In an encounter that took place early Sunday morning, two Naxals were killed and six were injured by Maharashtra police in Gadchiroli district’s Gyarapatti village.
The gun-battle took place in Narkasa forest area, located around 170 km from Nagpur, when commandos of C-60, a specialised anti-Naxal unit of Maharashtra police, were combing the area.
The operation was initiated after specific intelligence inputs were received by the security forces regarding the hideout of Naxal Bhaskar. Bhaskar is one of the masterminds of May 1 attack on police personnel. Police suspect that Bhaskar is injured in the operation. In April, the police force had killed his wife. The search is still on inside a forest of Gadchiroli.
On specific information, the security men went to the forest area and were conducting an anti-Naxal operation when the exchange of fire took place between the two sides, the police spokesperson said.
“Two Naxals were killed in the skirmish,” he said, adding that the deceased were yet to be identified. A large number of daily use items and automatic rifles were recovered from the spot, he said.
Sunday’s encounter comes after at least six Naxals were killed in three separate encounters with the police in Chhattisgarh’s Bastar region on Friday night and Saturday. The encounters took place in Sukma, Bijapur and Dantewada districts. Three rebels were killed in Sukma district on Saturday evening.
The gun-battle took place around 6pm in a forest near Tadmetla-Mukram nullah under Chintalnar police station area when a team of police’s District Reserve Guard (DRG) was out on patrol, Deputy Inspector General Sundarraj P told PTI.