Suspected Peoples Liberation Front of India (PLFI) rebels torched at least 10 vehicles of a private road construction company at Ramgarh district’s Dulmi area under Rajrappa police station in the wee hours of Sunday.

Locals told the police that around 15 bike-borne rebels from the splinter outfit entered the road construction company, Classic Engicom’s camp office and set the vehicles ablaze. The rebels, they said, also fired five rounds in the air after gutting the vehicles to ashes. Later, the police recovered three cartridges from the spot.

The incident may have been executed in retaliation to the company’s refusal to pay levy demanded by the Left Wing Extremist (LWE) group, police said.

While locals claimed that the owners of the company were related to the local legislator Chandra Prakash Choudhary, police refused to comment on this matter.

“Although no organisation has claimed responsibility for the incident, we suspect that PLFI may have planned and executed the late night attack. Luckily, no lives were lost and no casualties were reported,” said Ramgarh Superintendent of Police, Nidhi Dwivedi.

The police have launched a manhunt to nab the perpetrators, she added.

PLFI is one of the 17 splinter groups active in Jharkhand, where 18 of 24 districts are left wing extremism-affected. The splinter group split from the main CPI (Maoist) organisation and formed their own gang with different ideologies and purposes. The police, however, claim that a majority of the splinter outfits are hired guns and thugs who have unleashed a reign of terror on innocent villagers.

PLFI chief Dinesh Gope had quit the Indian Army in 2003 and formed the Jharkhand Liberation Tigers (JLT) in the same year. It was later renamed PLFI. The organisation has its roots in Khunti and has been responsible for several incidents of attacks on the security forces and private firms in the past.

The vehicles torched on Sunday included four Hyva, two graders and two JCB machines, police said. The attack may have cost the company somewhere close to Rs 1 crore, sources said.