Facing biting criticism from all sides for the murder of an abducted policeman by the Maoists, Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Friday proposed an all-party meeting to seek a political consensus on how best to deal with the hostage crisis. Leaders of all the parties were invited to this meeting to be held on Saturday.
After slain havildar Lucas Tete’s body was found, a concerned-looking Mr Kumar held a meeting with top police officials and bureaucrats in Patna on Friday and reportedly asked for the search and raid operations against the Maoists to be heightened in the areas in Lakhiserai and Munger where the rebels are believed to be holding the three policemen hostage.
With Mr Kumar’s advisers raising concerns about the potential political damage to the chief minister’s image and the ruling JD(U)’s prospects in the October-November Assembly polls due to the worsening hostage crisis followed by a bloody encounter, he chose to convene an all-party meeting, said sources. “Kumar’s line of thinking on Maoist insurgency — that it is a social problem and cannot be resolved through armed combat — could snowball into a hot political issue during the polls,” said an aide.
Although Mr Kumar reportedly deputed food and civil supplies minister Narendra Singh to old negotiations with the Maoists hiding somewhere in the hills in Lakhiserai and adjacent Munger districts with the three policemen as hostages, there was no confirmation about whether the talks began. But a combined combing operation by about 400 personnel from several security forces began at the Shringi Rishi hills and Dharhara jungles in Munger on Friday.
LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan blamed Kumar for Tete’s murder and said: “The CM is calling all-party meeting to hide his own failures to resolve this crisis. Why did he delay in starting talks with the rebels? Why has he never called an all-party meeting on the Maoist crisis in earlier years? How come the number of Maoist-affected districts in Bihar rose from six to 30 during his regime?”
“How does the CM offer talks and simultaneously order armed operations against the Maoissts?” asked Mr Paswan. Congress spokesman Premchand Mishra said: “This government remained criminally indifferent to this crisis when it broke out and still has no clear vision about a resolution”. RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, speaking in Delhi, was critical of the Nitish government’s role in trying to free the four policemen held hostage by the Maoists for five days.
Meanwhile, Mr Kumar has asked for 4,000 additional paramilitary personnel to deal with the sudden spurt in Naxal violence in the state.