Two days after the reported encounter of the four accused in the gangrape and murder of the 26-year-old Hyderabad veterinarian, the state government on Sunday appointed a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to investigate the case.
On December 6, in a reported encounter, the Cyberabad Police shot dead four accused in the case — Mohammed Areef, Jollu Shiva, Jollu Naveen and Chennakeshavulu — in an alleged "retaliatory firing" while the accused were taken for scene recreation at the crime spot.
This development comes even as two petitions have been filed before the Supreme Court — by SC lawyer ML Sharma and one by petitioners GS Mani and Pradeep Kumar — seeking a probe into the reported encounter. The encounter, which was hailed by many as "instant justice" was also met with criticism, including the Chief Justice of India Sharad Arvind Bobde, who stated that justice should never take the form of revenge.
The SIT will probe the case under IPC sections 307 (attempt to murder), 394 (Voluntarily causing hurt in committing robbery), 224 (Resistance or obstruction by a person to his lawful apprehension), 332 (Voluntarily causing hurt to deter public servant from his duty) read with Section 34 (Acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) and 176 (omission to give notice or information to public servant by person legally bound to give it) along with other all related cases registered in Telangana state as per the Supreme Court guidelines.
Comprising of seven Telangana state police officials, the SIT will be headed by Rachakonda Commissioner of Police Mahesh Bhagavath. Wanaparthy SP K Apoorva Rao, Mancherial DCP Uday Kumar Reddy, Rachakonda Addl DCP Surender Reddy and Sangaredy DSP Sridhar Reddy, Rachakonda IT cell officer Sridhar Reddy, Koratala CI Raja Sheker Raju along with Venu Gopal Reddy, Inspector DCRB, Sangareddy are part of the SIT. However, the SIT does not have any third party official as the member or supervisor.
The Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by advocate ML Sharma had sought an SIT probe under the scrutiny of the former apex court judges, while the separate petition filed GS Mani and Pradeep Kumar Yadav has sought an independent investigation against the concerned police officials.
Earlier, following a writ petition by several women civil rights activists who raised doubts and foul play by the police, the Telangana High Court directed the government to preserve the bodies of the four men till Monday, December 9. Meanwhile, the Principal District Judge, Mahaboobnagar has reportedly submitted the CD (video-recording) of the post-mortem to Registrar General of the Telangana High Court.