Tovino Thomas leads voter turnout as Kerala polls heat up
Actor Tovino Thomas casts his vote in Thrissur as Kerala records impressive voter turnout. Key constituencies see fierce electoral battles in the second phase of Lok Sabha elections.
Four members of the Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI) were arrested in connection with the brutal killing of a member of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) in Kannur in Kerala.
All four had fled to Wayanad after allegedly committing the crime.
The arrests came a day after Shyam Prasad was hacked to death in Kommeri while on his way home to Koothuparamba on his motorcycle in the evening. A gang accosted him in a car. The around 24-year-old Prasad was brutally hacked as he tried to escape the attackers.
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Though locals rushed him to the government hospital at Koothuparamba, he died on the way. Prasad was a student of the Kakkayangad ITI.
The ABVP has accused the Popular Front of India (PFI) for the murder. (The SDPI is the political wing of the PFI.) The BJP has called for a 12-hour hartal on Saturday. Only vehicles have been exempted from the hartal.
Calling for a ban on the outfit, ABVP state secretary Shyam Raj said that the murder has exposed the “terror” face of the PFI.
Kannur has been the hotbed of political violence in Kerala. The city boasts of a dubious statistic of killing of members of both the BJP-RSS and the CPI(M), which is in power in Kerala.
According to NDTV, at least 45 CPI(M) activists and 44 BJP activists have been killed in the district since 2000.
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