NIA raids 31 'banned outfit fronts' in AP & Telangana, seizes incriminating docs

Hyderabad: The sleuths of National Investigation Agency (NIA) conducted searches at 31 locations spread across eight districts of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana against 'banned outfit fronts' and seized storage devices, incriminating documents.

Searches were held in Visakhapatnam, Guntur, Prakasam, Srikakulam, Kurnool, Krishna, East Godavari and Kadapa - and four districts of Telangana - Ranga Reddy, Hyderabad, Medchal-Malkajgiri and Medak. This is in a case related to some organisations being a front to activities of the banned organization, CPI(Maoist), in AP.

During the searches, 40 mobile phones, 44 SIM cards, 70 storage devices such as hard disks, micro SD cards and flash cards, 184 CDs/DVDs, 19 pen drives, a tablet, an audio recorder, Rs 10 lakhs in cash from one accused, sickles, axe, machetes besides CPI(Maoist) flags, as well as a huge number of incriminating documents including handwritten letters of CPI(Maoist) party literature, CPI(Maoist) press notes, and so on have been recovered. The police said that investigation in the case is ongoing.

The case was originally registered as FIR No. 47/2020 dated 23 November 2020, at the Munchingput PS, Visakhapatnam (Rural) district and was re-registered by the NIA as RC-1/2021/NIA/HYD on 7 March 2021. The case pertains to the seizure of revolutionary literature of CPI(Maoist), press notes, medicines, wire bundles, and explosives substances from an accused identified as Pangi Naganna. Naganna was intercepted by the police during vehicle checking.

Investigation revealed that Pangi Naganna had been allegedly working as a journalist and was passing information about the police movements to the leaders of CPI(Maoist). He is also said to be involved in instigating the villagers to obstruct combing operations of police and prevent them from entering villages. He is also said to have motivated the villagers to revolt against police parties and hold rallies against the government.

So far, six persons - Pangi Naganna, Anduluri Annapurna, Jangarla Koteswar Rao, Manukonda Srinivasa Rao, Rela Rajeswari and Boppudi Anjamma - have been arrested in the case.