AYUSH ANAND & VAIBHAV CHADHA
Murder of BMS leader CK Ramchandran
Date of attack: July 11, 2016
Place: Payyanur, Kannur district, Kerala
CK Ramachandran was a well-known prominent RSS face in the area. By profession he was an auto-rickshaw driver and a former regional president of Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS). He left behind his wife Rajni (40) and 13 year old twins, daughter named Devangana and son Devdattan, both students of 8th Standard. Ramchandran was the sole bread-earner of the family. His wife Rajni, with tears in her eyes, told our team that around midnight of July 11, 2016, she was sleeping with her children and husband inside the bedroom of the house. Some 50 persons surrounded their house situated at Annur locality of Payyanur and started pelting stones and smashing the door and windows of the house from all sides. At the time of attack, he family got scared and started giving support to the front door, so that it can be saved from being broken down. But because of the heavy pounding and hammering, the door broke down. Then nine to 10 persons entered the hall of the house. They vandalised the house and destroyed the Laxmi-Ganesh idol at the worship place. They were armed with Sword, Iron rods, Axe and other local household weapons.
She said among the attackers, a relative of her husband, Nandan, was leading the mob. According to her, Nandan, the branch secretary of local the CPM unit, was the main conspirator and Ranjit, block level DYFI leader, gave the fatal assault to Ramchandran by slitting his throat by a sword. She added that before killing her husband, Nandan snatched her Mangalsutra and broke it. She pleaded for her husband’s life, but they brushed her aside. When she tried to save him from the sword attack she also got her finger chopped.
They were so well prepared that before the attack, they had blocked the house of his father-in-law Unnikrishnan, which is just three kilometres away, so that no one could come to rescue.
Though it was alleged by the CPM leaders that it was the revenge attack by CPM members after the murder of local CPM associated criminal Dhanraj, but the attack and planning was well-conceived much before that incident. Af ew weeks ago, Ramchandran’s auto-rickshaw had been vandalised by CPM goons and they had also put a wreath on it. It was a local signal of CPM workers to offer flowers to their political rivals before killing him. In this case also they did it much before the Dhanraj incident.
At that time also police were informed about the attack on his auto and wreath-laying, but the police remained inactive and failed to provide him the security. A FIR of this case is registered in the police station of Payyanur, having FIR No. 1192/2016 dated 12/07/2016 with naming two people Nandan and Ranjit as the main accused.
The main reason behind this ghastly murder is that said Ramchandran was prime witness in the murder case of Vinod Kumar (28), an RSS worker, who was killed in the year 2013, in which Sarin Sasi, the then SFI district secretary was an accused. Ramchandran’s wife also alleged that in Vinod’s murder case, Nandan and Ranjit were involved. In this case also, Ramchandran had given the police a statement and was going to appear as a witness in the court in Vinod’s case. Apart from this, Ramchandran was a very good organiser of the BMS in Payyanur area and many CITU workers had joined the BMS under his leadership.
In order to hide these facts, the Chief Minister has declared it as a counter attack to the death of Dhanraj.In our conversation with Circle Inspector, A Rahim told us that there are several hideouts of criminals in the area, so the police were facing difficulty in arresting the culprits in the case. Later on this special investigation team under CI A Rahim arrested P Gireesh (37), son of Vasu Kuttan Master, a resident of Vellur and V Riju, son of Govindan, a resident of Kukanam near Karivellur, both CPM worker in connection with this case on July 22. On July 29, they again arrested two more CPM workers identified as Raneesh K (33) and Prasobh KP (29), residents of Peralam in Karivellur. But still the main accused are yet to be nabbed as per the FIR of the case. (Reported by: The New Indian Express, July 22 and Times of India, July 29)