Maoist Ravi, sixth member of a family killed in gunfight with security forces | India News
HYDERABAD: Maoist central committee member Gajarla Ravi became Wednesday the sixth member of his extended family to be killed in a gunfight with security forces, marking the end of a generational association with insurgency that saw four of patriarch Gajarla Mallaiah’s five sons go underground and two of them fall to bullets, reports U Sudhakarreddy.A senior intelligence official said 56-year-old Ravi, a native of Velishala in Telangana’s Warangal district, was only seven when he started running errands for CPI (Maoist), including putting up propaganda posters in his village. He would go on to pick up the gun, barring a brief period when his brother Saraiah got him to enrol for a course at the Industrial Training Institute in Peddapalli. Ravi and his brothers – inherited their Maoist leanings from their father.Ravi’s brother Saraiah was killed in a gunfight with anti-Maoist forces inside the Kanthanapally forest in Warangal in April 2008. His wife Padma, alias Radha, died in the same operation.Ravi’s wife Nidigonda Prameela, alias Meena, was the divisional committee secretary till her death in an encounter at Andrapalli in 2018.Another brother, Gajarla Ashok alias Aithu, was a district committee secretary of south Bastar. He surrendered in 2015 and now works as a reporter with a local newspaper. His wife, Shanigarapu Uma alias Anitha is a nurse in a private hospital in Hanamkonda.The eldest of the brothers, Gajarla Rajaiah alias Posaiah, died of illness. The only one among the siblings not to have been part of any Maoist denomination is Gajarla Sammaiah, a retired coal worker in Mancherial. Ravi’s brother-in-law Ramesh, alias Naveen, was killed by police commandos in July 2020.
