The Hindu : Forces redeployed to fight naxalites in West Bengal

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Mar 01, 2004

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Forces redeployed to fight naxalites in West Bengal

By Marcus Dam

KOLKATA, FEB. 29. Para-military forces deployed in north Bengal to combat militants belonging to the Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO) are being sent to the southwestern region of West Bengal to assist police and the Eastern Frontier Rifles (EFR) in operations against naxalites. The relocation comes in the wake of the land-mine explosion that claimed eight lives in west Midnapore last week. Also, a group of ``about 25 known KLO activists has been neutralised'' in the State's northern districts, according to police. The State Government has asked for additional Central forces.

The Peoples' War circulating documents claiming responsibility for the explosion is being viewed by the administration as a show of belligerence.

Speaking to The Hindu from Midnapore on telephone, the Superintendent of Police, west Midnapore, Parveen Kumar, said two companies of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) had arrived from north Bengal to assist police in the combing operations.

In a rare gesture of ``solidarity with the forces deployed in the region'', a delegation of the local constables' wives went to Mr. Kumar's office on Saturday. Denying reports that they were seeking greater security for their spouses, Mr. Kumar said they wanted stricter action against those responsible for the land-mine blast in which two policemen were among the victims.

Over the past five months, there have been four major violent incidents in west Midnapore and Purulia districts, where, according to intelligence reports, hard-core activists of the Peoples' War and Maoist Communist Centre (MCC), from both Jharkhand and Andhra Pradesh, have set up bases. Photographs of secret group meetings of the militants, in the possession of the intelligence agencies, endorses suspicions that militants from outside the State have been participating and addressing these meetings.

The State administration may have been successful in tackling the KLO problem in north, but the developments in the southwest have been a cause for fresh concern. West Bengal has sought greater co-ordination with the neighbouring States to tackle the naxalite problem as arms and explosive devices, such as the one used in last week's incident, are smuggled across the borders.

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