PATNA: As news reached the families of six CRPF personnel, who were among the 25 uniformed men killed by Maoists in Chhattisgarh’s Sukma on Monday, there was a sudden wave of sorrow and anger among thousands of villagers.
In Phoolchoda village in Sheikhpura district, the house of slain CRPF constable Ranjeet Kumar saw people arrive from nearby villages to console his family. A father of two boys – Satish, 6, and Vikas, 4 – Ranjeet had called his wife Sunita Devi, on Sunday from Sukma and promised to come home on leave in May.
“The Maoists who claim to be fighting for the poor are killing sons of poor men like me. There is no longer any substance in their so-called revolution,” said Indradev Yadav, Ranjeet’s aged father.
As slain head constable Naresh Yadav’s grieving father, Ram Narayan Yadav, spoke with journalists at their home at Ahila village in Darbhanga district, he could not help blaming the government for the loss of 25 personnel of CRPF’s 74th battalion.
“So many families from several parts of the country lost their brave sons. The government must probe and find out the intelligence failure which seems to have led to this incident,” he said.
“It is a cowardly attack on brave men fighting for the nation…” , said Anita Devi, widow of slain CRPF constable Krishna Kumar Pandey at his house at Bharandua village in Rohtas district. Clutching her seven-month-old daughter, the couple’s only child, she said the government must “put an end to fighting and deaths”.
The six CRPF personnel from Bihar killed in Sukma on Monday are Ranjeet Kumar, Naresh Yadav, Krishna Kumar Pandey, Abhay Kumar, Saurabh Kumar and Abhay Mishra. One CRPF constable from neighbouring Jharkhand was also killed in the incident.
Meanwhile, Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Tuesday announced an ex gratia of Rs 5 lakh to the families of each of the six CRPF personnel on Monday.
Kumar condoled the death of the 25 CRPF jawans, saying the country will never forget these brave soldiers who died for the nation. He also said the last rites of all six martyrs from Bihar would be conducted with full State honours in their villages.
RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav condemned the attack and blamed intelligence failure. He called upon home minister Rajnath Singh to order a probe “to bring out the truth”.
State Congress chief spokesperson, Premchandra Mishra, described the Sukma incident as the home minister’s “personal failure”.