Support for Maoist Roopesh pours in on Facebook

Roopesh, the western ghats special zone committee chief of the CPI (Maoist), and his wife Shyna along with three others were arrested three weeks ago in Coimbatore in a joint operation by the Andhra Pradesh and TN police.

The Facebook page pressed the need for treating the arrested Left extremists as political prisoners and also demanded the withdrawal of the Unlawful Activity Prevention Act. It also asks the government to stop hunting Maoists and take action against the Kerala police officers who had threatened to kill the arrested Maoist members in an encounter.

The Facebook page reflected the fear of encounter by the police and the post on the page went on to say, ‘Even if Roopesh had committed some crime, the state cannot eliminate him by encounter killing him.’

Immediately after ‘Q’ branch police team picked up the five from a teashop in Karuvathampatti, near Avinashi, Coimbatore, on May 4, the Naxalites were tense till the shutter of the shop was opened and they were taken out in full view of the public.

Later, at night, they refused to touch the food served to them. Only after the Tamil Nadu police diplomatically conveyed to them that the ‘Q’ branch has no encounter plan, they started eating. “But when a team of officers from Kerala police visited Roopesh and his wife when they were in ‘Q’ branch custody, the exchange was not very pleasant. This could have led Roopesh and his associates, who face as many as 23 cases in Kerala, to believe that the police from his home state could finish them off,” the sources said.