DD Cameraman Was Killed Unintentionally, Media Not Our Target Says Maoists After Dantewada Attack

Days after Achutyanand Sahu, a Doordarshan Cameraman was killed in an ambush by the Maoists in Chhattisgarh's Dantewada, the ultras have issued a statement on the murder.

In a handwritten note which surfaced on Friday, the Communist Party of India (Maoist) has said that it had no intention to kill Doordarshan News cameraman and that he was caught in the ambush and that they did not intend to ¡®target the media¡¯.

PTI

¡°DD Cameraman Achyutananda Sahu was killed after being caught in the ambush and we had no intention of targeting the media,¡± the statement released by Sainath, Secretary of the Darbha divisional committee of the Maoists read.

In the statement, the Maoists have further asked journalists and officials on election duty to not accompany security personnel.

Naxals release a statement on Dantewada attack, saying 'DD Cameraman Achutyanand Sahu was killed after being caught in the ambush and we had no intention of targeting the media.' pic.twitter.com/bAoEQ8ScaS

¡ª ANI (@ANI) November 2, 2018

The police have hover rejected the clarification and claimed that evidence suggests that the attack was intentional.

"Why was the camera looted? For the first time, while running away, they left two automatic weapons but did not throw a video camera. Why? Because it has recorded evidence of what happened in the first few minutes of targeted media ambush? Multiple bullet wounds and multiple fractures of skull bones sustained by the cameraman in no ways indicates it was by mistake, Naxals saw him shooting posters with a camera for 10 minutes and then ambush started," Dantewada Superintendent of Police (SP) Abhishek Pallav said.

Sahu, along with three police personnel, were killed on October 30 in an ambush in poll-bound Dantewada district, a Maoist hotbed.

Chhattisgarh will go to the polls in two phases, first on November 12 and second November 20. The results will be announced on December 11.