Within a few days, Sundargarh police got a series of success in curbing the activities of the People’s liberation Front of India (PlFI), a splinter group of the Communist Party of India-Maoist
(CPI-Maoist) in the district. Three PlFI cadre, Sumit Khalko, Chaitan Jaipuria and Dharam Bag were arrested by police under Hatibari police limits on Thursday evening for allegedly demanding Rs 5 lakh from Satyanarayan Agarwal, a businessman of Purunapani area. In another incident, four days after the encounter between the police and the PlFI rebels in neighbouring Jharkhand, one member of the extremist group was killed.
In yet another incident, on a tip off about the hideout of some cadre of the outfit, the police, the DVF and the CRPF conducted a joint operation at Dembujharan jungle near Chandiposh under Rajgangpur police station limits in the wee hours of Saturday. In a ferocious encounter of about two hours between the police and the cadre, three members of the outfit were reportedly injured. However, they managed to flee with other members. The police recovered a huge cache of ammunitions, including nine guns, one pistol, 68 rounds 8 mm bullets, six explosives, besides five water bottles, three air bags, one Maoist cap and medicines from the spot. As many as 10 to 12 rebels were in the camp at the time of police raid and the outfit had allegedly killed at least seven civilians in Sundergarh district and were planning to launch major violence in the district, said Sundargarh SP Sanjib Arora. Efforts are on to nab the injured members, he added.