‘Was inspired by sister to pursue military dream’
HYDERABAD: We wanted to see him as an army officer, but he fell to the bullets of our own police, said the father of 21-yearold Damodar Rakesh, who was killed on Friday after the Telangana Police opened fire as agitations against the new military recruitment policy, Agnipath, escalated into large-scale violence and arson at Secunderabad railway station.
The incident took place at around 9 am on Friday, when around 500 protesters gathered at the Secunderabad station, apparently mobilised through messages on social media and attacked three passenger trains, burning down bogies, blocking railway tracks and breaking property. In videos that have gone viral, protesters could be seen wielding long sticks and smashing signboards, fans and electronic display boards, as well as stalled trains and shops and establishments.
To disperse the mob, the police fired 15 rounds, injuring around 12 people. One of the bullets hit Rakesh in the chest and he was declared dead in Secunderabad’s Gandhi Hospital.
“The general railway police (GRP) forces were forced to open fire at the angry mob, only after lathi-charge and lobbing of tear gas shells failed to bring the protests under control,” a senior police official said.
Rakesh, a resident of the Dabeerpet village of Khanapur block in Warangal district, had passed all the tests required for recruitment to the army, including the physical fitness examination held three years ago. He was waiting to take the written test in 2020 but was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
“He always dreamt of joining the Indian army and serving the nation like his elder sister, Sangeetha, who is serving in the Border Security Force,” Rakesh’s father, Kumaraswamy, said. “When he came to know that the written test has been cancelled and the authorities are planning to recruit youth temporarily through the Agnipath scheme, he got agitated. Last evening (Thursday), he told us that he was going to Hyderabad as he had some work in the Army Recruitment Office at Trimulgherry in Secunderabad,” he added.
Around 10 am on Friday, the family received a call from the police that Rakesh had sustained injuries in the Secunderabad violence. “Some police officials came to our house and took me, my wife Poolamma and sister Vanamma in a jeep, saying that we would be taken to Hyderabad. But they took us from place to place within the district and when we threatened to jump from the moving jeep, they dropped us back at our place in the evening and informed us that our son died in police firing,” said Kumaraswamy.
Rakesh, who completed his graduation last year in Narsampet town, is survived by his elder brother, who is a farmer and was left differently abled after an accident; and two sisters – one posted as a BSF officer in West Bengal and the other is a homemaker. “We wanted to see him as an army officer. We would have felt proud had he died in a war against the enemy. But he fell to the bullets of our own police,” Kumaraswamy said.