Jharkhand: Godda MP had warned Centre of attack

A BJP parliamentarian from Jharkhand has accused the Centre of ignoring his alerts for putting the highly Maoist-affected tag on the state’s Santhal Pargana. B Vijay Murty reports.

A BJP parliamentarian from Jharkhand has accused the Centre of ignoring his alerts for putting the highly Maoist-affected tag on the state’s Santhal Pargana.

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Godda MP Nishikant Dubey said he had written reams to the Centre — many of them to the PMO — four years ago to justify the inclusion of the entire Santhal Pargana area in the high-risk category.

The ministry of home affairs has so far declared 78 districts across the country as highly left wing extremism-affected districts. They include 16 of Jharkhand’s 24 districts but missing from the list are the six Santhal Pargana districts of Dumka, Deoghar, Godda, Jamtara, Pakur and Sahebganj.

“They need to be included in the integrated action plan. They are geographically strategic by being thickly forested and close to Nepal and Bangladesh,” he said.