Varavara Rao wants Kishenji niece to identify body

Stating that Kishenji’s elder brother was very ill and his mother very old and a cancer patient, Rao told PTI from Hyderabad that the Maoist politburo member’s body should be identified by Deepa who lived at Peddapalli town in Karimnagar district of Andhra Pradesh.

Criticising the Mamata Banerjee government for “damaging” the peace talks with the Maoists, Rao said “Mamata on one hand spoke of peace while carrying on joint force operations. This is nothing but deception.”

The Maoist sympathiser suspected that Kishenji was captured by the joint forces in West Midnapore district on Wednesday and killed. “A story of an encounter was then fabricated,” he alleged.

Human rights activist and pro-Maoist Sujato Bhadra, who heads the government-appointed team of interlocutors for talks with the Maoists, demanded that in compliance with the National Human Rights Commission’s directives, a criminal case should be registered against the party which killed Kishenji.