4 Maoists held in Orissa; arms, explosives seized

CRPF, Special Operations Group undertake combing operations in forests

Four Maoists were arrested and a substantial amount of explosives and arms seized from them by security forces in separate operations in two districts of Orissa on Sunday, official sources said.

While two were picked up from Pallapadu forest of Gajapati district, the others were nabbed from the Tekguda jungles in Malkangiri during joint combing operations by the CRPF and the state's elite anti-naxal Special Operations Group.

Twenty-five detonators, huge quantities of fuse wire, starters and a single barrel rifle were seized from the rebels arrested in Gajapati, Superintendent of Police Sanjeev Arora said.

The rebels were identified as Manas Majhi alias Laden (30) and Giffio Pradhan alias Gullu of Adaba area in Gajapati, he said, adding Majhi was wanted in cases of torching of buses and blasting of mobile phone towers.

Pradhan was engaged in collecting and passing on information and providing logistic support for Maoists.

In Malkangiri, CRPF and SOG personnel raided the forests in Kalimela area, where the Maoists had set up a camp. Though most of them fled, two were caught, inspector-in-charge of Malkangiri police station R.K. Patil said.

The two nabbed Maoists were identified as Bandi Sodi (28) and Deba Madkami (25) of Tekguda village.

Bandi had joined as a cadre about four years ago and allegedly confessed to being involved in an attack on CRPF personnel and incident of booth-capturing during the last elections at Tekguda and Bejengeguda.