CPI-Maoist showing Dantewada massacre CD to cadres

RAIPUR - In a bid to inspire its cadres, the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) is showing its cadres a CD of the April 6 massacre in Chhattisgarh in which 76 security personnel died.

The seven-minute CD, in circulation in the forested interiors of Bastar region, is being shown in training camps to tell them on how a “historic and unprecedented” attack on security forces can be staged.

Police sources said a few copies of the CD were recovered from a Maoist guerrilla last week from an interior location in Dantewada district close to the Andhra Pradesh border.

It is in Dantewada that the gruesome slaughter of the security personnel took place. It was the worst ever attack on security forces since the Maoist insurgency erupted in India in 1967.

The video footage is of poor quality but one can hear the voice of a Maoist leader reportedly coordinating the April 6 attack.

It shows Maoists walking away with the arms belonging to the dead Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel.

It also shows the fighters marching in a single file in a forested location carrying bags of explosive on their backs.

Police suspect that the CD was prepared when the rebels were on their way to Chintalnar forest to lay the Dantewada ambush — and on their return journey.

A state intelligence bureau official said: “The CPI-Maoist has learnt the art of preparing video films of its major attacks from the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam).”

The officer described the CD as “99 percent genuine”. But Chhattisgarh Director General of Police Vishwa Ranjan refused to accept “it as a CD of the April 6 massacre”.

“The CD is a mix up of a number of attacks carried out by the Maoists in recent years,,” Ranjan said. “I don’t think it has a single footage of April 6.”