7 arrested for attacking 'non-locals' in Hyderabad

Seven persons have been arrested for allegedly assaulting 'non-local' students, including some from Tamil Nadu, who had appeared for a written test of a state-run company at Ramachandrapuram area of Hyderabad, police said today.

The students had appeared for a written test for recruitment of technical personnel at Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) on February 14 and were awaiting the results, they said.

Around 50 local job aspirants besides some employees within the BHEL union had held a protest near the BHEL campus on Wednesday last, and later thrashed some non-locals, a senior police official said.

They were fearing that the outsiders may grab their job opportunities, the official said.

"Their (locals') allegation was that the final interview list did not include names of local candidates and only outsiders qualified the tests," Medak district superintendent of police VC Sajjanar told PTI.

Some youths from Visakhapatnam district and non-locals students from Tamil Nadu were among those who were beaten up at the BHEL campus.

However, a complaint was lodged by two Visakhapatnam students with the Ramachandrapuram police yesterday following which seven locals were arrested, he said, adding that more arrests are likely.

The DSP did not rule out the possibility of pro-Telangana activists behind the incident.