Southern States
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Andhra Pradesh
PWG lifts the lid on Madhava Reddy killing
By K. Srinivas Reddy
HYDERABAD, DEC. 5. The standard practice of changing the position of the VVIP vehicle in a convoy would have saved the former Panchayat Raj Minister A. Madhava Reddy. But, death was hovering over the Minister, who was travelling in a brand new Toyota Qualis, easily identifiable for the naxalites who lay in wait at the road over bridge near Ghatkesar on that fateful night.
The naxalite team, which was to detonate the landmines planted on the bridge, was confused about the vehicle in which Madhava Reddy was travelling. In a split second decision, the team targeted the Qualis leaving the other two vehicles, as Madhava Reddy was seen travelling in it earlier in the day.
These chilling details of undeniably the most sensational attacks ever carried out by the naxalites are found in an article published in ``Jung,'' military magazine of the People's War Group (PWG). Though the police could by and large theorise the sequence of events culminating in the killing of Madhava Reddy and his PSO Rambhupal Reddy, the article gives an authoritative account of the meticulous strike on the night of March 7, 2000.
``The convoy reached the bridge around 11 p.m. But as the pilot vehicle was coming without headlamps...it took sometime to identify the convoy which had only three vehicles... Gypsy, Ambassador and Qualis. Generally, the VIP vehicle would be in the middle with the pilot leading it and the escort vehicle tailing it...Poor visibility and the presence of only three vehicles (as against the input from the recce team about five vehicles being in the convoy which started from Bhongir) and also the positioning of Qualis at the end of the convoy led to some confusion.''
``Whether to blow up the Ambassador or the Qualis was the dilemma but there was no time to think. Since we did not have information about Madhava Reddy travelling in the Ambassador, we detonated the mines as the Qualis passed over them,'' the `Jung' pointed out.
It says the PWG state committee had formed a five-member special action team to target Madhava Reddy and one of the team members Bhusharajula Shankar alias Krishna was assigned to conduct recce on the movement of the minister in Bhongir. Based on his inputs, the team decided that the target could be hit at three places and one of them was the road over bridge located 23 km away from Bhongir.
Four buckets containing eight kg of gelatine were planted on the approach road to the bridge. The mines were connected with wires on March 2. The length of the connecting wires was such that mines could be triggered from a distance of 70 metres. On March 6, two team members positioned themselves near the bridge and observed the minister's convoy racing towards Bhongir.
Following this input, the team expected the minister to return and waited till 11.30 p.m. but Madhava Reddy did not turn up. ``The next day, the team took positions at 4.30 p.m. By 7 p.m. we were informed that Madhava Reddy went to Yadagirigutta and returned to Bhongir at 10 p.m. After 30 minutes, he started for Hyderabad. The Gypsy led the convoy followed by the Ambassador and the Qualis.''
``DSP Ravindar Reddy (then DSP Bhongir) and another police jeep were following the convoy.'' The action team later learnt that the DSP's vehicle and the police jeep peeled off just two km away from the blast site.
The `Jung' article also gives details on how the action team triggered mines so precisely. The mines were planted in line with rainwater storm drain on the embankment. The mine operator carrying the flash gun set off the blast the moment the target vehicle's shadow was in line with the storm water drain. ``This turned out to be very useful as we could hit the vehicle in the dark,'' the article sums up.
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