Police clueless on CRPF trooper's killing

Raipur, March 23 (IANS) Police in Chhattisgarh's Sukma district Friday failed to get any clue about Maoists who had brutally killed a paramilitary trooper in full public view Thursday.

"It was a brutal killing and the incident has shocked us. We have not got any clue so far about the killers who were definitely the Maoists. Soon they would be in the police net," an officer at the police headquarters here told IANS.

The officer said that police have laid seige in vast areas of the violence-hit Chintagufa area, some 500 km south from here, to apprehend the attackers as the killing has angered troopers of the 150th battalion of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF).

The CRPF camp is also located close to the venue where Maoists, who were estimated to be 3-4 in number, stormed into a weekly market and slit the throat of CRPF head constable Om Prakash.

The newly formed Sukma district, is one of the worst leftist insurgency hit districts and is part of a nearly 40,000 sq km mineral-rich Bastar region, where Maoists have considerable hold since late 1980s.