied the SIT nor the department made any arrangement for the SIT, police sources alleged.
The condition of the two police officials had worsened to the extent that an ambulance had to be called.
Ravishankar Ayyanar, the head of the SIT told the media that in accordance with the orders of the Hyderabad High Court the probe will be completed within 60 days. He said that the team visited both the spots where 20 people were killed in two encounters on April 7.
SIT was now planning to visit Tamil Nadu to meet the families of the deceased. While the AP Police and forest department claimed that those killed were wood smugglers and they had attacked the police and forest department personnel and they were killed in retaliatory firing, the families of the victims said that they were ordinary laborers and were killed by the police in a fake encounter after they were arrested.