Hyderabad : The ailing mother of Maoist leader Kishanji broke down and collapsed in Andhra Pradesh’s Karimnagar district after learning that her son had been killed in West Bengal.
Family members said Madhuramma was inconsolable as she had not seen her son Mallojula Koteswara Rao alias Kishenji since he went underground while he was a student at Osmania University.
It was in 1974 that he joined the Radical Students Union. Four years later, he went into hiding.
The family had not seen him for over three decades. But it has asked the West Bengal government to hand over his body for the last rites.
Relatives and friends rushed to the slain leader’s house Thursday night.
“Our request to the government is hand over his body to us so that we can see him for the last time and perform the last rites according to our traditions,” said Kishenji’s elder brother Anjaneyulu.
Revolutionary poet P. Varvara Rao, who too broke down on learning about the death, recalled that Kishenji joined the movement at a young age as he wanted to fight for the rights of the oppressed.
Born Oct 10, 1953 in a Brahmin family, Kishenji’s organisational skills impressed People’s War Group (PWG) founder Kondapalli Seetaramayya and he picked him for the PWG state secretary post.
A master strategist, Kishenji was believed to be the mastermind behind Seetaramayya’s dramatic escape from Osmania Hospital in Hyderabad in 1984.
In 1986, on the direction of the party, he moved to Chhattisgarh. He played a key role in the merger of PWG and the Maoist Communist Centre to form the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist).
He rose to become the politburo member of the CPI-Maoist and headed the outfit in West Bengal. He was the third in the party hierarchy and carried a reward of Rs.19 lakh on his head.
His younger brother Venugopala Rao is a central committee member of the party and is believed to be active in the Andhra-Orissa border area.
IANS
