Trooper killed in Chhattisgarh Maoist attack

Raipur, June 17 (IANS) A Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) trooper was killed Tuesday and three other troopers were seriously injured in Chhattisgarh’s restive southern region when Maoist guerrillas attacked a combing team, the police said. The incident took place in the afternoon in a remote forested stretch of Kanker district, some 250 km south of the capital Raipur.
“CRPF head constable, Devi Lal, was killed and three other CRPF men were seriously injured when heavily armed leftist radicals attacked with grenades and guns a 48-member -strong combing team of the CRPF and the District Force,” Pawan Deo, deputy inspector general, Kanker, told IANS.
He said the three injured troopers were rushed to Raipur for treatment.
Deo said combing team strongly retaliated the Maoist attack and an hour-long gun battle took place thereafter. CRPF troopers found abandoned shoes and pools of blood at the site that suggests the insurgents too had suffered injuries.
Kanker — along with Bastar, Dantewada, Bijapur and Narayanpur districts that form the about 40,000 sq km vast mineral rich Bastar region — is a Maoist stronghold since 1980.