The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Saturday said it has arrested two persons for the CPI (Maoist) attack on security forces, in which six ultras and one civilian were killed near Tiriya village in Chhattisgarh in 2019.
“The duo, including a woman, were nabbed after extensive investigations and search operations, taking the total number of arrests in the Tiriya encounter case (also known as the RK Dairy case) to six,” the NIA said in a statement.
According to NIA investigations, both the arrested accused persons were working closely with top leaders of the CPI (Maoist) to promote and expand the banned outfit’s anti-national activities. Several incriminating materials related to the activities of CPI (Maoist) cadres were earlier seized by the NIA during searches at the premises of the two accused. The arrested accused, identified as Kandula Sirisha alias and Duddu Prabhakar alias Duddu, were working for different frontal organisations of CPI (Maoist), the NIA said.”Kandula, a member of the frontal outfit, was previously active as an armed cadre (Tech. Incharge) of CPI (Maoist).
Both Duddu and Sirisha used to receive funds from CPI (Maoist) and worked for different frontal outfits to spread the Maoist Ideology. Both were frequent visitors to the core Naxal belt in Andhra-Orissa border Special Zone, where they would go to meet Late R.K. aliasAkkiraju Haragopal, CCM of CPI ( Maoist) and leader of the United Front,” the agency said in a statement.
The Tiriya encounter had occurred in July 2019, when a joint team of local District Reserve Guard (DRG), Special Task Force (STF) and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) had travelled to the forest area near Tiriya in police station Nagarnar area of Jagdalpur district in Chhattisgarh after a tip-off. They had received information that a group of Maoist cadres had gathered to conspire about carrying out a big incident on July 28, which is observed as so-called Shaheed Diwas by the Maoists.
After the encounter, the security forces had recovered arms and ammunition, along with incriminating handwritten documents and literature among others from the site, and started investigations in the case.
The case was initially registered as FIR No.179/2019 dated July 28, 2019 under various sections of Arms Act and Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. It was re-registered by NIA on March 18, 2021 in Raipur after the agency took over the case, along with several other cases related to Maoist conspiracy in Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh.