Home ministry seeks CRPF report on killings

Union home ministry on Monday sought a report from the CRPF and the Chhattisgarh government on the June 29 encounter in the state in which 17 people, alleged to be Maoists and their sympathisers, were killed.

Union home ministry on Monday sought a report from the CRPF and the Chhattisgarh government on the June 29 encounter in the state in which 17 people, alleged to be Maoists and their sympathisers, were killed. The ministry has ruled out any judicial inquiry into the encounter.

“We are double-checking the identities of the people killed in the encounter. The exercise will take a day or two. We suspect that one person killed in the encounter was the main accused in Dantewada jail break case of 2007 in which 300 inmates, including around 100 suspected Maoists, had escaped,” said a senior home ministry official.

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In an interview to NDTV, CRPF director general K Vijay Kumar defended the action and wondered if only killing of security forces should be the norm. He added that his force, inside the jungles of Silger in Bijapur district, drew the first fire in the night and his men retaliated according to Standard Operating Procedures.