I am alive, I am alive… don’t leave me here… I tried to cry for help from the rescue team members who, ironically reached the blast site about four hours after the incident,” a shocked ASI Hiralal Pal could barely utter these words while recounting the ghastly incident.
“They presumed me dead and instructed my body to be thrown aside at that time,” Pal admitted on Friday along with seven other victims at Apollo Hospital Ranchi, said. The blast site is just 31 km from Dumka district headquarters.
Sharing horrifying stories of the Maoist attacks in Dumka on Thursday evening, the other victims said that they had to pretend themselves as dead persons in order to save themselves from the bullets of the rebels.
Pal was among several others who could not move out from the spot after being injured by the landmine blast at Asna village in Dumka killing eight people, including five policemen and injuring 12 others in the incident.
Similarly, other policemen, who succeeded in saving their life after the attack, said that they did not get chance even to retaliate, as the rebels already waiting for them to come, started firing as soon as they reached over a culvert near Asana village under Shikaripara police station.
Sharing the horrifying story of the Naxal attack on them, they said that they would not have survived, had they not run away from the spot as the rebels had surrounded them from all sides.
“As soon as we reached near the culvert, the rebels started firing on the patrolling jeep moving ahead of our bus which turned down. The moment we could understand anything, they started firing on our bus and triggered the landmine,” said Constable Ajay Oraon of Garhwa Police, getting treatment at Apollo Hospital in Ranchi.
According to Oraon, although the jawans in the jeep tried to retaliate, they could not get time for that as the rebels were firing indiscriminately on them. Since, they were very few in number as compared to them; it was wise to save lives as most of
the policemen had been killed at the spot. “As I was injured very badly, I sneaked out of the spot and ran away to save my life. After running for over a km, I decided to go towards the CRPF camp located nearby at Rajban,” said Oraon.
Similarly, Constable Prakash Soren, as they had lost most of their men in the blast, said there was no any other option but to run away and save their lives. "As we had lost our balls in the blast, the only option left with us was to run away for saving our life," said Soren. No backup was there for at least 45 minutes after the blast took place, he added.
According to Soren, the rebels took away the arms of the policemen who were crying for help after the blast and took away their arms with them. Those who were seriously injured and could not move, had to remain silent posing themselves as dead, he said.
The injured persons were taken to Ranchi by chopper on Friday and admitted to the Apollo Hospital. Those injured in the blast are - ASI Hira lal Pal, Constables Prakash Soren, Ramesh Marandi, Ajay Oraon, Umesh Tigga, Polling Officer Subodh Oraon and bus driver Niranjan Yadav.
The family members of the deceased however, expressing dissatisfaction over the security arrangements during the polls has blamed it on the administration for the incident. "If the administration can take them safely to the booths, why they did not make proper security arrangement for taking them back if they knew that the polling parties are attacked while they return back after conducting the polls," a family member of a deceased was quoted as saying on Friday.