Appa Rao is a Telugu professor at Andhra University.
An assistant professor at Visakhapatnam's prestigious Andhra University has been arrested for allegedly being a supporter of Naxal insurgents in the state.
J Appa Rao, who teaches Telugu, was arrested late last night from his home. His wife says around 1 am, when the couple along with their two children were sleeping, around 10 people came and took him away. The men did not identify themselves, she said.
Students who were part of the protest at Andhra University this morning said Appa Rao is a human rights activist, who, being a tribal, worked closely with people in tribal areas, motivating and supporting tribal youth to pursue education.
Vizag District Police Chief K Praveen said that the professor was under surveillance for several years and they had adequate evidence that he had been supplying explosives to Maoists, sourcing the material from East Godavari.
The police say Mr Rao was a childhood friend of Bala Venkataramana Raju alias Ganesh, Vizag district committee secretary of the CPI (Maoist) party.
Vizag falls under what the Maoists have labelled AOB, the Andhra-Odisha Border, and the district has a history of Maoist militancy, where they perform strikes this side of the border and escape into Odisha.