Bengaluru: Top leader of the proscribed Communist Party of India (Maoist) in Karnataka B.G. Krishnamurthy has reportedly died in a freak accident in a forest near Sringeri, top Intelligence sources told this newspaper. Krishnamurthy was seriously injured in March this year after an elephant trampled him in the forest, where he was camping. “He has reportedly succumbed to his injuries,” said an official source.
The Naxal leader along with his comrade wife Hosagadde Prabha has been ailing for the last few years and the couple has reportedly been seeking medical treatment in Kerala. Krishnamurthy hails from Bukkadibail village in Sringeri taluk and had succeeded Nelagudi Padmanabha and Saket Rajan, who was the most celebrated Naxal activist in the State in the last decade. He was gunned down at Menasinahadya in 2005.
With the reported death of Krishnamurthy and the arrest of CPI (Maoist) State general secretary Veeramani alias Eashwar in Coimbatore on May 4 along with the top Maoist couple Roopesh and P.A. Shyna from Kerala the Naxal movement in Karnataka is now faced with an acute vacuum in its leadership. “Krishnamurthy and Vikram Gowda are two prominent Naxal leaders in Karnataka.
Vikram is focusing more on Kerala now which is why Veeramani from Dharmapuri in Tamil Nadu had taken over the leadership in South Western region, which includes Karnataka. His arrest and Krishna murthy’s demise is a big blow to the already weakening Naxal movement in the State,” the officer added.
