Mahabubabad District Court Delivers Swift Justice in Chilling Case Involving the Murder of a Journalist’s Nine-Year-Old Son
Manda Sagar, a 26-year-old auto mechanic from Shanigapuram village, was sentenced to death by hanging on Friday by the Mahabubabad District Court for the kidnapping and murder of nine-year-old Kusuma Deekshith Reddy.
The boy, affectionately known as Sunny, was the son of Kusuma Ranjith Reddy, a journalist working for a regional daily.
On October 18, 2022, Sagar lured young Deekshith away from his home in Krishna Colony. Under the pretext of buying oil cans, he took the boy to the isolated hilltop of Danamaiah Gutta near Mahabubabad town. Less than 3 hours after kidnapping him, accused Sagar strangled the innocent child with a T-shirt before setting the body ablaze with petrol. The crime was particularly unsettling because Sagar was no stranger to the Reddy family; he was a friend of the victim’s father.
Sagar knew that Ranjith Reddy had recently purchased a property and saw this as an opportunity for easy money.
Until Sagar’s arrest and subsequent confession, the police believed that Deekshith was still alive and treated it as a kidnap-for-ransom case. According to police timelines, the victim was kidnapped at around 6 p.m. on October 22, 2022. By 9 p.m., his life was tragically cut short.
Justite took 342 days
Following a complaint by Journalist Ranjith Reddy, the police arrested Sagar on October 22, 2022. Superintendent of Police (SP) G Chandramohan explained that Sagar had initially planned to kidnap Deekshith and demand a ransom of Rs 45 lakh from his family. However, fearing that the boy might identify him, Sagar drastically ended the young life.
The police team, led by Circle Inspector S Ravikumar and then DSP Angoth Naresh Kumar, collected robust technical evidence to ensure conviction. They discovered that Sagar had used various communication apps, including Dingtone, to make ransom calls to the family. “Hearty congratulations to the team, including CIs Ravi Kumar and Satish, and SIs Arun Kumar and Venkatachary,” said SP Chandramohan to the media in October 2022.
The Mahabubabad district court recorded 43 witnesses out of 48 before handing down the death penalty. “A great sense of relief that justice is done to the bereaved family,” said DGP Anjani Kumar, adding that the Telangana Police remains committed to securing convictions in all sensational cases.
With inputs from PTI