Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Maoist sharp-shooters enter WB

KOLKATA:With panchayat polls round the corner in West Bengal, the state police anticipate a major bloodbath in certain pockets in coming days. However, the terror threat this time is more from external elements than internal goons, as five most-wanted Maoist sharp-shooters are believed to have sneaked into West Bengal from neighbouring Jharkhand and Bihar with the sole intention of creating panic during the polls.

The Left Wing Extremism Section (LWES), under the Intelligence Branch (IB) of the state police, has recently secured several incriminating documents which confirm the entry of these five sharp-shooters.

LWES officials stumbled into this evidence during a recent raid in Nadia district, where they also secured a fresh Maoist hit-list containing names of several senior CPI(M) leaders. During the raid, senior Maoist leader and a central committee member of Communist Party of India (Maoist), popularly known as comrade Prasenjit, was also arrested along with six other most-wanted guerrillas.

Interrogations of those arrested confirmed the entry of sharp-shooters from Bihar and Jharkhand to create panic during the panchayat polls. IB special superintendent A Kumar confirmed the arrest and interrogation of Maoists by LWES sleuths. It is learnt that during the raid, sophisticated weapons like SLR rifles, light machine guns, mortars and landmines were recovered.

Meanwhile, IB sources told DNA that the team of shooters is probably headed by a most-wanted category Maoist guerrilla and a high-level CPI(Maoist) central committee leader comrade Dhrub.

A BSc graduate and fluent in the many languages, Dhrub was trained in Chattisgarh. His rise within the party has been meteoric, mainly because of his skills in handling sophisticated arms, as well as in organising armed movements even in the most adverse conditions.

As per preliminary information with LWES, the intention of the Maoists visitors is not to add to the fire power of their comrades in their existing stronghold districts of Bankura, Puruliya and West Midnapore.

“A careful study of the documents seized by our experts have revealed Dhrub and his men’s main intention is to create panic in new areas. “According to information available with us they have identified Malda, Murshidabad and Nadia as their new target areas,” a senior IB official told DNA. He also said that the police in these three districts have been specially alerted. “Nadia and Murshidabad, being Indo-Bangladesh bordering districts, the BSF battalions posted there have also been alerted to foil any attempts by Maoist guerrillas to cross over to Bangladesh,” he said.


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