Maoists blast mobile tower, shoot at cops in weekend violence

In Maoist violence over the weekend, armed insurgents blew up a mobile phone tower control room of a private telecom company in the Malkangiri district of Chhatisgarh, police said. Maoist rebels also opened fire on a police station at Pamed, a remote area in Bijapur district in the tribal Bastar region, on Saturday night, leading to an encounter with the security forces. However, there were no casualties.

More than 30 rebels of the outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist) blew up the control room at Nilakamberu village of Malkangiri using a landmine late Saturday, a senior district police officer said. Located 618km from Bhubaneswar, the district is considered a Maoist stronghold.

In the Pamed incident, Maoists opened indiscriminate fire at the police station at around 9.30 pm, forcing the security personnel to retaliate. Citing preliminary reports, inspector general of police (Bastar) T J Longkumeer said, ''There was intermittent firing from both the sides but there are no reports regarding casualties so far.''

As Pamed police station is located in the middle of dense forests, near the state's border with Andhra Pradesh, sources said the Chhattisgarh police have sought the help of their counterparts from the neighbouring state to rush additional reinforcements to the area. It is suspected that the area could have a heavy presence of cadres of the Maoist military wing, People's Liberation Guerilla Army (PLGA).

The mobile communication network is extremely weak in the area, making it difficult for the police to gather information about the actual situation prevailing in Pamed. However, all police stations around Pamed have been alerted. ''The exact details about the incident will be available only after additional reinforcements reach Pamed from the neighbouring district in Andhra Pradesh,'' police said.

In November 2007, Naxalites had unleashed a major attack, killing 11 security personnel belonging to the Special Armed Force and district police in a powerful blast near Tonguda village under Pamed police station. It then took almost 24 hours for the security personnel to reach the area and recover the bodies of slain security personnel.

Chhattisgarh's 40,000 sq km Bastar region made up of five districts - Dantewada, Bijapur, Bastar, Narayanpur and Kanker. It has been rocked by a series of blasts and gunfights in 2010. In about past three months, the state witnessed killings of 150 people, mostly security personnel.