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States for joint anti-naxal operations

NEW DELHI: A meeting of the Chief Ministers of seven States most affected by naxal violence on Wednesday broadly agreed to a suggestion of Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram for launching effective joint operations by the States to deal with naxal elements in inter-State border areas.

The meeting, presided over by Mr. Chidambaram, was attended by Chief Ministers of Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and West Bengal. All the seven Chief Ministers agreed that the battle against naxalism must be fought on twin fronts of security as well as development.

Among their priorities was employment generation for local youth in the violence-affected areas and construction of roads. Some of the affected States have a dismal record of laying 10 km of road in a year, mainly owing to poor security situation in the area.

The Chief Ministers recognised the need to effectively implement the Scheduled Tribes and other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006. Several States said they had already formed specialised forces to deal with the naxal problem and some were in the process of raising such forces. The Chief Ministers informed the meeting about steps taken to fill up vacancies in State police forces.

The Home Minister drew the attention of the Chief Ministers to the need to train the police in jungle warfare. Responding to the request of some Chief Ministers to train their intelligence personnel, Mr. Chidambaram assured them that an effort would be made to augment the training facilities at the Centre. He was also not against defensive action by village community in the event of an extremist attack.

Some of the Chief Ministers stressed the need to streamline the grievance redressal machinery while others wanted technical support for training their police forces and strengthening intelligence gathering branches.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar favoured a holistic approach in dealing with the problem and said the Centre should desist from adhering to a piecemeal approach.

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