Accidental firing kills 2 AP schoolboys
In a bizarre accident, two schoolboys were killed and three others seriously injured when a police constable, while demonstrating his loaded carbine to the students, fired the weapon by mistake on Wednesday.
Police sources said that a single accidentally-fired shot from a carbine pierced all four students. The two boys of the zilla parishat high school at Velairpadu who died were Class 10 student M. Venkatakrishna, 15, and Class 8 student P. Sai Babu, 13. The injured students are Navin Kumar, 12, P. Kishore, 11, and G. Naga Raju, 14. Venkatakrishna died immediately as he was shot through the heart and Sai Babu, shot in the stomach, died on the way to the hospital. While Navin Kumar was injured in the face, Kishore and Naga Raju suffered injuries on the leg.
The incident took place on Wednesday afternoon while weapons were being shown to the students during an open house organised by the police on the occasion of Police Martyrs Week. The aim of the “open house” programme was to educate school students about the duties and responsibilities of the police.
The director general of police, Mr K. Aravinda Rao, said that a criminal case had been booked against the police constable, APSP Sixth battalion’s M. Srinivas, for his negligence and over enthusiastic act that lead to the incident. Disciplinary action has also been initiated against Srinivas.
Mr Rao said that the constable, who was guarding the police station, was not supposed to display the loaded weapon to the students.
“It is a very unfortunate and bad incident. The overenthusiasm of the constable has lead to this. As it is a Maoist-affected area, the weapons are always loaded as at any time they may be attacked. It is sheer stupidity on the part of the constable to display the weapon. It was his own bad luck too,” said Mr Rao. The police station is situated in a Maoist-infested area.
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