Hyderabad: Most wanted Maoist Sanjoy Deepak Rao nabbed in city

Hyderabad: With reliable inputs by the Intelligence department, the Cyberabad Police apprehended the most wanted Maoist, Sanjoy Deepak Rao, Central Committee Member of CPI (Maoist), on Friday near Malaysian Township, Kukatpally.

The Special Intelligence Bureau (SIB) has been tracking this high-profile target for a long time. A revolver with six live rounds, a laptop, Rs 47,250 and other material were seized from him. According to the police, Rao is native of Thane (Maharashtra). He was most wanted by the police of Maharashtra, Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and NIA. The government of Maharashtra declared Rs 25 lakh reward for the informant leading to his apprehension. The police said he will be taken into custody and interrogated for eliciting his involvement in various unlawful activities, area of operation and links with activists in the frontal and mass organisations in Telangana.

Rao is a BTech (electrical) from the then Regional Engineering College (REC) now NIIT, Jammu and Kashmir, in 1983-84. “He was attracted towards Left-wing extremist ideology after likely being influenced by his father who was a strong Communist trade union leader,” said DGP Anjani Kumar.

While he was studying in J&K, some of Rao’s friends supported the separatist movement in Kashmir.

He used to visit his friend’s houses in Mumbai, Pune and Hyderabad taking utmost precautions while moving on party work. “After returning from J&K, he initially worked with various CPI groups. In 1999, he, along with Konath Muralidharan, alias Ajith, formed CPI ML Naxalbari group.

He was made in-charge of Maharashtra and Muralidharan was the all-India secretary,” said Kumar. In July 2000, he was arrested by the Sahadha Police of Nandurbar district and later was released from jail at the end of 2000.

In 2005, the Mulkanoor police of Karnataka, arrested him; he was released from jail at the end of 2006. The DGP said Rao came to Hyderabad about four days back and was proceeding to Maad (Chhattisgarh) to attend a meeting. On specific inputs given by Intelligence department, the Cyberabad police intercepted him on Sept 15 morning in the Kukatpally area.