Maoists free run in Lalgarh continues

MIDNAPORE: Maoists shot dead two CPM leaders and issued posters threatening to kill six other Marxist leaders in West Midnapore district as violence continued unabated in strife-torn Lalgrah, despite over a month-old operation by joint security forces.

Nirmal Mahato, CPM branch committee secretary of Amdanga, was shot dead by Maoists, claiming he was killed for exploiting poor villagers, police said. Maoists then blocked the Amdanga-Lalgarh road felling boulders preventing security forces from raiding the area.

The attack came barely 10 hours after Maoists gunned down CPM local leader Kalipada Singh at Chirugora village last night. A gang of 15 Maoist cadre stormed into Singh’s house and killed him on the spot for alleged corrupt practices. Maoists declared that Singh, convenor of CPM-backed Police Santras Pratirodh Committee, was ‘given death sentence’ in their ‘kangaroo court’ recently, the police said.

In another development, panic spread as posters (supposedly put by Maoist rebels) came up in Goaltore, Midnapore Sadar, Salboni and Jhargram warning six CPM leaders, including CPM zonal committee secretary of Jhargram Rabi Sarkar, of ‘justice’ at the kangaroo court very soon.

A large posse of security forces comprising central paramilitary troopers and West Bengal state police personnel , deployed for the last six weeks to flush out the rebels from the area, combed Amdanga and adjoining villages and detained Anil Mahato — brother of the agitating tribal body People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCAPA) leader Chhatradhar Mahato — and five school students.

Despite the state government launching the massive security operation June 18 to free the area from Maoist guerrillas, killings of CPM leaders have been going on unabated. The rebels have also abducted four policemen in the past one week. TOI