BSF top guns review situation along Odisha border with AP, Chhattisgarh

Odisha Sun Times Bureau

Malkangiri, July 24:

BSF Additional Director General B D Sharma and IG A K Sharma, accompanied by senior officers of the central para military force, today visited Malkangiri, the Odisha district worst affected by Maoism, and reviewed problems associated with Left Wing Extremism in the district and anti-Maoist operations in the backdrop of the arrest of top Maoist leader Sabyasachi Panda.

ADG BD Sharma and IG AK Sharma, who arrived at the MV 3 camp of the BSF by a special helicopter, discussed and reviewed Maoist activities and anti-Maoist operations in the remote bordering district with Malkangiri SP, SDPO Malkangiri, Commandant BSF and several other senior officers.

Sources said the closed door meeting focused, among other things, on a special strategy to deal with situations arising out of any possible untoward incident unleashed by the Andhra Odisha Special Zonal Committee of the outlawed CPI (Maoist) and Maoist groups from bordering Chhattisgarh in the backdrop of the arrest of Maoist leader Sabyasachi Panda.

The meeting decided to intensify patrolling by BSF along the district’s border with Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh to keep a check on infiltration of Maoists from these states apart from issuing high alert in these areas, sources added.

ADG Sharma told reporters that despite intelligence inputs of Maoists from Andhra and Chhattisgarh trying to take shelter in Malkangiri district, the ultras had not been able to mount any operation due to incessant rains.

SDPO Malkangiri Pinaki Mishra told reporters that arrested Maoist leader Sabyasachi Panda’s Odisha Maobadi Party had no activities in Malkangiri district and there was no possibility of his men creating any violence or entering into the district.