For ‘Naxal list,’ DGP blames Naxals

Pune, March 31 No list of Naxalites was drawn up or made public by the police, said the new Director General of Police AN Roy, referring to controversial “list of Naxalites” allegedly released by the State police, which reportedly bore names of prominent social activists like Baba Adhav, Medha Patkar as well as several NGOs. Roy who was on a routine visit to the city on Monday hinted that it could have been a tactic used by the Naxalites to divert the attention of the police force.

“The police had not drawn up the list in the first place, but the media had splashed the news of the ‘list’. No such list was ever released,” said Roy, who hinted the Naxalites could have intentionally raked up a controversial issue for vested interests.

Roy, who had returned from his trip to Naxalite infested areas like Gondia, Chandrapur and Gadchiroli district, also admitted that the recent incident when two surrendered Maoists from Vidharba decamped with a couple of AK 47 rifles and ammunition from a police sub-divisional office in Vidharba was a “serious offence.”

He said that several things in the State Government’s surrender policy had not been implemented and a meeting with the heads of the concerned departments would soon be held.

Roy also reiterated that the Naxalite problem had been successfully confined to the regions where they first erupted, and not allowed to spread.

Earlier in the morning, Roy had inaugurated an anti-human trafficking nodal training cell as well as the website of the Centre for Police Research in Pashan. “The police are not very sensitised, when it comes to human trafficking cases,” admitted Roy who added that the convergence of resources in the form of co-operation and co-ordination between the police, the civil society as well as NGOs was essential to change the mind sets of the police.

“Often human trafficiking issues assume secondary importance as compared to murders and dacoities. But more attention should be given to trafficking which is more of a social than a purely criminal issue,” said Roy.

He said that upgradation of professional policing skills, checking Naxalism and terrorism and a people-friendly police force would be his priorities. After expressing concern over the rising rate of accidents, he said a committee to check drunken driving would be functional in several regions shortly.