Poor security, intelligence failure led to J’khand blasts

NEW DELHI: The killing of Anup Marandi, son of former Jharkhand chief minister Babulal Marandi, and 17 others during a football match in Giridih on Saturday highlights the lack of ground-level intelligence as much as it does the lapse on part of the police in having left the venue before the leaders and the crowds dispersed.

And as senior CRPF officials admit, the poor intelligence on Left-wing extremists’ designs could largely be due to gross mismanagement of the local anti-Naxalite mobilisation drives like the Salwa Judum or Nagrik Suraksha Samiti.

It works this way: The demarcation of villagers residing in Naxal pockets between sympathisers and anti-Naxalites has not only left the latter prone to being easily identified by the extremists, but it has also dried up vital sources of ground-level intelligence.

With most Salwa Judum activists now uprooted from the natural habitat and settled for almost two years in fortified camps, they have ceased to have any links of lines of communication with the Naxalites and may now be no longer useful in providing inside information on extremist hideouts or movement.