more-in It was an attack carried out by a combined group of militia and armed Communist Party of India (Maoists). Maoists armed with nine AK 47 firearms and two others wielding INSAS (INdian Small Arms System) assault rifles intercepted the convoy of the MLA K. Sarveshwara Rao and an ex-MLA Siveri Soma. The two four-wheelers reached Livitput of Dumbriguda village in Visakhapatnam district of Andhra Pradesh State. Two of them were women Maoists clad in olive-green uniform, sources in Intelligence wing of AP said on Sunday. The group emerged on the road from the roadside trees. “Our information is there were no local villagers in that group. It was a combination of militia and armed Maoists,” AP Additional DGP Harish Kumar Gupta told The Hindu over phone. Even the militia numbering 20 to 30 could be from the adjacent Odisha or Chhattisgarh States, he said. As the Maoists aimed their guns on the vehicles, some of them got closer to the vehicles and seized three firearms — a 9 mm Carbine and two 9 mm pistols — from the three personal security officers accompanying the MLA and the ex-MLA. The gunmen were told that they would be dead if they resisted. They asked the two public representatives to get off the vehicles, took them to a nearby secluded place and shot them dead after grilling them. Intelligence officials, unwilling to be named, said that multiple cautions were given to the MLA. Even three days before the attack, a security advisory was given to Mr. Rao asking him not to move without informing the police. “During such sensitive security situation, we send special teams to check the routes the public representatives travel in advance,” the officials said. However, that security sanitisation was not done on Sunday in case of the MLA.

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