The Congress on Friday said the central government's claim that demonetisation will end Left wing extremism has been proven wrong, mentioning that there have been 17 major Maoist attacks since November 8, 2016, when the move to scrap high-value currency was announced.
"Yesterday (Thursday), in a cowardly attack carried out at the Jharkhand-Chhattisgarh border (Boodha Pahad), seven brave jawans, including five CRPF personnel, were seriously injured when Naxals carried out not less than 56 landmine blasts," said Congress leader Rajeev Shukla at a press briefing.
"We strongly condemn this incident and pray for our injured soldiers. This is the second major attack in the past week.
"On November 11, in a similar landmine last attack by Naxals, four brave jawans were attacked in Jharkhand's Latehar district."
"Modi government made tall claims that demonetisation will eliminate Naxalism (Maoism). But those claims have evaporated in thin air," he added.
"There have been 17 major Naxal attacks after demonetisation, in which 69 security personnel were martyred and 86 civilians killed," he said.
He also said that terrorists and Maoists have time and again been caught with new currency notes and even fake Rs 2,000 notes.
According to the Home ministry, till April 2017, at least 250 attacks were carried out in Maoist-affected districts of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Bihar, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, said Shukla.
"Will the Home Minister deny this? When will Modi government rise from its deep slumber and take concrete steps to deal with the biggest internal security threat," he asked.
He also said recent media reports suggested that Maoists once again expanding their base in the "Red Corridor".
"Reports from intelligence agencies suggest that this is indeed true and the Naxals are regrouping and looking to expand their presence to areas beyond the so-called 'Red Corridor'," he said, quoting intelligence reports.
"Despite definite inputs from intelligence agencies, the state government and the Central government failed to gauge the serious security implications and this resulted in these two attacks -- first in Latehar and then at Boodha Pahad," he added.
--IANS
sid/him
(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
