Bidari, STF men raped women in custody

BANGALORE: Muthulakshmi, widow of slain forest brigand Veerappan, on Friday alleged that while searching for her husband, Karnataka Police Housing Corporation Managing Director Shankar Mahadev Bidari, who was heading the Special Task Force (STF), and his team “raped women” and “administered electric shock on their private parts”.Addressing a news conference here, she termed Bidari an “inhuman person who doesn’t care about women”. Explaining  the “atrocities” committed by Bidari and his team on 400 people who were kept captive for over two years, Muthulakshmi wanted a CBI investigation in this regard.“They raped us and administered electric shocks several times, and when we suffered in pain they laughed. There should be a CBI probe into the STF atrocities,” she said, and added that they were scared to speak about it fearing for their lives.“I was not allowed to speak about all this before the Sadashiva Commission because I was in the Tamil Nadu police custody at that time,” she said.The commission probed STF’s alleged atrocities. “We were kept in the Dimbam and Paminambakan camp for two years and officers like Mosali, DSP Ashok Kumar, Bava and SI Kumaradasa tortured us. It was Kumaradasa who gave us electric shocks. Of the 400 victims, only 15 have been rehabilitated. When we were taken to court by the TN police, we were threatened to speak what they asked us to say,” said Muthulakshmi.TN and Karnataka governments announced each a compensation of Rs 5 crore to the victims. However, Muthulakshmi said the amount had not yet reached the affected women.Lauding the order of the Karnataka HC terming the appointment of Bidari as DGP & IG “null and void”, she said, “It is a really good judgement, and now the CBI should probe into the atrocities committed by the STF when Bidari was its commander.”She said the Karnataka Fact-Finding Committee comprising officials from Andhra Pradesh and TN announced that there was “something suspicious” about Veerappan’s death. “The case is still going on in the Madras HC. My husband was not killed in an encounter. He was administered poison-laced buttermilk. The movie that Bangalore-based director A M R Ramesh is planning is baseless. I have filed a petition in the Madras HC seeking a stay on it, and the court has already given an interim stay,” Muthulakshmi said. She had written a 654-page biography of Veerappan that would be released in Kannada and English soon, she added.Bidari reactsReacting to Muthulakshmi’s claims, Bidari said her accusations were baseless. “We worked tirelessly for the country and to safeguard law. All allegations made by Muthulakshmi are baseless and false. We have not committed any human rights violations,” he said.