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Nagappa goes into hiding

Fakir Chand in Bangalore

Nagappa Maradagi, the 35-year-old film associate of Kannada film icon Dr Rajakumar, who made headlines after his escape from the hideout of forest brigand Veerappan last week, has gone into hiding 48 hours after reaching Bangalore on Friday afternoon.

Even as the hostage crisis entered its 64th day on Monday, only top police officials are aware of his whereabouts.

The police explained that they wanted to keep away hordes of press corps, including the electronic media, hounding him for one-to-one interviews, sound bytes and for details of his great escape from the outlaw's lair, leaving Rajakumar and two other hostages behind.

Like his guru, Nagappa lives in a suburb of Bangalore with his wife and a daughter. Security had been tightened there since Friday, with a couple of armed constables posted to keep away curious crowds as well as frenzied fans of Rajakumar, enraged over his misadventure, which has complicated the hostage crisis.

Sensing a law and order problem, the police whisked away Nagappa from Mallya hospital on Saturday, after a thorough check-up and treatment for injuries sustained during his escape. When Nagappa's anxious parents reached his home from Dharwad, there were no signs of their son or his family, with the house locked.

The police warned the assistant director against going home at Devaiah Park in the northern part of the city. Instead, he was taken to a relative's house at Dasarahalli on Mysore road.

Neigbhours were surprised at the security drill and the unusual presence of police forces as Nagappa became a household name only after his dramatic abduction along with Rajakumar by Veerappan from Gajanur on the night of July 30.

With government emissary R Raja Gopal returning to Madras during the week-end from his fourth failed mission to the jungles, and blaming Nagappa for messing up Rajakumar's release, the state government decided to keep him away from the media glare even as the police contradicted some of his reports.

"We don't want Nagappa to complicate issues by telling different things every time. The situation is delicate, though not tense. His tale of encountering a bear on the way back from the forest, or having attacked Veerappan before taking to his heels from his hideout appears to be a concoction as Gopal's version contradicts it," said a police official, part of an intelligence team that recorded Nagappa's version of his escape and other details regarding the fugitive.

The police do not seem convinced of Nagappa's description, much less his details as he is still in a state of shock and sounded incoherent during the 'debriefing'.

State Director General of Police C Dinakar told the media that "the movements and places of Veerappan's hideout as described by Nagappa were not even worth mentioning."

The Rajakumar Abduction: complete coverage
The saga of Veerappan

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