Chidambaram visits CRPF HQ, poses tough questions to top brass

Home Minister P Chidambaram on Thursday visited the CRPF headquarters and posed some tough questions to top officials of the force over the Dantewada incident in which 76 security personnel were butchered at the hands of Naxals.

Home Minister P Chidambaram on Thursday visited the CRPF headquarters and posed some tough questions to top officials of the force over the Dantewada incident in which 76 security personnel were butchered at the hands of Naxals.

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Official sources said the Minister, who spent over two hours at the CGO Complex office, held a close door meeting with CRPF Director General Vikram Srivastava and other top officers in which a presentation was made before the Minister.

The sources said Chidambaram was peeved about certain drawbacks he encountered during his visit to Dantewada after the deadly ambush earlier this month.

Among some of the issues understood to have been raised by Chidambaram was the deployment of senior officers in the field and about the operational details.

He also wondered how Naxals could use certain geographical features to camouflage their movement without the notice of forces and enquired what went wrong with the Standard Operating Procedures.

He directed officers to cooperate with former BSF chief E N Rammohan, who is entrusted with the inquiry into the Dantewada incident.

To bolster their spirits, he told the officers that he was proud of the force and they should not feel demoralised, the sources said.