A day after 14 CRPF men were massacred by Naxals in Chhattisgarh, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh termed Naxalism “a challenge to the nation” and vowed on Tuesday that his Government would overcome it as “the nation is united in fight against the left-wing militancy”.
“We are working on a strategy to deal with Naxals; soon it would start producing results,’’ Singh told reporters in Raipur. The Minister ducked a question whether Army needs to be put in red zone to eliminate Naxals.
He spent the entire day in Chhattisgarh to boost the morale of paramilitary jawans and chaired a meeting at Raj Bhawan along with Chief Minister Raman Singh to assess what went wrong in the jungle of Sukma when Naxals opened indiscriminate fire on a CRPF combing team by using local men and women tribals as human shield.
Sources said that CRPF officers acknowledged that Naxals surprised the paramilitary by using human shield which was a planned move to blunt a full-blown retaliation by jawans. Reports received from Chhattisgarh’s red zone confirmed that Naxals walked away with several AK-series rifles, about 450 rounds of ammunition, and four bulletproof vests belonging to deceased CRPF troopers.
Singh looked emotionally shaken when he paid his last respects to 14 cops on outskirts of Raipur in afternoon before bodies were being flown to their native villages. He also met CRPF jawans at a private hospital in Raipur where they were airlifted by two IAF choppers Mi-17 from Sukma as most of them had been hit by multiple bullet shots.
He reiterated that the Centre would team up with State Governments to deal with Naxalism and announced the next of kin of each of the 14 CRPF jawans killed by Naxals in Sukma district will be paid Rs38 lakh and every injured will get Rs65,000.