Bowing to demand by Maoists that it withdraw cases against 13 prisoners for the freedom of Biju Janata Dal MLA Jhina Hikaka, the Odisha government on Wednesday announced that it was agreeable to do so after expiry of the deadline set by the ultras at 5 pm.
Investigators on Friday told a Delhi court that Mohammad Omar Madni, a suspected terrorist, has disclosed about the links between Pakistan-based terror outfit Lashkar-e-Tayiba and Maoists in Jharkhand.
50 of at least 350 children abducted by the rebels managed to escape, state media said.
Besides weakening the Maoists' lethal capacities and reducing violence, it is essential to ensure that governance is improved, so that those prone to sympathising with, or supporting, the Maoists would, in the long run, realise the needlessness and futility of doing so, says P V Ramana and Raj Bala Rana.
Independence Day was celebrated across states and Union territories on Thursday, as several chief ministers announced job schemes while some others vowed their support for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of a Viksit Bharat by 2047.
The government will use any element of its 'national power' against Maoists under a new policy to deal with the extremists and not hold peace talks with them till they renounce violence and express faith in democracy.
Maoists in Chhattisgarh have invited the state government for peace talks provided a 'conducive and pro-people atmosphere' is created.
Italian tourist Claudio Colangelo, who was released on Sunday after being in Maoist captivity for 11 days, said he became victim of an ongoing tussle between the ultras and the government.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh said that no dialogue should be held with the outlawed Maoists who carried out a deadly attack recently in Chhattisgarh against Congress party leaders.
'Menon's kidnappers are unlikely to behave like the radical Islamists who have a tendency to displease their own people and community. The Maoists are shrewd and will bargain hard, but not behave recklessly. Young Christians are their primary constituency and they bank heavily on them in the jungles.'
Maoist rebels in Nepal reportedly plan to create a 'revolutionary zone' with the help of ultras drawn from Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and West Bengal.
Maoists exploded a series of landmines in the forests of Latehar district and exchanged gunfire with security personnel early on Thursday before the polling began for the Chatra Lok Sabha seat in Jharkhand.
The interrogation of top Maoist leader Kobad Ghandy, who is currently in the custody of Delhi police's Special Cell, has confirmed Nepal's link to the Maoist movement. According to sources, the interrogation of Ghandy has revealed the close ties the Maoist leadership has developed with their powerful counterparts in Nepal. In his statement, Ghandy talks of four visits he made to Nepal along with some other Communist Party of India - Maoist leaders, between 2002 and 2006.
A police officer and a Maoist were killed and two others injured in a gunfight between the security forces and the ultras at Sarenga in Bankura district, the police said on Thursday.A group of armed Maoists shot at and injured local Communist Party of India - Maoist leader Tarashankar Patra late on Wednesday night. On getting the information, police and joint forces rushed to the spot, and a gun-battle ensued.
"There were some women cadre also in the Maoist contingent that attacked the train on Thursday," Additional Director General of Police (ADG), Law and Order S K Bhardwaj told PTI.
Branded a Maoist by the Maharashtra police Arun Ferreira was released on bail on January 5. At his first press conference after his release he spoke about his ordeal and how the State has been muffling the voice of dissent.
Maoists ambushed a joint patrol at Sipkhola area in Mathura Danda village, 450 km west of Kathmandu, said Nepal Television.Six rebels were also killed. \n\n
The Nagpur bench of the Bombay high court on Tuesday refused bail to advocate Surendra Gadling in connection with a 2016 Surjagarh iron ore mine arson case, noting that prima facie the accusations against him are true.
In one of the biggest encounters in the recent times with the Maoists, involving the Andhra Pradesh police and Central paramilitary forces, 10 left-wing ultras were killed while scores of others were injured.
Top Maoist leader Sabyasachi Panda has claimed responsibility for the murder of Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Swami Laxmananda Saraswati and four others, which lead to large scale flare-up in Orissa's Kandhamal district, according to two local television channels.
Maoists blew up a school building at Manjiladih in Jharkhand's Giridih district on Monday night, the police said.
Shocked over the audacious Naxal attack in Chhattisgarh, political parties today favoured use of all legitimate means to "quell" armed insurgency, underlining that they cannot accept the "pernicious Maoist doctrine".
Rubbishing Trinamool Congress's links with Maoists as alleged in West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacherjee's letter to Home Minister P Chidambaram, Mamata Banerjee on Thursday said, "The chief minister himself is a Maoist leader."
Left parties on Monday condemned the brutal Maoist attack in Chhattisgarh saying they disapproved violent retribution against political opponents, but opposed the killings of and atrocities against innocent tribals there.
Anti-Naxal operations will be intensified in the aftermath of the Maoist attack on Congress leaders, the government said on Tuesday but ruled out holding peace talks with the extremists unless they abjure violence.
The clash occurred after Maoists attacked a team of the Royal Nepal Army's Thakurdwara Battalion trying to clear obstructions on the Kohalpur-Chisapani section of the East-West Highway on Sunday.
"You cannot talk peace and kill people. We cannot sit back and watch. We have to maintain law and order. We cannot suck our fingers when the killings go on," Mamata said a day after the Maoists offered to extend their unilateral ceasefire offer by four months if the operation by Joint Forces was kept suspended for the same period.
Maoists on Tuesday morning released seven members of a polling party, who were abducted by them two days ago in Bihar's Jamui district, police said. According to police sources, the seven officials were released by Maoists near Kaukakol area in the district.
Maoists have shot dead two persons, including a village panchayat ward member, two days after abducting them in Odisha's Malkangiri district, police said on Saturday.
After spreading their tentacles to the troubled northeastern state of Manipur around the year 2008 with the help and cooperation from the outlawed People's Liberation Army, Maoists have made further inroads into the region by setting up active cells in different parts of Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.
A 36-year-old suspected woman Maoist, wanted by the Chhattisgarh police, was on Tuesday arrested from a south Delhi locality where she was allegedly hiding, police sources said. Soni Sori, a primary school teacher and an aunt of Lingaram Kodopi who was recently arrested for allegedly acting as a conduit between Maoists and Essar, was apprehended from Katwaria Sarai by a team of Delhi police. "We raided the premises on a tip-off provided by the Chhattisgarh police," said a cop
The Bharatiya Janata Party charged the Congress with attempting to politicise the Maoist attack at Baster in Chhattisgarh that claimed 27 lives, saying it is 'very unfortunate'.
Ghandy, 66 told reporters after the acquittal that he had disassociated himself from the banned outfit of Communist Party of India-Maoist.
The Trinamool Congress on Friday termed Communist Party of India - Marxist leader Sitaram Yechury as the country's 'number one Maoist' and alleged that he has close links with the Maoists in Nepal. "Sitaram Yechury is the man who supports the Maoists and keeps going to Nepal. He should be considered as the number one Maoist in India," TC chief whip in Lok Sabha Sudip Bandopadhyay said, when asked to comment on Yechury's allegation that TC is fomenting violence in Bengal.
