Raipur (Chhattisgarh) [India], January 18 : Chhattisgarh Deputy Chief Minister Vijay Sharma announced that security forces have killed four Naxals, including senior cadre Dilip Bedja, in an operation in Bijapur district, marking a significant blow to the Maoist presence in the National Park area.
Speaking to ANI, Dy CM Sharma said, "Four Naxals have been killed, one of whom is a big name, Dilip Bedja, who had been active in the National Park area for a long time. Many efforts were made to bring him into the mainstream, but ultimately, the security forces took him down. Now the National Park area is also almost free from Naxals."
On Saturday, security forces in Chhattisgarh recovered the bodies of two Maoist cadres along with automatic weapons from the encounter site in the northwestern region of the state from Bijapur, officials confirmed.
Bijapur Superintendent of Police (SP) Jitendra Yadav said that a joint team of District Reserve Guard (DRG), CoBRA and the Special Task Force (STF) carried out a search operation in the northwestern region after receiving intelligence inputs regarding the presence of the Maoist National Park Area Committee's Divisional Committee Member (DVCM) Dilip Bedja and other armed Maoists in forest and hilly areas.
According to an official statement, preliminary identification suggests that one of the deceased Maoists is Dilip Bedja, a DVCM cadre of the National Park Area Committee.
"So far, during the search operation, the bodies of two male Maoist cadres and graded automatic weapons like AK-47s have been recovered from the encounter site," the statement read.
Inspector General of Police (IG), Bastar Range, Sundarraj Pattilingam, said that despite difficult geographical conditions and other challenging circumstances, the DRG/CoBRA/STF personnel conducted decisive operations against armed Maoist cadres with extreme courage and commitment.