Welfare measure helped police check Maoists activities in Agency areas: official

Seven Maoists were killed; five major exchanges of fire reported

Visakhapatnam Rural SP Attada Babujee addressing a press conference in Visakhapatnam on Monday.

Apart from increasing the presence of security forces in the Maoist-affected areas, welfare measures for the tribal people played a key role in pushing the Maoists to the cut-off area in the Andhra Odisha Border region, said Superintendent of Police, Visakhapatnam district, Attada Babujee.

Addressing the annual press conference here on Monday, he said there were about five major exchanges of fire in the Agency areas, in which seven hardcore Maoists were killed, compared to two in 2018 and 2017.

This apart, about 10 Maoists and 32 militia members were arrested, compared to 19 and 38 in 2018 and 16 and 37 in 2017. About 15 Maoists, including four Area Committee Member rank cadres, and one Divisional Committee Member and 18 militia members had surrendered during the year.

Violence up

On the other hand, the Maoists also had scaled up their violent activities by killing five civilians, after branding them as police informers during the year, compared to three killings in 2018 and two in 2017.

The police also seized huge quantity of arms from dumps and encounter sites in this year compared to the previous two years. The arms seized during this year include 13 weapons, 10 landmines, 33 detonators, 24 kitbags and 215 ammunitions.

Welfare measures

According to Mr. Babujee, welfare measures played a key role this year to wean away the tribal people from joining or supporting the outfits. “In the interior parts of the tribal areas, we organised a number of medical camps that benefited over 14,000 people,” he said.

Skill development courses through various programmes such as Prerana, Cheyutha and Spoorthi were imparted on 3,649 tribal youth.

About 1.8 lakh tribal people benefited from the free bus service provided by the police and 369 farmers were given tractors and seeds under the Rythu Nestam programme.

“We also restored road connectivity in the interiors parts of the Agency areas and 152 villages were connected and over 27,000 tribal people benefited from the awareness camps that were conducted by the police,” said Mr. Babujee.