Bihar CM calls all-party meet over kidnapping of cops by Maoists

PATNA - Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar will preside over an all-party meeting here on Saturday to discuss the kidnapping of four policemen by the Maoists.

The Maoists have killed one of the four kidnapped policemen.umar is also trying to personally contact opposition leaders to take them into confidence on the kidnapping issue.

Earlier on Friday, the Union Home Ministry dispatched another helicopter and additional paramilitary personnel to Bihar to assist the cops in locating the three policemen, who are still in the Maoists’ custody.

The Bihar Government had sought 4,000 additional paramilitary forces from the Central Government to deal with the rising Maoist violence.

It has been reported that a comprehensive plan is being worked out to launch a joint operation along the Bihar-Jharkhand border to get hold of the Naxals.

The body of police constable Lucas Tete was found in the Lakhisarai jungles of Bihar on Friday morning with a note from Naxals saying, “We have killed a hawaldar since our colleagues were not released. If our colleagues are not released we will kill other cops as well.”

A new deadline set by the Naxals for releasing the abducted cops in exchange for their jailed comrades had ended at 10 a.m. on Friday. he Maoists called local TV channels on Thursday to declare that one of the four policemen they had kidnapped had been killed as the state government had failed to respond.

Nitish Kumar had on Thursday assured all support to the families of the cops taken as hostage, and said the police top brass have also been asked to do everything possible to get the kidnapped cops released.

The four policemen - Mohammad Ehsaan, Rupesh Kumar Sinha, Abhay Prasad Yadav, Lokus Tete- were taken hostage on Sunday, during an encounter in the forests of Lakhisarai.

Seven other policemen were killed and eleven were injured in the same encounter.

The encounter began on Sunday evening when over 150 armed Maoists attacked search teams of the Bihar police combing the area following intelligence reports of the Maoists presence in the forest area. (ANI)