Nine CRPF men killed in Maoists' ambush in Chhattisgarh’s Sukma district

Mine Protection Vehicle carrying 10 CRPF men blown off by triggering an IED

Maoists ambushed a CRPF team in Chhattisgarh’s Sukma district.

Two days after Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh travelled on a motorcycle in the Injeram area of Sukma district and resolved to end the Maoist conflict using development, the outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist) cadres blew up a mine-protected vehicle carrying some Central Reserve Police Force personnel and killed nine of them hardly a few kilometres from Injeram on Tuesday.

The incident took place on the Kistaram-Pelondi road in south Sukma, hardly a few kilometres from the Kistaram police camp.

‘Maoists were wearing CRPF uniforms’

Chhattisgarh police officials on Tuesday claimed that the the CRPF team was out for an area domination exercise when their Mine Protected Vehicle (MPV) was blasted by the Maoists.

According to some sources, the Maoists, who attacked the CoBRA team in the morning, were wearing CRPF uniforms creating confusion for the security forces.

“The incident took place in the core Maoist area where firing happens with or without intelligence inputs. There was an intelligence alert after the Bijapur incident (where the Greyhounds had killed 10 Maoists recently). But this is an area where every day an exchange of fire takes place. There are two camps in that area so our jawans use bikes or MPV vehicles to move from one camp to another. This is a core area where they use black uniform,” said D.M. Awasthi, the Special Director General of Police, Chhattisgarh ANO.

Chhattisgarh CM Raman Singh called an emergency meeting at his residence on Tuesday evening and ordered intensification of operations in the area.

Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh meets the injured.

 

An official statement said an encounter took place between the CRPF’s 208 CoBRA (Commando Battalion for Resolute Action) and the Maoists in south Sukma at around 8 a.m. “Seeing the response of the 208 CoBRA, the Maoists fled. Again at about 12.30 p.m., the Maoists targeted a team of 212 battalion of the CRPF on the Kistaram-Palodi road in Sukma district in which a Mine Protected Vehicle was blown up by triggering an IED (Improvised Explosive Devise),” the statement said.

One of the deceased was an ASI, Ramkrishna Singh Tomar, who hailed from Madhya Pradesh. The others were all constables: Ajay Kumar Yadav from Bihar, Manoranjan Lenka from Odisha, Jitendra Singh from Madhya Pradesh; Shobit Kumar Sharma, Manoj Kumar Singh and Dharmendra Yadav from Uttar Pradesh; Laxman from Rajasthan and H.S. Chandra from Karnataka.

Madan Kumar and Rajesh Kumar, who were injured, were hospitalised in Raipur.

Deeply distressing: Rajnath Singh

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh termed the attack "deeply distressing."

"I bow to each and every security personnel who attained martyrdom while serving the nation," he said.  "My heartfelt condolences to the families of those personnel who lost their lives in Sukma blast. I pray for the speedy recovery of the injured jawans. I spoke to DG @crpfindia regarding the Sukma incident and asked him to leave for Chhattisgarh."

(With inputs from Vijaita Singh)