The families of the four men, who were accused of the Hyderabad veterinarian's rape and murder and subsequently killed by the police, have moved the Supreme Court seeking a compensation of Rs 50 lakh each and a CBI probe into their death.
The families have termed the encounter, carried out by the police as "fake".
The petition asked the court to call for all the police records before and after the "encounter" that occurred in the early hours of December 6, and also sought a compensation of Rs 50 lakh each for the families of the accused.
"State to provide adequate compensation and damages of Rs 50,000,00 (Lakhs) each to the deceased family for fake encounter killing of 4 deceased accused," said the petition. The petitioners also sought a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the role of the Cyberabad Police Commissioner VC Sajjanar.
The accused - Mohammed Arif, Chintakunta Chennakeshavulu, Jollu Shiva and Jollu Naveen - were taken to the crime scene, around 60 km from Hyderabad early on December 6, for the purpose of reconstruction of crime scene and were killed when they allegedly tried to flee.
The Telangana government claimed in the apex court that the accused attempted to escape police custody and also grabbed their guns, and then the police had to act in self-defence. It insisted that the accused were killed in the cross-fire. The four accused were accompanied by 10 policemen, and police say two of the accused, a driver and a cleaner, managed to get hold of the guns from the trained officers.
On December 12, the Supreme Court, through an order, set up an inquiry commission led by former apex court judge Justice (retd) V.S. Sirpurkar, retired Bombay High Court judge Rekha Baldota, and retired CBI Director D.R. Karthikeyan, to probe the circumstances of the "encounter" of the four accused in the case. The apex court ruled that the commission would have to complete its investigation within six months. It also appointed advocate K. Parameshwar as counsel for the Commission.
The top court also stayed the proceedings initiated by the Telangana High Court and the National Human Rights Commission into the encounter.