Rajaram Satapathy TNN
Bhubaneswar: Five days after the gruesome murder of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati and four of his associates, police are still clueless about the killers. The state government still maintains that Saturday’s attack on Jalespeta Ashram in Kandhmal district was the handiwork of Maoists, but BJP — the ruling coalition partner — refuses to buy its own government’s version. Neither do the police. BJP and other saffron organizations have thrown the blame on “Christian militants” who, according to them, were intolerant to the Swamiji’s “relentless battle against conversion and his years of effort to educate poor tribals”. DIG R P Koche, who has been put in charge of Kandhamal district after the district SP’s suspension in the wake of the killing, said some people have been detained for the incident, but that the “arrest process is yet to begin”. He re-fused to say how many suspects have been detained so far. Sources say even the police are baffled over the manner in which the attack was made on the Swamiji and the weapons used. The postmortem report says the Swamiji was riddled with bullets from AK-47 assault rifles and 9 mm pistols. “The attack group had more than 40 people, all young. They had about four AK-47s, and some carried countrymade guns,” said a senior officer. “It was not a spurof-the-moment hit. They came fully prepared.” The government seized on the AK-47 bullets to point a finger at Maoists. Besides, Kandhamal has been emerging as another hotbed of the Naxalites, who are using the dense forests and hilly, uninviting terrain to hold training camps and recruit locals. Even in the Nayagarh attack in February, in which truckloads of arms from police were looted and 15 people were murdered, the Maoists had used Kandhamal as their base before launching the offensive, sources say. But the police brass is not willing to believe the government’s theory on the Maoist angle. “Any killing by Maoists is decided by its 39-member central committee and they normally issue statements, taking the high moral ground. In case of Swamiji, the Maoists have so far not owned responsibility. More so, Laxmanananda Saraswati was not a class enemy for them — a terminology they often use against oppressors and exploiters. The Swamiji spent his entire life fighting against conversion,” a senior officer said. He said Maoists normally do not antagonize local people and couldn’t be so naive as to kill the propoor Swamiji. “We believe some of their newly recruited people may have done the killing,” he added. (TNN)
Bhubaneswar: Five days after the gruesome murder of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati and four of his associates, police are still clueless about the killers. The state government still maintains that Saturday’s attack on Jalespeta Ashram in Kandhmal district was the handiwork of Maoists, but BJP — the ruling coalition partner — refuses to buy its own government’s version. Neither do the police. BJP and other saffron organizations have thrown the blame on “Christian militants” who, according to them, were intolerant to the Swamiji’s “relentless battle against conversion and his years of effort to educate poor tribals”. DIG R P Koche, who has been put in charge of Kandhamal district after the district SP’s suspension in the wake of the killing, said some people have been detained for the incident, but that the “arrest process is yet to begin”. He re-fused to say how many suspects have been detained so far. Sources say even the police are baffled over the manner in which the attack was made on the Swamiji and the weapons used. The postmortem report says the Swamiji was riddled with bullets from AK-47 assault rifles and 9 mm pistols. “The attack group had more than 40 people, all young. They had about four AK-47s, and some carried countrymade guns,” said a senior officer. “It was not a spurof-the-moment hit. They came fully prepared.” The government seized on the AK-47 bullets to point a finger at Maoists. Besides, Kandhamal has been emerging as another hotbed of the Naxalites, who are using the dense forests and hilly, uninviting terrain to hold training camps and recruit locals. Even in the Nayagarh attack in February, in which truckloads of arms from police were looted and 15 people were murdered, the Maoists had used Kandhamal as their base before launching the offensive, sources say. But the police brass is not willing to believe the government’s theory on the Maoist angle. “Any killing by Maoists is decided by its 39-member central committee and they normally issue statements, taking the high moral ground. In case of Swamiji, the Maoists have so far not owned responsibility. More so, Laxmanananda Saraswati was not a class enemy for them — a terminology they often use against oppressors and exploiters. The Swamiji spent his entire life fighting against conversion,” a senior officer said. He said Maoists normally do not antagonize local people and couldn’t be so naive as to kill the propoor Swamiji. “We believe some of their newly recruited people may have done the killing,” he added. (TNN)
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