It was a bullet which was fired at 22-year-old D. Rakesh, killing him, amid the violent anti-Agnipath protests at the Secunderabad railway station on Friday. The other 13 protesters, who suffered injuries and are undergoing treatment at Gandhi Hospital here, had been hit by pellets.
At a press meet on Sunday, Government Railway Police-Secunderabad SP B. Anuradha was urged to reveal the kind of injury that the sole victim sustained. She said Rakesh had received a “bullet injury”.
A total of 20 rounds were fired during the protests. Of those, she said, one was a bullet and the rest were pellets.
“It was the Railway Protection Force that fired the rounds,” she added.
Explosion averted
The GRP officer also discussed how a massive explosion was averted during the rioting. When the violence unfolded, hundreds of passengers were present at the station, and trains were ready to chug out.
“Loco engines were filled with 3,000 litres of transformer oil and 4,000 litres of HSD oil. When the protesters were setting fire to coaches, they attempted to target the engines too. If the loco engines had caught fire, it could have led to a blast because of the transformer oil. That could have caused great loss of lives and property damage,” she said.
Thee senior officers said that RPF personnel opened fire in air to save lives of passengers, police, and the agitators, and to prevent them from setting fire to the loco engines.
