A major offensive against Maoists in Bastar is in the offing as Chief Minister Raman Singh signalled taking a tough stand against the daredevil act of rebels which killed 22 people including over a dozen Congress leaders among whom were CGPCC chief Nand Kumar Patel, former MlAs Mahendra Karma and Udai Mudliyar.
Several other former MlAs and Congress workers have also been injured in the biggest ever Maoist attack on a political party’s leaders in the country enacted on Saturday.
Notably, CM Singh rushed to Jagdalpur on Sunday morning to take stock of the situation there. After visiting injured in the Jagdalpur Medical College and Hospital the Dr Raman held a meeting with security officials and instructed to hunt down the Maoists involved in the attack.
Top brasses of State police administration, Investigation Bureau and paramilitary forces engaged in anti insurgency operations in Chhattisgarh. A meeting was also held in State capital Raipur to chalk out strategy to give a befitting reply to the Maoists.
Meanwhile, a massive combing operation has been launched by the paramilitary personnel in the area swarmed by Maoist insurgents on Saturday who attacked a convoy of Congress leaders and workers returning from the Parivartan Yatra from Sukma at Darbha Ghati about 35 kms from Sukma and 45 km away from divisional headquarters at Jagdalpur. According to sources, the troopers first had a stock of the area where a land mine was triggered and later had a closer look at the cars which were attacked by the insurgents.
However, it was still not known how deep in the jungles the troopers would be moving to hunt for the insurgents as the area is close to the Andhra Pradesh border.
The dense jungles in the area where the attack took place posed some problem for the security personnel to look for more bodies due to incessant rains in the morning hours.
Reports reaching here from Sukma also stated that the troopers picked up the used cartridges to find out what type of arms were used by the insurgents in their attack.
Since morning, half a dozen more bodies were shifted from the Darbha Ghati to Jagdalpur for their last rites. The road on the Darbha Ghati still remained closed for normal traffic as a huge crater was formed due to the landmine blast before insurgents opened indiscriminate fire on the vehicles in the Convoy.