Palamaneru: Villagers stage road blockade with body, seek ex gratia for farmer

Palamaneru(Chittoor district): Villagers of Indra Nagar in Palamaneru mandal on Thursday staged a road blockade along with deceased farmer Subramanyam's body on Gudiyatham Road for more than five hours, demanding justice to the farmer's family.

They erected tents across the Palamaneru – Gudiyatham road obstructing the vehicular traffic. It may be recalled that Yanadi Subramanyam was trampled to death by herd of elephants on Wednesday while he was sleeping outside of his house in his agriculture fields.

Farmer leader Umapathi Naidu, who led the protest, demanded the government to give compensation to the family of deceased farmer and take steps for permanent solution for arresting jumbos menace. He also demanded compensation of crop loss occurred due to elephants based on new GO. DFO Sunkara Ravi Sankar along with revenue and police officials reached the place and tried to pacify the farmers.

Farmer's leader Umapathi Naidu said that they will not relent until the government announce compensation and do justice the deceased Subramanyam's family. Palamaneru RDO Padmavathi, who reached the place, assured the agitating farmers that the bereaved family will get Rs 5 lakh compensation of which Rs 2.5 lakh cheque will be given immediately apart from providing pension to the wife of Subramanayam and relief from CM's fund.

Later, the villagers pacified and allowed the officials to take the body for postmortem.