Police firing claims 8 lives in Andhra Pradesh

Hyderabad, July 28: Eight people, including a woman, were killed and eight others injured, three of them critically, when police fired to quell a stone-pelting mob at Mudigonda village in Khammam district as the Left-sponsored state-wide bandh in Andhra Pradesh turned violent today.

Health Minister S Chandrasekar, who represents Palair constituency in the Assembly in which Mudigonda village is located, told reporters that eight persons were killed in the firing.

He said that the police action was consequent to the Left parties' blocking the road for more than three hours and not heeding to the request to allow free movement of vehicles.

Home Minister K Jana Reddy told newspersons that Inspector General of Police Poornachandra Rao had rushed from Hyderabad to assess the law and order situation.

The government has ordered an inquiry into the police firing, Mr Reddy said, adding that action would be taken against erring policemen, if any.

The CPI and CPI(M) activists had pitched camps and were staging dharna on the road since this morning to protest against the lathicharge on party activists demanding land for the landless.

Police, who tried to evict them, were allegedly attacked with stones, resulting in serious injuries to a Circle Inspector and a Sub-Inspector.

State CPI(M) Secretary B V Raghavulu, recuperating at the Gandhi Government Hospital after the police broke his six-day fast-to-death this morning and shifted him for treatement, demanded an ex gratia of Rs five lakh each to the kin of the victims in the police firing.

He demanded action against the 'erring' policemen and cautioned that any laxity on the part of the Government could force his party to review its support.

CPI(M) Politburo member Sitaram Yechuri would reach Hyderabad tomorrow and visit Mudigonda to study the situation.

The State CPI(M) has called for a bandh in Khammam district tomorrow.

UNI