New Delhi/Kolkata, Feb. 16: Union home minister P. Chidambaram on Tuesday termed the Maoist attack on a police camp in West Bengal as "outrageous" and said that there were indications of failure in some aspects on the part of the state police. He further
said that only a detailed review would reveal as how the police camp with adequate strength was attacked by the Maoists.
"While there are indications of failure in some aspects, only a thorough review will reveal how the police camp with adequate strength was overrun, when there was daylight, by the Maoists," he said in a statement from New Delhi. A team of senior officials of the home ministry will soon visit Kolkata and review the preparedness of the state police to deal with emergency situations like the attack.
The West Bengal government, meanwhile, had to face the ire of the families of the slain Eastern Frontier Rifles (EFR) jawans on Tuesday when five state ministers were gheraoed at the Salua EFR headquarters and locked up inside the administration office.
The disgruntled family members were joined by EFR jawans and thousands of women and children from the EFR barracks as they stopped the car of the ministerial team headed by state finance minister Asim Dasgupta and also burnt an effigy of chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee. The convoy was halted and although the ministers were escorted by security personnel through the compound to the safety of the commandant’s room, the agitators locked up all the six gates and sat outside on a dharna.
Finally, after a 90-minute long meeting with the family members, the ministers were allowed to come out. Mr Dasgupta was accompanied by ministers Kiranmoy Nanda, Kanti Ganguly, Srikumar Mukherjee and Mortaza Hossain.
"The state government will give a compensation of Rs 15 lakhs to the bereaved families, lifetime salary of the jawans and a job to one family member each. We will also put up boundary walls around the EFR barracks and construct permanent accommodations for them," Mr Dasgupta announced at around 10.20 pm after the meeting. On behalf of the state government, he also asked for 90 days to fulfil all the demands of the protesters. The ministers also promised to stay at the spot till the bodies arrived after post-mortem.
Mr Chidambaram also spoke to Mr Bhattacharjee about Monday’s attack. In his statement, he said: "The attack is another outrageous attempt by the banned organisation to overawe the established authority in the state. I condemn the attack. There has been a massive loss of lives. Besides, more than 40 weapons are reported to have been looted. The leader of the CPI (Maoist) has claimed responsibility for the attack and has threatened to repeat such attacks in the future."
A family member of one of the jawans said: "EFR jawans are not trained to participate in operations against Maoists. This is why they became soft targets. The barracks have no fencing wall and anybody can walk in. Even after the death of 24 jawans, the chief minister did not come to boost our morale and instead sent a team of ministers with the promise of compensation."
The EFR jawans, meanwhile, gave an open challenge to Maoist leader Kishenji. "He is fighting for his own selfish reasons and killing innocent people. If he has the courage, he should come and face us in a frontal battle," said one jawan. The jawans also claimed that local police officers who were supposed to be with the force were absent.
The attack has shaken the morale of an already-weary EFR force. Serving jawans are questioning the battle readiness of the force, which has been sent in with the CRPF, CISF and other paramilitary forces. "Why are the Maoists only picking EFR personnel and not the other paramilitary forces? They know that we are ill-equipped to fight them," said a jawan.
Meanwhile the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) has started fishing in the troubled waters. Stating that 13 jawans were from the Hills and 10 jawans from the Dooars region, they have refused compensation for the 23 dead jawans and are instead demanding a separate Gorkhaland. They have called a bandh in the hill region on February 19.
Pramod Kumar and DIBYAJYOTI CHAUDHURI