A committee appointed by Supreme Court to probe the death of four men, accused in the 2019 rape and murder of a veterinarian has stated that the cops “deliberately fired upon with in an intent to cause their death”.
The report has also said it believes the firing on the accused was done with knowledge that it would invariably result in death.
Here is everything about the case:
It was in November 2019 that a shocking incident happened near a desolate toll plaza at Tondupally in Shamshabad in Hyderabad’s Telangana.
A 26-year-old veterinary doctor was tricked by four people near the toll. The four accused had claimed that her scooter had a flat tyre and they had offered to help her.
The woman was then raped and later strangulate near their parked truck some meters away from the toll. Later, the accused had taken her body taken to Shadnagar and burnt the body at an underpass on Hyderabad-Bangalore highway.
The distressing incident shook the entire nation and was reminiscent of horrific Nirbhaya rape and murder case.
Incident
Later, the police had said that the accused had keenly noticed the victim's routine of parking her scooter at the plaza before taking a cab. On the day of the incident, the four accused had trapped her.
The victim’s body was found the next day, while the police had later arrested the four suspects—Mohammed Areef, Ch Chennakeshavulu, J Shiva and J Naveen.
Uproar at the incident
There was uproar both within the state and across the country about the incident. The state’s police faced a flak for the delay in registering of FIR in the case.
The gruesome incident had reverberated in the Parliament too, while cries for stern punishment continued to grew shriller.
Death of accused
In December 2019, the four accused were killed by police near the spot where the victim’s body was found.
The local Cyberabad commissioner VC Sajjanar had claimed that the police had taken the four men for a crime scene reconstruction when they were attacked, forcing the police to open fire.
Jubilation, protests and SC probe
The incident resulted in massive jubilation in several parts of the country. However, there were also protests that raised questions about the police’s version into the killing of the four accused.
This led to several petitions being filed in the high court, the National Human Rights Commission forming a team, and the state setting up a special investigation team.
Finally, the Supreme Court appointed a three-member judicial panel to probe the encounter.
The panel submitted its report on Friday, which has said that the killings were intentional.
