Human Rights Forum seeks judicial probe into Ramanaidu’s death

Visakhapatnam: The Human Rights Forum (HRF) demanded that the Atchuthapuram police including the Inspector of Police, Yelamanchili, should not interfere in the investigation of recent suspicious death of Parupalli Ramanaidu in Atchuthapuram police station.

The HRF also demanded a judicial inquiry or CB-CID probe to rule out departmental bias. Also to avoid the possibility of coercing the witnesses and tampering with material evidences by the police.

A three-member HRF team met the deceased Ramanaidu’s family members, the Atchuthapuram police, inspector of police, Yelamanchili and visited the Atchuthapuram police station where Ramanaidu allegedly hanged himself with a coir rope in the early hours of April 25.

Ramanaidu, a resident of Cheemalapalli village in Atchuthapuram mandal, Visakhapatnam district was one of the five accused in Penta Appa Rao’s murder case registered in Atchuthapuram station. The murder took place on April 3 this year.

HRF AP State general secretary K Sudha and Visakhapatnam district president M Sarat said the presence of remaining four accused in the police station on April 24 and 25 was not mentioned in the FIR.

Ramanaidu’s family members stated the remaining four accused members were present in the police station on the April 24 night when they visited the police station, but the police are not admitting this, Sudha said.

“There is a deliberate move to include a few witnesses and exclude some others. For an instance, Ramanaidu’s son says that a plain clothed police man picked up Ramanaidu and took him to police station on a two- wheeler while the same person stated in the complaint that the VRO took him to police station.

The police stated that they took Ramanaidu to Usha Prime hospital. According to inquest report, the last person to see Ramanaidu was alive and the first person to see him dead was the duty doctor at Usha Prime hospital.

The inclusion and exclusion of witnesses by the investigating agency does not seem to be done to gather the best evidence. The inquiry seems to be going in the direction of developing evidence which reinforces the suicide theory instead of unearthing relevant facts,” Sudha explained.

There are a few procedural infirmities which the investigating personnel ought to have taken into consideration. The NHRC guidelines have not been strictly followed in filing of autopsy report. 

According to section 176 (1-A) of the CrPC, it is mandated that all custodial deaths should be inquired by a judicial magistrate rather than an executive magistrate. The HRF demanded for judicial magistrate probe into Ramanaidu’s death and government should pay compensation to Ramanaidu's family, Sarat and Sudha demanded.