RAIPUR: Chief minister Raman Singh on Friday emphasised on the need to win the locals confidence and form a district-level unified operation command in Maoist-affected districts of Chhattisgarh, at the State secretariat here.
Reviewing the anti-Maoist strategy during the State-Level Unified Command Meeting convened by him, Singh said that the district level meeting should be held at regular intervals to analyse and revise strategies to counter left-wing extremism.
The meeting will jointly be supervised and evaluated by the respective superintendent of police and senior officers of the deployed central paramilitary forces.
“A joint training centre should also be set up for the troops of the central and State forces at Sukma and Bijapur,” he suggested at the meeting attended by top officials from the State police and paramilitary forces.
Sukma and Bijapur are among the seven worst Maoist-affected districts in south Bastar.
A group of 50-60 jawans of the central and State forces could be trained for 3-5 days to enable better coordination at the village level. Senior officers should be posted at places where the security personnel are deployed, he suggested.
In an attempt to alleviate the trust-deficit with the local tribal population, Raman Singh felt the greater need to infuse a sense of security among the villagers. He directed them to implement social welfare development schemes soon, with priorities on education, health, drinking water facilities, telecom network, roads and electricity.
The discussion on area domination by the forces came up with a suggestion to enhance its expansion and impact. Sixteen of Chattisgarh’s 21 districts have Maoist presence.
After the meeting, Chhattisgarh director general of police A N Upadhaya said that all agencies engaged in anti-Maoist operations shared their concerns. “The operations will continue as usual but most of the exercises are going to be joint,” he said.