The Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) has busted a major arms dump of the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist) and seized a huge cache of arms, ammunition and explosives from the Chakarbandha forest at Dumaria in Gaya district of Bihar.
The seizures include large number of suitcase IEDs, can bombs weighing up to 40 kg, 25 petrol bombs, 90 kg explosives besides nine kg of ammonium nitrate, detonators, cordex wire, guns, radio sets and 23 hand grenades among others. The security forces also seized three 12 bore guns and other items related to fabrication of explosive devices.
CRPF officials suspect the explosives could have been used against the security forces as the CPI (Maoist) is conducting the Tactical Counter Offensive Campaign (TCOC) against the police and paramilitary agencies during this month but without any “success” so far.
While the recovered can bombs were made of 40, 25, 10 and 2 kg, the suitcase IEDs weighed 20 kg each. In an earlier operation on February 2, the security forces had recovered another dump in the same area.
“A credible intelligence input generated by a CRPF officer led to a recovery of a major haul of arms, explosives and Improved Explosive Devices dumped in the Chakarbandha forest area under Dumaria police station in Gaya district of Bihar on February 17. The operation was jointly conducted by the CRPF and State Police. The dump was found inside a deep cave located amidst dense forest,” the CRPF said in a statement.
Chakarbandha forest which is spread in the Gaya and Aurangabad districts of Bihar touching the fringes of neighbouring Jharkhand was a stronghold of CPI (Maoist) till about two years back. However, the Maoist activities have been effectively checked through the presence of security forces, especially the establishment of CRPF camps in the forest in 2013. The dump is suspected to be owned by the Madhya Zone of Bihar Jharkhand Special Area Committee of the CPI (Maoists).
The sustained offensive by the security forces across the Maoist affected States has in the recent past led to surrender of a large number ultras, including their field commanders have surrendered before the governments. The desperate Maoist leadership is seeking to regain foothold in the areas lost to the security forces by carrying out some major action against the police and paramilitary establishments in such areas.