Strategy shocks officials
In a broad daylight attack, armed Naxalites struck at a police station in West Midnapore district and killed one police officer and kidnapped two others before they went back to the jungle bordering Orissa. The Naxalites looted guns from the police station and cash from a nearby bank. Immediately after that, Koteswar Rao alias Kishenji, a top Naxalite leader, owned up the act and claimed that it was done to retaliate the joint police operation in the three states (Chhattisgarh, Orissa and Jharkhand) and the ongoing operation in West Bengal which started in June and still continuing.
The attack took place at Sankrail police station, which is 40-45 km away from the district headquarters and near the Orissa border. The Naxalites, according to eyewitness accounts, were 45-50 in number, and they came on motorbikes. They were dressed in olive green uniform and armed with rifles and other firearms. Immediately after approaching the police station, half of them encircled it from outside and kept a watch while others entered the police station.
According to the chief secretary, Ashok Mohan Chakrabarty, there are 42 policemen in the police station. Although how many of them were present at the time of attack could not be ascertained till now. After entering the police station, the Naxalites opened fire on the policemen. The second officer, Dibakar Bhattacharjee, was killed on the spot while some other policemen were injured. Thereafter, the Naxalites looted some firearms from the police station and left the place. They also took the OC, Atindranath Dutta, and ASI Swapan Roy as hostages with them. Before leaving the area, the Naxalites entered into a nearby branch of the State Bank of India and looted around Rs 10 lakh from the bank’s vault. Later Kishenji issued a statement through news channels that the state police DG and other senior police officials should not venture into that area today if they wanted their kidnapped policemen back alive.
In his impromptu telephonic interview with the news channels, Kishenji justified the attack by holding the Centre and the state government responsible.
He said, the Prime Minister, Sonia Gandhi, P Chidambaram, chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and other senior officials of the state were to be held responsible for any escalation of violence. Also, he blamed Mamata Banerjee and her party’s six Central ministers for the ongoing police operation against them.
More From This Section
He demanded that the Centre must abandon the ‘Operation Green Hunt’ which is about to start in the three states against them. It seems that because of the heavy presence of Central forces in these states as a build-up to the operation, the Naxalites could not strike back at them in those areas. Instead, they selected one police station in West Bengal which is not even the area where the joint police forces were conducting their operation. In fact,
Sankrail is far away from Lalgarh. Clearly, the Naxalites followed the basic tactics of the guerrilla warfares: attack the enemy at its weakest links. The Naxalites tried to rouse the policemen against the state by saying that there were not their targets. According to Kishenji, the kith and kin of the policemen should put pressure on senior policemen to stop the operation against them. He admitted that the attack was initiated by a squad from neighboring Orissa and the local squads took part in it.
Before leaving the area, the Naxalites planted some landmines on NH6 which remained closed after that. Shocked by the attack, police could not react immediately. So, no bomb squad could be sent to the spot even after four hours. The DG of West Bengal police, Anup Vora, was in the district headquarters but no reinforcement could be sent to the Sankrail police station fearing for the lives of the abducted police officers. The chief minister, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, expressed concerns and held several round of meetings with senior police officers.