Mangaluru: It took a series of protests, for the cops to arrest the main accused in the Sundar Malekudiya finger chopping case. Soon after the arrest, Dakshina Kannada Superintendent. of Police, Sharanappa, briefed the press on Sunday, during which he revealed that the prime accused and his accomplice were Gopal Gowda and Vasanth Gowda respectively. ASP Bantwal Rahul Kumar Shahapurawad was investigating the case. The police had formed four teams and had already arrested Pushpalatha, wife of Gopal Gowda, while one other accused, Damayanthi is still at large.
The accused had severed the fingers and injured the left arm of Sundar Malekudiya at Kataje in Neriya of Belthangady taluk on July 26. Sundar lost two of his fingers in the attack and his left hand was nearly severed. It is suspected that the accused attacked?Sundar with regard to a dispute over three acres of land, whose right to cultivation had been given to the latter by Forest Department. Following the assault, there was a huge outcry by various organisations and public demanding arrest of the accused and the district administration had directed Social Welfare Department to pay Rs 80,000 as compensation to Sundar Malekudiya under the Prevention of Atrocities against Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Act.
The four police teams split up in different directions. The team led by Belthangady Circle Inspector and Belthangady SI went to Chikkamagaluru, the team led by Bantwal Rural SI went to Hassan, the team led by Sullia Circle Inspector and Poonjalkatte SI went to Bengaluru and the team of Puttur CPI and Puttur rural SI went to Madikeri in search of the accused.
Based on a tip off, the Sullia CPI and Poonjalkatte SI went to Bengaluru on August 20 and later to Puttaparthy in Andhra Pradesh and were successful in nabbing the prime accused Gopal Gowda on Saturday evening. Based on the information given by Gowda, the police arrested Vasanth Gowda, who was working at a resort in Hassan.
As there was a delay in nabbing the accused, the police had also taken legal help by availing warrant from the court and had also planned to attach the properties of the accused if the arrests were delayed by another 10 days, the SP explained. The SP said that Gowda along with three others had severed the fingers of?Sundar with a weed removal machine.
The accused were produced before the court and the police will seek police custody, the SP said.
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