ROURKELA: A day after suspected Maoists hijacked and looted a truck laden with huge cache of blasting explosives, Rourkela police intensified combing operation along the Odisha-Jharkhand border with DGP YB Khurania visiting the steel city to take stock of the situation on Wednesday.
Reliable sources said the DGP held a closed-door meeting with IG (Operation) Deepak Kumar, DIG (Western Range) Brijesh Kumar Rai and Sundargarh SP Pratyush Diwakar, also in charge of Rourkela. Khurania also reportedly visited K Balang police station amid tight security and reviewed the ongoing investigation.
At around 9.30 am on Tuesday, eight armed persons hijacked the explosives-laden truck from near a forested stone quarry at Banko within K Balang police limits, more than 90 km from Rourkela and drove the vehicle to a nearby forest. Another 10-15 persons waiting inside the forest looted at least 150 packets of explosives each weighing 15 to 25 kg. The loot site is barely two km from the Maoist hotbed of Saranda forest in West Singhbhum district of Jharkhand. The empty vehicle was later found abandoned inside the forest and its driver was unhurt.
Requesting anonymity, a police officer associated with the investigation said driver of the explosives-laden vehicle Debnath Toppo and owner of the stone quarry Niraj Pandey were interrogated. Without ruling out the involvement of the outlawed CPI (Maoist) in the incident, he estimated the value of the looted explosives to be around `1.5 lakh.
Earlier, SP Diwakar had stated that the looted explosives packets contained blasting gelatine sticks. However, it is yet to be ascertained if some of the packets contained detonators as the gelatine sticks would require detonating devices to explode.
Following the incident, Odisha police and Special Operation Group intensified search operation across forested bordering areas under the jurisdiction of Rourkela police district. Besides, security forces comprising Jharkhand police, CRPF and Cobra battalions are carrying out combing operations at Jaraikela, Digha, Tholkobad, Chhotanagra and other areas in the neighbouring state.
Sources privy to Maoist activities said no criminal group would take such a risk to get specialised materials having little monetary value. However, frustrated with the intense combing operations by security forces in Jharkhand, the Maoists led by Misir Besra may go to any extent amid the threat to their existence, they said.
During 2009 when Naxalism was at its peak, Maoists had looted an explosives-laden vehicle from Champajharan forest within Chandisposh police limits. Subsequently, some explosive packets were found buried inside the Saranda forest in Jharkhand.