Top police officials from four states – Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odisha and West Bengal – on Wednesday decided to work on better inter-state coordination and information sharing, particularly in the inter-state border areas, to curb the menace of left-wing extremism (LWE). Apart from LWE, issues related to terror groups, were also discussed at the inter-state zonal committee meeting, chaired by Jharkhand Director General of Police, D K Pandey, at the police headquarters here. The meeting, though scheduled earlier, comes in the wake of the latest attack by naxals in Gaya district of Bihar, where 10 CRPF men were killed in a fierce encounter with them on July 18. [related-post] Inspector General (Operations) M S Bhatia said: “The naxals often take advantage of the vacuum that tends to get created in the border areas. They feel that they can inflict damage in one state and cross over the border to another safely, as jurisdictional issues come into play. Therefore, it was decided to have a much better coordination and real-time sharing of information. Further, it was decided that more joint operations in border areas, which are monitored by the Range DIGs, should be carried out.” With respect to the July 18 incident, officials said that information about movement of naxals across the border was shared with Bihar counterparts. “In bordering districts, we keep on sharing intelligence on a regular basis. This is monitored at several levels. We had got information about movement of some naxal dasta, across the border. So, we had shared the information with the SSP of Gaya and SP of Aurangabad, a few days before the attack. However, this was not specific. As far as presence of Sandeep Yadav (top Maoist leader, who was suspected to have been present in the encounter) is concerned, we believe that he was already present across the border,” said Palamu Superintendent of Police Mayur Patel. Following the incident, however, Jharkhand police have intensified vigil on the borders in Palamu and Chatra to ensure that the naxals, who carried out the Gaya attack, do not enter into Jharkhand to escape security forces from Bihar. In the meeting, it was also decided to strengthen cooperation on the activities of terror groups, who could be trying to set up sleeper cells or recruit youngsters by radicalising them. “The meeting focused on sleeper cells, both busted and possibly the new ones, and the follow-up. Besides, it was also decided to curb their financing. Another problem we have is that of fake currency that comes into India from Bangladesh and into our state from Pakur-Sahibganj (close to West Bengal) channel,” said Bhatia.
