Bhubaneswar: The arrested Maoist leader Sabyasachi Panda's mother Krishna Devi on Wednesday claimed that her son was in no way linked to the assassination of the VHP leader Swamy Laxamananda Saraswati.
Krishna Devi made this statement while deposing before the Justice AS Naidu Commission of Inquiry, which is probing the murder of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati on August 23, 2008 night and the subsequent riots in Kandhamal district.
"I know my son very well. The man who gave the interview after killing of Saraswati is not my son. The government is trying to frame him," Krishna Devi told the Commission when asked to identify the man on the TV screen.
Sabyasachi's wife Subhashree Panda alias Milli Panda is scheduled to depose before the Commission tomorrow.
Panda, who was the state secretary of the outlawed CPI (Maoist) at the time of Saraswati's murder, had told a select group of journalists in an interview a few days after the incident that his outfit had killed Saraswati.
The state government had set up the Inquiry Commission to probe different angles in the killing of Saraswati and the subsequent ethno-communal violence where 38 people were killed and several houses and churches burnt.
Panda was arrested from a rented house in Berhampur on July 17 2014 and has been charged with the murders of 25 security personnel and 34 civilians, including Laxmananand Saraswati.
