Hyderabad, December 27: Cracking down on the agitators involved in the attacks on public property during the Telangana agitation, police started picking up suspects involved in the attacks.
Sources said Task Force sleuths also nabbed Srikanth Raju, one of the persons behind the attack on Janardhan Reddy, and handed him over to the CID which is investigating into the attack. “Three persons were taken into custody for the attack on the legislator,’’ Additional Director-General of Police AK Khan told reporters.
Some history-sheeters were involved in the attack, he added.
CID officials said that along with Srikanth Raju, two more, R Sattaiah and K Venkanna, were also arrested.
In a pre-dawn swoop Cyberabad police barged into the houses of pro- Telangana activists in Kukatpally and took more than 18 persons into custody.
Meanwhile, tension prevailed at the Nizam College Hostel after police picked up a student from Basheerbagh.
“We were going for a cup of tea around 5.30 pm when some persons came in a Maruti van from behind and tried to bundle us into the vehicle.
I managed to escape but they took away my friend,’’ Nagesh, a final- year BA student of Nizam College, said.
Hundreds of students staged a protest on the road opposite their hostel at Basheerbagh. The students relented only after the police pacified them saying that student Shiva Prasad was picked up for his involvement in yesterday’s violence and would be produced in court. BJP legislator G Kishen Reddy visited the hostel and tried to secure the release of the student from police custody.
Later in the night, TRS legislators T Harish Rao and Ravinder Reddy visited the hostel and staged a protest.
They squatted before the hostel gate saying they would not leave the place till the student was released and the police forces were withdrawn.
The TRS leaders relented after the police produced Shiva Prasad before a agistrate.
Cyberabad police swooped down on the houses of pro-Telangana activists suspected to be involved in attacks on private and public property in the Kukatpally area. Activists of TRS, Congress and Telangana Youth Force (TYF) were taken into custody for their alleged involvement in the burning of an RTC bus at Sardar Patel Nagar and three private vehicles at Dhanalakshmi Nagar at midnight. They were whisked away from their homes around 3 am and detained in the police station for the whole day.
–Agencies