Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Mar 20: At least 30 Maoists were killed while a security personal also lost his life in two separate anti-Naxal operations in the Bastar region of Chhattisgarh on Thursday.
While 26 Naxals were gunned down in a major encounter along the Bijapur-Dantewada border in south Bastar, fur Maoists were killed along the Kanker-Narayanpur border of north Bastar, a senior police officer said. During the operation in Bijapur, a member of the Bijapur District Reserve Guard (DRG), a locally raised force to combat Naxalism, was also killed.
According to the police, a joint team of security personnel had gone out on a combing operation in the Gangaloor police station area. Around 7 a.m. the exchange of fire with Naxalites started, which continued till the afternoon. In the search operation initiated after the firing stopped, bodies of 26 Naxalites, along with a large quantity of arms and ammunition, were recovered from the encounter site, the officer added.
The second encounter was reported between the joint police party of DRG and Border Security Force, and the Maoists, along the Kanker-Narayanpur border of north Bastar. The police issued a bulletin around 1.30 p.m. that the bodies of four Maoists had been recovered.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Vishnu Deo Sai called the encounters a major success. “Today our soldiers have achieved another big success in the direction of ‘Naxal Mukt Bharat Abhiyan’. 30 Naxalites were killed in 2 separate operations of our security forces in Bijapur and Kanker of Chhattisgarh. The Modi government is moving forward with a ruthless approach against Naxalites and is adopting a zero tolerance policy against those Naxalites who are not surrendering despite all the facilities from surrender to inclusion. The country is going to be Naxal-free before 31 March next year,” Mr Shah wrote on X.
Mr Sai called the encounters a victory while expressing condolence over the death of the DRG jawan. “The State government remains fully committed to eradicating Naxalism, and security operations will continue until Chhattisgarh is free from this menace,” he said. The combined figure of the two encounters pushed the overall number of Naxalites killed in Chhattisgarh this year beyond 100, signalling a further intensification of the anti-Naxal campaign.
The current year’s the biggest anti-Naxal operation so far was conducted in Bijapur on February 9 when 31 Maoists were gunned down by the security forces in which two security personnel were also killed and two others sustained injuries. A large cache of arms and ammunition including AK-47, INSAS and .303 rifles, grenade launchers and other explosives was also recovered from the encounter site, the police added.
Together with the 17 Maoists killed in Gariaband, a neighbouring district of Raipur along the Odisha border, at least 81 Maoists had been killed in the first 40 days of 2025, a figure that translates to two Maoists being gunned down every day. In 2024, a year that saw intensification of the anti-Maoist campaign in Chhattisgarh, as many as 239 Maoists were gunned down by the security forces. Union Home Minister Amit Shah had last year set the deadline of March 2026 to wipe out left-wing extremism in the country.
