04-15-2006, 03:21 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>India's top cop to tackle Maoist threat</b>
NEW DELHI, India (AFP) - India's most celebrated policeman Kanwar Pal Singh Gill agreed to join the fight against Maoist rebels in a strife-torn state as New Delhi looks to snuff out a spreading insurgency.
Gill, credited with ending a 13-year-long Sikh rebellion in the 1990s, is now going to central Chhattisgarh state to help the beleaguered administration.
"I will take up the job next week and will speak on the Maoist problem in a month from then," Gill told AFP on Thursday.
The 72-year-old earned a media tag of "supercop" for his success in handling problems in Punjab, where 25,000 people died between 1983 and 1996.
Maoist violence has been increasing in Chhattisgarh as 50 troopers and 28 civilians have been killed in recent months.
The incidents prompted state officials to call for Gill, who has also battled tribal rebels in India's troubled northeast and advised Colombo on its 30-year war with Tamil separatists.
Chhattisgarh Chief Secretary R.P. Bagai said Gill was being brought in solely as a security adviser to help battle the Maoist guerrillas.
"Gill's appointment will be valid for one year from the date of his assuming office," Bagai added.
Chhattisgarh on Tuesday ended an experimental 10-month campaign that included government-sponsored anti-Maoist rallies but guerrillas often attacked unarmed civilian activists.
A security think-tank which Gill set up after retirement from police service has lambasted the propaganda efforts.
"As a result today there are 45,000 civilians in makeshift security camps out of fear of retribution from the guerrillas they were told to oppose," said Saaji Cherian, a Maoist expert at Gill's Institute for Conflict Management.
"The state virtually used these civilians as human shields and now it has turned them into refugees in their own land," Cherian said.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh met Tuesday with the chief secretaries of India's 29 states looking for ways to tackle the insurgency, a spokesman for the premier said.
Some 669 people died in 2005 in violence linked to more than 9,000 armed rebels who have spread over 15 states, according to government estimates.
Some 556 died in 2004 and 116 people were killed in the first two months of this year.
New Delhi refuses to negotiate with the armed Maoists, who launched their campaign in 1967 and claim to be fighting for the landless poor and against exploitation by powerful feudal lords.
04/14/2006 03:07
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NEW DELHI, India (AFP) - India's most celebrated policeman Kanwar Pal Singh Gill agreed to join the fight against Maoist rebels in a strife-torn state as New Delhi looks to snuff out a spreading insurgency.
Gill, credited with ending a 13-year-long Sikh rebellion in the 1990s, is now going to central Chhattisgarh state to help the beleaguered administration.
"I will take up the job next week and will speak on the Maoist problem in a month from then," Gill told AFP on Thursday.
The 72-year-old earned a media tag of "supercop" for his success in handling problems in Punjab, where 25,000 people died between 1983 and 1996.
Maoist violence has been increasing in Chhattisgarh as 50 troopers and 28 civilians have been killed in recent months.
The incidents prompted state officials to call for Gill, who has also battled tribal rebels in India's troubled northeast and advised Colombo on its 30-year war with Tamil separatists.
Chhattisgarh Chief Secretary R.P. Bagai said Gill was being brought in solely as a security adviser to help battle the Maoist guerrillas.
"Gill's appointment will be valid for one year from the date of his assuming office," Bagai added.
Chhattisgarh on Tuesday ended an experimental 10-month campaign that included government-sponsored anti-Maoist rallies but guerrillas often attacked unarmed civilian activists.
A security think-tank which Gill set up after retirement from police service has lambasted the propaganda efforts.
"As a result today there are 45,000 civilians in makeshift security camps out of fear of retribution from the guerrillas they were told to oppose," said Saaji Cherian, a Maoist expert at Gill's Institute for Conflict Management.
"The state virtually used these civilians as human shields and now it has turned them into refugees in their own land," Cherian said.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh met Tuesday with the chief secretaries of India's 29 states looking for ways to tackle the insurgency, a spokesman for the premier said.
Some 669 people died in 2005 in violence linked to more than 9,000 armed rebels who have spread over 15 states, according to government estimates.
Some 556 died in 2004 and 116 people were killed in the first two months of this year.
New Delhi refuses to negotiate with the armed Maoists, who launched their campaign in 1967 and claim to be fighting for the landless poor and against exploitation by powerful feudal lords.
04/14/2006 03:07
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