Following the incident, 62-year-old Rajaiah, who was nominated by the Congress as its candidate for the Warangal Lok Sabha be-election slated for Novemer 21, was replaced by former Union Minister Sarve Satyanarayana as the party's candidate.
Former Congress MP Sircilla Rajaiah's daughter-in-law and three grandsons were found charred to death at his residence in Telangana under mysterious circumstances early on Wednesday and hours later the Congress leader, his wife and son were taken into police custody for questioning.
Following the incident, 62-year-old Rajaiah, who was nominated by the Congress as its candidate for the Warangal Lok Sabha be-election slated for Novemer 21, was replaced by former Union Minister Sarve Satyanarayana as the party's candidate. Rajaiah's daughter-in-law S Sarika and three grandsons seven-year-old Abhinav, and twins Ayaan and Shriyaan, aged three, died on the spot due to burn injuries, police said.
Warangal City Police Commissioner G Sudheer Babu said Rajaiah, his wife Madhavi and son Anil Kumar--were among those inside their house when the incident happened on the first floor of the two-storey building at Hanamkonda.
"We have taken them to police station for examination (questioning)...no one has been arrested. After collecting evidence (post-mortem report) and facts, we will take further action," he said.
Senior police officials said the circumstances that led to the incident are not clear yet and they were probing it from all angles, including that of suicide and murder. The four bodies have been shifted to a Government hospital for conducting post-mortem. Anil and his parents live on separate floors of the same house.
Asked if it was suicide or murder, Sudheer Babu said, "It's not that easy to come to a conclusion at this stage immediately. We have a lot of ways to find out, and definitely we will do investigation in a scientific manner. It's clear evidence that the death is due to burn injuries...whether burn injuries caused by themselves or someone else caused it... we have to ascertain it through the scientific way."
Asked if deaths were due to fire mishap, he said, "There is still no clarity. We cannot say any thing now. FSL (Forensic Science Laboratory) experts are looking into it. Once they complete their examination, we can say some thing. We are investigating from all angles".
Earlier, Telangana North Zone Inspector General, V Naveen Chand who visited the spot, said that a gas cylinder was found in the bedroom of Sarika. Her parents were in the process of lodging a complaint and hence Rajaiah and the two others were taken away for questioning. As per the contents of the complaint, a case would be registered, he said.
The cooking cylinder was found in the room with its regulator open, police said.
In April, 2014, a criminal case was filed against Rajaiah, Madhavi, Anil Kumar and another woman, at the Begumpet women's police station in Hyderabad, following a complaint lodged by Sarika, who alleged that her husband and in-laws had been harassing her for dowry.
In her complaint, Sarika, who had quit her job as a software engineer in a multinational company, had also alleged that her husband was having an extra-marital affair. Sarika had then also staged a sit-in protest outside Rajaiah's house over the same matter. Following today's incident, Sarika's mother and sister alleged in their native Nizamabad district that her in-laws "tortured and killed her".
"My sister cannot commit suicide...she was tortured and killed," Sarika's sister alleged.
Rajaiah, a former MP from Warangal, had filed his nomination for the Warangal Lok Sabha bypoll. He withdrew from the contest following directions from the party in view of the incident, a Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee functionary said. Today is the last day for filing of nominations for the byelection, necessitated following the resignation of Kadiyam Srihari after he was made Deputy Chief Minister.
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 "Sircilla Rajaiah")
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