14 Naxals have been gunned down in an encounter with security in Chattisgarh’s Sukma. According to reports, the encounters took place in the Konta and Golapalli police station limits in the early hours of Monday. Apart from 14 Naxals, 1 area committee member (ACM) with a bounty of Rs 5 lakh was arrested along with a female Naxal. Special DG, Anti-Naxal Operations said that they had inputs of about 20-25 people to be in the camp. One more operation is still underway in the interiors of Sukma. 16 weapons have been recovered from the slain Naxals and search operations are still underway. This is the second operation against Naxals this week in Chattisgarh. On August 3, one Naxal was killed and two policemen were reportedly injured near a rural market in Bijapur area.
The policemen were patrolling the market area for protection when 15-20 heavily Naxalites have attacked the policemen. According to reports, On August 1, a COBRA commando was injured in an IED blast that was triggered by the Naxals in the same Bijapur area.
After massive actions by state and central security forces, Left-wing terrorism in Chhattisgarh has been driven almost to its end point. There have been numerous encounter operations against Naxals by CRPF and the state units in the state. The central government has also been pushing infrastructure development in the Naxal affected zones which have not only brought an increasing number of villagers and tribals to the mainstream but also has helped weed out Naxalism from the root.
More and more Naxals have been surrendering seeking protection and a normal life. A holistic developmental agenda with roads, schools, connectivity and accessibility to healthcare in Naxal dominated areas has brought positive results in the state. This year in May, 44 districts were removed from the list of Left Wing Terrorism affected areas.
Chattisgarh CM Raman Singh had recently announced that the Naxals will have only two options, either they will leave extremism and surrender or they will be finished by the security forces. The Home Minister had announced that Chattisgarh will soon get its own specialised anti-Naxal unit ‘Black Panthers’ in the line of the ‘Greyhound’ units of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
