Lagacharla women say KTR, Narender Reddy did not ask them to attack Collector

This comes after former Kodangal MLA Patnam Narender Reddy said the purported confession in his remand report was cooked up by the police and that he had not said anything of that sort or named anyone.

Hyderabad: Punching more holes into the police claim that the Lagacherla attack was pre-planned and instigated by the BRS, family members of farmers arrested in the incident on Thursday made it clear that neither BRS working president KT Rama Rao nor former Kodangal MLA Patnam Narender Reddy had asked them to attack the Vikarabad Collector or other officials on Monday. This comes after former Kodangal MLA Patnam Narender Reddy said the purported confession in his remand report was cooked up by the police and that he had not said anything of that sort or named anyone.

About eight women from Lagacharla village, who met Rama Rao at Telangana Bhavan here on Thursday, told the media that they were protesting against the government’s decision to hand over their lands for setting up a pharma village and that no BRS leader had provoked or encouraged them to attack the Collector or any other officials. They also held a press conference in the city earlier.

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“We are fighting for our land. No one provoked us to attack the officials. All the allegations made by the police are baseless,” said Jyothi, a pregnant tribal woman, whose husband was arrested in the case.

As the Collector came without any security to Lagacharla, the villagers did not recognise him and raised slogans of “Go back, Go back”, she said, adding that no one physically assaulted the Collector. However, their family members were subjected to third degree and treated inhumanely.

Jyothi broke down while explaining the police attack on her husband to Rama Rao, saying that her husband was severely beaten and taken away even though he had nothing to do with the attack. “When I went to meet my husband at prison, he told me that he was physically assaulted by the police,”Jyothi said.

Another woman, Devibai, informed that the police came to her house around 1 am and took her husband away using force though he was not present during the incident. The tribal women stated that Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy’s brother A Tirupati Reddy also visited their village and said that the pharma village would come at any cost and that they would have to part with their lands for the project.

Rama Rao assured the women that the BRS would stand by them and would not rest till their family members were released from the prison. “We will be with you till you get justice. The BRS legal team will take care of the case. Don’t worry. We will see that all your problems are solved,” he told them.

He appealed to the National Human Rights Commission and the State Human Rights Commission to investigate the brutal police attack on farmers in Lagacharla.

Earlier, addressing a press conference, the tribal women claimed that the villagers did not attack anyone and demanded the government to release all the people arrested. They said the officials were pressuring them to give away their land and due to fear of losing them, the villagers were resisting the presence of the officials.

“If we give away our land, how will we survive? There is no question of parting with our land. Even if we have to give our lives, we will not give land for the pharma village,” they said.