Cauvery Basin2

Tamil Research Institution (TRI)
viii)
Balachandran was afraid, and though there were several calls later from
Sivakumar’s number, he did not pick them up;
Brief Facts of the Statement of Ilangovan
ix)
Ilangovan, travelling on the 6 th April with his friend Paneerselvam to find work as
masons, had got into an auto at Nagariputhur around 8 pm, but it was blocked off
by around eight armed men in mufti, who made them get out; one of them then
made a call from his phone;
x) An ‘EICHER’ lorry appeared shortly thereafter, and the two men were thrown into
it; Ilangovan found there were already about 30 persons in it, of whom 10 were
carrying guns;
xi)
xii)
The lorry brought after almost an hour them to a compound which was dark and
with many different vehicles; here the armed men jumped out, and some of them
went into an office from where they brought a video camera, with which they
photographed the men;
When the armed men were preoccupied, Ilangovan utilized the occasion and
cover of darkness and climbed over the front left side of the lorry and ran off,
taking advantage of the darkness; he scaled a fence and went up a hill behind
the compound, until he reached the lower Tirupati temple, where he hid, till
almost 4.30AM before managing to return to his home.
The fact finding team has had access to some of the relevant documents, including the FIR
filed by a forest officer, in which the claim is made that, in addition to the other weapons
listed by the DIG in his statement to the press, the men who were killed had four firearms.
(Refer to Annexe 4, 5 & 6 for complete submission by the three witnesses).
4.FURTHER VISITS OF THE FACT FINDING TEAM
On 15 th April, the fact finding team divided itself into two teams and visited 19 families of the
deceased victims in their respective villages. The teams visited –
i) At Keelkanavayur village in Tiruvannamalai district and met Ms. Lakshmi who is
the young widow of Paneerselvam. Lakshmi and late Pannerselvam have an eight
months old girl child named Sanjana. Paneerselvam’s family belongs to
Melkanavayur village which is 2 kms further on the hill.
ii) At Melkuppasanur village in Tiruvannamalai district and met the families of the
deceased victims Chinnasamy, Govindasamy, Rajenderan, Vellimuthu. It is
pertinent to note that the Vellimuthu was physically challenged with hearing and
speech impairedness. Rajendran’s wife is two months pregnant.
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