Justice AS Naidu Commission to begin hearing today

Bhubaneswar: Former judge of Odisha High Court justice AS Naidu who has been recently appointed by the state government to probe the killing of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati and the post communal violence in Kandhamal will begin hearing today here.

The judicial proceeding was stalled since past four months following the death of justice Sarat Chandra Mohapatra , the one-man judicial  commission  probing the incident.

Of the 500 affidavits the commission had received, it so far examined 65 government and 101 private witnesses, when justice Mohapatra passed away on May 12, 2012.   

Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati along with his four disciples was killed on August 23, 2008 in Kandhamal leading to a large scale communal violence in which 38 people were killed besides burning of over 4,000 houses.

The state government had set up a judicial commission headed by Justice Mohapatra to probe the matter from September 17, 2008.