Five jawans, two Maoists killed in Chhattisgarh encounter

Five jawans and at least two Maoists have died in an ongoing encounter on Saturday (April 3) between security forces and the rebels in the Bijapur district of Chhattisgarh. Three of the martyred jawans were from the Central Reserve Police Force while two were from the District Reserve Guard (DRG), media reports said.

Sources say Maoists fired upon a joint party of the CRPF and the DRG, following which the encounter started in the Silger forest of Bijapur’s Tarem area. At least two Maoists, including a woman operative, have been gunned down. Firing from both sides is on, sources said.

PTI reported that some security personnel have also been injured.

“The personnel belonging to the CRPF’s elite unit CoBRA (Commando Battalion for Resolute Action), the District Reserve Guard (DRG) and the Special Task Force (STF) were involved in the operation,” Chhattisgarh Director General of Police DM Awasthi told PTI.

On March 23, five DRG personnel were killed when Maoists blew up a bus carrying the security personnel with an IED in Narayanpur district.

Earlier this week, the Indo-Tibetan Border Police arrested three rebels for planting explosives to target security forces in Chhattisgarh’s Sukma district. The rebels are known to use IEDs to target security forces.

In March this year, the rebels killed a zila parishad member in Bijapur district. Barely hours before the incident, the rebels set nearly 11 vehicles on fire in Dhanora area of Kondagaon district.

The crime statistics released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) late last year suggested that Chhattisgarh continues to be the hardest-hit by violence and crime unleashed by Maoists.

As many as 16 new base camps were set up in 2020 across the strategically chosen hypersensitive forested terrain of conflict zone in south Chhattisgarh.

Last year, security forces recovered 40 bodies of the rebels killed in various encounters and arrested as many as 390 Maoists. The forces lost 36 personnel in the gunfight with the rebels.

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