Mayhem back in Kerala killing fields

Another bloody series of CPM-RSS political assaults and tit-for-tat murders is now threatening to take over Kannur...

Another bloody series of CPM-RSS political assaults and tit-for-tat murders is now threatening to take over Kannur district, Kerala8217;s political killing field. The latest eruption has so far left seven brutally chopped up in just the last 24 hours in Thalassery, Kannur8217;s traditional hotspot8212;one of the victims died by evening on Monday and two more, including a CPM branch secretary, are in a critical state.

Kannur is where the CPM and the RSS had been busy killing and maiming each other8217;s workers for many years. Till a lull came about some five years ago, both sides had killed and permanently crippled hundreds. The peace brokered between the warring sides had remained tenuous, with an occasional hacking or killing continuing.

According to sources, trouble began after nothing more serious than a village altercation on Sunday that happened to involve men belonging to the two sides took on a political colour. Not long after, four motorbike-borne assailants, reportedly belonging to the RSS, pulled up and hacked down a couple of CPM men waiting near the local CPM office at Erinjoli. One of them is in a critical condition.

The police said soon after, a bunch of armed CPM men caught a couple of RSS-BJP men riding a motorbike in the same village and stabbed and seriously wounded them. By morning, the RSS men, the police said, stabbed and hacked down another CPM man, Jessil, only to have CPM workers do the same shortly after to C Shaji, a local RSS worker.

By noon, while the police were rushing reinforcements to the area, RSS men caught a local taxi driver and CPM worker, Sudhir, hacking and stabbing him to death in front of a bunch of schoolkids he was taking to the local school in his car. A few kilometres away in Mahe, another bunch of assailants with hatchets and knives caught up with the local CPM branch secretary Valsan and left him critically wounded.

Senior Police officials said they hoped to make some arrests by Monday night and were moving more of their men from adjacent areas to the affected localities.