Thaindian News

Raipur, March 22 (IANS) Maoists abducted a deputy ranger-rank forest official from his residence and hacked him to death in Chhattisgarh, police said Tuesday, adding they had begun combing operations to track down the assailants.

Meanwhile, a special police officer was killed by Maoists in Bijapur district’s forested stretch Tuesday.

The killing of the forest official took place Monday night at Gariaband forested area, barely 75 km from here.

“Some 3-4 Maoists reached the house of Madhusudan Patil and, despite opposition from his wife, took him away and killed him by slitting his throat at a culvert, hardly half a km from his house,” Lambodar Patel, Gariaband police station chief, told IANS over phone.

He said Patil tried to run away when Maoists first hit him around the neck but they slit his throat, and he died on the spot.

He added that the brutal killing of the 48-year-old forest official created terror in the area and locals, mostly tribals, preferred to remain indoors in fear of more such killings of civilians by Maoists on charges of spying for local police.

Dozens of policemen combed the Gariaband forested area in a bid to track down the killers, but failed to make even a single arrest.

Meanwhile, police arrested three rebels from Bastar region’s Narayanpur district and seized some documents pertaining to plans to target some sites in the coming weeks.

Officials at police headquarters here say the outlawed Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) has developed a considerable base in forested areas of Raipur district in the past two years.

Ten of Chhattisgarh’s 18 districts are worst-affected by Maoist insurgency and the state’s 40,000 sq km Bastar region, which is the southern tip of the state, is considered the nerve centre of the Maoist activities in India since late 1980s.