The Crime Branch of the Andhra Pradesh police has arrested a man in connection with the attack on senior Telugu Desam party leader Dr Nagam Janardhan Reddy at the Osmania University campus on Thursday.
Officials said they arrested Srikant Raju alias Nagaraju on the basis of a closed-circuit television footage and photographs, which showed Nagaraju allegedly assaulting Reddy when the leader had gone to the campus with other TDP leaders to meet the students fasting for Telangana state.
Nagaraju, who hails from Masireddypally village of Nalgonda district, has allegedly admitted his role in the incident in which he and other assailants chased the senior leader and beaten him up with slippers.
Talking to a television channel before his arrest, Raju said he was angered by the reversal of stand of the TDP on Telangana issue.
Nagaraju is allegedly a former Naxalite and former vice sarpanch of his village and has several criminal cases against him, the police said.
The Crime Branch is looking for another assailant, Rajiv Reddy, who is allegedly a lawyer and a Bharatiya Janata Party activist.
Reddy, according to the police, is seen in the video as extending his foot on the way as Reddy was escaping from the mob and thus making Reddy fall on the ground.
The Joint Action Committee of Osmania University Students has denied its links with the attackers and has apologised to Reddy.
The attack on Reddy has become a major political controversy in Andhra Pradesh, as the TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu had blamed Telangana Rashtra Samiti for the incident and refused to join the Telangana Joint Action Committee.
