Veerappan fights a lone battle with age and asthma

But his latest strike is likely to have another unfortunate fallout as Veerappan comes from the backward Padayachi Gounder community with Tamil origins and Rajkumar is a Kannadiga icon. The fragile relationship between the two ethnic communities will again be pushed to the brink.

However, it appears that the abduction is an act of desperation by the brigand who has been reduced to a virtual loner after his long guerrilla warfare with the state. The terror of the vast rain-shadow region of the Western Ghats, bordering Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, has lost all hardcore members of his gang, including brother Arjunan, in encounters with the police.

Age is also catching up. Veerappan has crossed 60. Since the 1997 abduction and later release of wildlife photographers Krupakar and Senani and after the custody death of brother Arjunan, Veerappan has been maintaining a low profile.

Though he expressed his willingness to surrender through Tamil Nadu journalist Gopal, Karnataka refused to withdraw the 50-odd cases against him. The state has suffered the most at his hands, having lost more than 22 police personnel and four forest officials, apart from another 25 — including gang members, innocent villagers or suspected informers — who got killed in the state.

There are more than 70 offences registered against him in Tamil Nadu. The states sat up only after Veerappan lynched Tamil Nadu forest officer Chidambaram in 1987 and commenced combing operations. Tamil Nadu has been more amenable to Veerappan’s surrender offers.

It is clear that Rajkumar’s kidnapping from his native villager of Gajanur on the Tamil Nadu-Karnataka border is Veerappan’s desperate bid to pressure Karnataka to withdraw the cases against him. He also wants to be allowed to surrender and avoid death at the hands of the Karnataka police as age and asthma make it difficult for him to continue in the forests.

(Kamal Gopinath has reported on Veerappan extensively)