By IANS,
Bhubaneswar : The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Orissa has moved the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) for a probe into the killing of two of its members as Maoists by police last year, a party leader said Friday.
Alleging it was a staged shootout, the opposition party sought action against the policemen and officials involved.
A party team, including BJP leaders Bhupinder Yadav and Rajya Sabha MP Rudra Narayan Pani, met NHRC member Justice G.P. Mathur at the NHRC office in Delhi Thursday.
“We requested him for a high-level inquiry into the incident,” Rudra Narayan Pani, a member of the team, told IANS over phone from Delhi.
He said the family members of the deceased had also accompanied the BJP team and produced evidence to show the two were not linked with any Maoist activity and were innocent.
Madhav Singh Thakur and Ramesh Sahu were killed Dec 26 at the Gandhamardan Hill area in Bargarh district. Police claimed the two were Maoists and killed in an exchange of fire.
But Gandhamardan Suraksha Yuva Parishad (GSYP), a local organisation, and the BJP refuted the claim and said both were members of their organisations.
The BJP, GSYP and affiliated groups have been demanding a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe saying both were killed in a fake encounter because they were opposing mining in the region.