SLN clubbed, murdered father of seven -MP

[TamilNet, Sunday, 04 March 2001, 22:01 GMT]
The murder of Kandaiah Uthayakumar, father of seven, who was arrested Wednesday 28 February by the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) in Savalakaadu in Mannar should be investigated and the persons responsible should be brought to book, said Mr.Selvam Adaikalanathan, MP for the Vanni, in an appeal sent to the Sri Lankan President Sunday. He told TamilNet that the SLN personnel had surrounded and searched Uthayakumar's house around 9 p.m. Wednesday. They had accused Uthayakumar of smuggling banned commodities to the Vanni and assaulted him in front of his crying children.

The MP said that after questioning and beating him for more than an hour, the SLN personnel had dragged him away. Uthayakumar's children had then heard a shot and their father's scream.

His body was handed over to the Mannar hospital next morning. SLN sailors at the hospital prevented his children from seeing their father's body said when they had rushed there, the MP said.

Uthayakumar's children have no one to look after them now because their mother is in the Vanni, according to Mr. Adaikalanathan . Uthayakumar and his family were displaced from Kodikamam in Jaffna by the war.

Many displaced persons in Mannar have taken to smuggling food, fuel and other essential items to the Vanni because most other avenues for employment or business are closed due to government policy and the ravages of war.

However, Police sources in Mannar said that it was not clear whether Uthayakumar was involved in smuggling to the Vanni or not.

Uthayakumar's children said that one of the SLN sailors who dragged away their father had come back to the house around 3 a.m. in the early hours of Thursday and told them that their father would return home in the morning and that they should prepare a welcome for him.

Preliminary inquiries reveal that Uthayakumar death was due to severe assault, Police sources at the Mannar hospital told Tamilnet Sunday.