Authorities perform last rites of Basavaraju, 7 other Naxalites killed in Chhattisgarh encounter
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....uthorities perform last rites of Basavaraju, 7 other Naxalites killed in Chhattisgarh encounter<BR>PTI News<BR>Dated:- 27-5-2025<BR>PTI<BR>Narayanpur, May 26 (PTI) The last rites of top Maoist leader Nambala Keshav Rao, alias Basavaraju, and seven other cadres killed in an encounter in Chhattisgarh last week were performed by the authorities on Monday, officials said. They were cremated in Naraya....
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....npur. In one of the biggest strikes on Naxalites, security forces gunned down Basavaraju, the general secretary of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), and 26 other cadres, during an encounter in the forest of Abhujmad along the Bijapur-Narayanpur inter-district border on May 21. Two jawans of the District Reserve Guard (DRG) of the state police were also killed during the operation. Of the 2....
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....7 killed Naxalites, bodies of 19 were handed over to the lawful claimants by following official procedure and verifying necessary documents, Inspector General of Police, Bastar Range, Sundarraj P told PTI. Meanwhile, there were two petitions filed by certain individuals in the Andhra Pradesh High Court over the bodies of Maoist cadres Basavaraju and Naveen. The Andhra Pradesh HC on May 24 direct....
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....ed the petitioners to approach the appropriate Chhattisgarh police authority over the claim for the bodies. No order was issued to Chhattisgarh police to hand over the bodies to the petitioners, he said. Five groups of claimants, including the two petitioners who had moved AP HC, reached Narayanpur but couldn’t produce any valid and satisfactory documents to prove their relationship to the slai....
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....n cadres, the senior official said. They also couldn't provide any valid and legal document in support of their claim to take the bodies to Andhra Pradesh or Telangana, he said. The family members of another deceased Maoist cadre, Kosi alias Hungi, a resident of the state’s Sukma district, were handed over her body after verifying their claim when they approached police on Monday, he said. Ho....
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....wever, Kosi’s kin urged the local authorities to facilitate the cremation of the body in Narayanpur, the district headquarters, citing fear of the spread of communicable diseases as it had decomposed, it said. No claimants approached for the remaining two more bodies of Naxalites, he said. A total of eight bodies of Naxalites were cremated in Narayanpur as per the legal procedure, he said. Pr....
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....ima facie, it appears that his own acquaintances disowned the dreaded and cruel Maoist cadre Basavaraju and his associates, he said. “Ashamed of the inhuman misdeeds of the head of the banned and illegal Maoist outfit, no one from his acquaintances turned out to even see his face for one last time. On the other hand, the state extended all basic and humanitarian courtesy in cremating the disown....
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....ed and unclaimed Naxal dead bodies by following due legal procedures,” he said. Conspiracy by the Naxal outfit and its supporters to glorify their "cruel" gang leader and other cadres by conducting a massive funeral in their native place has been lawfully and tactfully averted by the alert police and intelligence agencies, he said. Despite the family of Basavaraju (70) demanding that the body ....
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....be handed over to them and the funeral be held in his native place in Srikakulam district of Andhra Pradesh, he was cremated in Narayanpur. Accusing the police of not handing over Basavaraju's body to them, his family had approached the Andhra Pradesh High Court, seeking a direction to the Chhattisgarh and AP governments to give them the body for performing the last rites. The kin of another sla....
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....in Naxalite had also approached the AP high court with a similar plea. The Andhra Pradesh HC on May 24 disposed of the two writ petitions, saying the petitioners were open to approach the police authorities of Chhattisgarh to seek custody of the bodies of the deceased. The Chhattisgarh Advocate General had informed the HC that after completion of the post-mortem, the bodies would be handed over ....
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....to the respective relatives as per legal procedure. Nambala Janardan Rao, who called himself a nephew of Basavaraju, told PTI videos in Narayanpur that they were told by local authorities that they could not take the body and that it would be cremated in Narayanpur itself. The police did not say anything until yesterday (on Sunday), they claimed. “They (police) wrote down our names and left y....
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....esterday. There was no one at the hospital in the morning. We went to the SP office this morning. At 1 pm, a person came to us and asked us to follow him. We followed him, and then he wrote down our Aadhaar numbers. “After this, he said we could not take the body citing its deteriorating condition and asked us to perform the last rites here (Narayanpur) only. We were not even allowed to see the....
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.... body,” he said. Activist Bela Bhatia in Narayanpur told reporters that police misused their powers and forcefully cremated Basavaraju and others despite their family members demanding that the bodies be handed over to them for the last rites. There are several judgments in which it has been said that the body has the right to dignity and the family members also have a right to perform the las....
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....t rites. This is in Article 21 of our Constitution and many international laws, Bhatia said. PTI COR TKP NR<BR> News - Press release - PIB....