ITBP suffers first casualty in fight against Naxals

From The Business Standard R Krishna Das/Kolkata/ Raipur - Oct 09,2010 The Indo Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) suffered its first casualty in its fight against Naxal guerillas in Chhattisgarh as rebels blew up a jeep and killed three jawans of the para-military force in Rajnandgaon district today morning. The jawans were returning from the Maharashtra border after patrolling when the incident took place. The rebels detonated a powerful landmine that blew up the vehicle in which they were traveling in. The incident took place near Kahoka village in Manpur--about 120 kilometres from the district headquarters of Rajnandangaon, Superintendent of Police B N Meena said. Three jawans were killed while another sustained serious injury, Meena said. The victims were identified as Dilip, Dinesh and Shibu. The incident took place a few yards from the Kahoka police outpost. This is the first casualty suffered by the ITBP deployed here to combat the red army. In all, five battalion of the force had been posted in Chhattisgarh as part of Union government's reinforcement for the state to fight the Naxalites. The ITBP had been working with a new strategy in its operation by launching a campaign to win over the confidence of the villagers besides area-domination mission in the Naxal-infested pockets. The attack has also seen as Naxal's new plan to target the para-military force deployed in the state. The rebels had escalated attack on the central force this year. In a meticulously planned operation, Naxalites had killed 75 jawans of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) near Talmetla in Dantewada district on April 6. In August, rebels attacked a team Border Security Force (BSF) personnel in Kanker district, killing three jawans and injuring two others in an ambush near Bhuski village. http://wap.business-standard.com/storypage.php?id=0&autono=410761