7 bodies found in Vontimitta tank

Kadapa: In a sensational incident, seven unidentified bodies were found in a tank in Vontimitta mandal on Kadapa-Tirupati road on Sunday. The incident came in to the light around 1.30 pm with the locals who noticed the floating bodies alerted the police, who fished five bodies by the evening. Police said that the deceased were not the locals or from nearby surrounding villages.

Based on looks, dress(dhoti and shirt), some tools recovered along with the bodies, police speculate that the dead might be woodcutters from Tamil Nadu state.

Additional superintend of police and Officer-On-Special Duty (OSD) Nayeem, who visited the spot, told the media that police had rushed to the tank in Vontimitta following the information from the locals that seven bodies were found floating in water. He said five bodies were recovered thus far and search was on for the remaining two bodies.

However, refusing to confirm that the deceased were the woodcutters,the OSD said that they were considering them as of now as unidentified bodies since no one had claimed them so far.

“We have received the information from the locals around 1 pm Sunday and rushed to the spot along with fire department officials and recovered five bodies. Enquiry is going on into the incident,” he said. Nayeem said combing operations for red sanders smugglers and woodcutters was a routine activity carried out by police to prevent smuggling.

Meanwhile, according to the highly confidential sources, police had chased 39 wood cutters on the night of February 16 (Friday) after intercepting a lorry illegally transporting red sanders from Lankamalleswara forest.

It is learnt that they could nab most of them but some of them ran away towards Vontimitta tank in their bid to escape. It is suspected that they might have jumped into the tank and drowned. But police are tight-lipped on the identity of the victims, saying they can divulge details only after investigation.