Mines Providing Bombs To Naxals

Mines providing bombs to Naxals

Vishwa Mohan

Times of India

25th November 2005

NEW DELHI: Every time there is a landmine blast carried out by Naxalites, security agencies wonder where the ultras got the explosives.

Central agencies now know that it is not only smuggled into the country, but is also siphoned off from the stocks of public sector coal mines.

This was found during the country-wide surprise checks against the public sector coal companies carried out on Tuesday and Wednesday.

CBI sleuths found that a number of officials of the coal companies had allegedly diverted explosives, used for excavation, to the open market which, in turn, reached Naxalites as well as other anti-social elements in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Maharashtra.
An official said though no specific name has surfaced so far, it was found during the initial investigation that some officials had been earning a lot of money by "over issuance of explosives".

The sleuths have got enough leads to get to the bottom of the nexus between officials of the coal companies and local population in the diversion of the explosives, specifically gelatine sticks, he added.

The CBI sleuths in association with vigilance departments of the coal companies had conducted surprise checks at Wani Railway siding of Western Coalfields, Nagpur; Talcher of Mahanadi Coalfields, Sambalpur; Kathara area of Central Coalfields, Ranchi; Tilaboni Collieries of Eastern Coalfields, Asansol; Korba and Deepika extension mines of South Eastern Coalfields, Bilaspur; and Govindpur Colliery of Bharat Coking Coal Ltd, Dhanbad.

They found a number of documents during the searches, showing "over issuance of explosives" by officials.