Top cops from Maoist-infested states meet at West Bengal's Purulia

KOLKATA: Top police officials from three Maoist-infested states of West Bengal, Orissa and Jharkhand met at West Bengal's Purulia on Tuesday to strategies joint operations against the red ultras.

This is for the first time that such a high-level police meeting has taken place in Purulia since last November when Maoist military strategist Kishenji's was killed in an encounter in West Bengal.

Purulia is also a part of Jangalmahal which was a Maoist stronghold even a year ago. It is learnt that top police officials from the three states have exchanged information about the Maoist movements in their respective states and explored possibilities of holding simultaneous operations against the outlawed CPI (Maoist) in the three states.

Often the Maoist cadres take shelter in one state after carrying out their operation in another state. The top police officials from the three states also discussed ways and means to check this practice by the red ultras.

It is learnt that four inspector generals (IGs), four deputy inspector generals (DIGs) and nine superintendents of police (SPs) had attended the two hour meeting held at Purulia district police headquarters on Tuesday.

The Inspector generals of Ranchi and Singhbhum in Jharkhand and Baleswar in Orissa were among those heavyweight police officials who had attended the meeting.

Inspector general of police (Western Range) Gangeswar Singh was also there at the meeting. All the three police chiefs of West Midnapore, Purulia and Bankura which comprises Jangalmahal had attended the meeting.