Six people have been arrested for assaulting and urinating on a 26-year-old man belonging to Erukula community, categorised as Scheduled Tribes, in Ongole town in Prakasam district, Andhra Pradesh on June 19. A total of nine persons including three juveniles were involved in the horrific crime. The victim was identified as Mota Naveen. The accused who inflicted this atrocity were his own childhood friends. Naveen was subjected to the violence for eloping with the 17-year-old sister of one of the accused. The issue came to light when accused Prabhu and Narendra shared the video on social media.
The accused were identified as Ramanjuneyalu, Abhilash, Jaishankar, Sheik Gafur, Prabhu and Narendra along with three other teenage boys. Section 307 (Attempt to murder) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) along with SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act was invoked on eight of the accused except for Abhilash who hails from the Madiga community. Naveen had eloped with Abhilash’s girlfriend who also was the sister of one of the accused (juvenile) in this case.
According to the police, on June 19, Naveen was invited over the pretext of drinking. Later, the accused ganged up and assaulted him. Visuals from social media show the accused abusing and urinating on a visibly injured Naveen. The accused belonged to Kamma, Naidu and Yadava communities while the remaining two were from Madiga (Scheduled Caste) and Muslim community.
The accused including Naveen have a criminal history, police said. Police learnt about the incident after the video of the assault went viral. Following this, police questioned Naveen who is availing treatment at a hospital.
“When we first interrogated Naveen at the hospital, he said that only two people beat him up. He did not divulge further details about the atrocity. So a case was registered under Section 324 (Voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means) of the Indian Penal Code. We knew about all of this after one of the accused put up the videos on social media,” said Prakasam district SP Malika Garg.
The SP also told TNM that they have booked the victim Naveen under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act in December, 2022 for eloping with a minor girl.
Of the nine accused, six have been arrested while Ramanujeyalu, Sheik Gafur and Narendra are absconding. A team has been deployed to apprehend the three accused. The three juveniles were apprehended and produced before court, police informed.