Bhopal: Dandakaranya Special Zonal Committee (DKZSC) secretary Ravulu Srinivas aka Ramanna, mastermind of 2010 Tadmetla incident in which 76 CRPF jawans were massacred in an Maoist ambush, might have been killed in Wednesday’s encounter with security forces in South Bastar district of Bijapur in Chhattisgarh, intelligence reports have indicated.
Intelligence reports said eight senior Maoist leaders, including Ramanna and Hidma, commander of first battalion of outlawed CPI (Maoist) deployed in south Bastar, may have succumbed to injuries suffered in the encounter with security forces that took place at Pubarti under Basaguda police station in Bijapur district on Wednesday evening.
“We have reports that Ramanna was among eight Maoist leaders who were killed in the Pubarti encounter. A search party of security personnel was now following the bloodstains found near encounter site to recover their bodies”, Bastar district superintendent of police (SP) Rajendra Narayan Das told this newspaper on phone on Thursday.
The police has so far recovered body of one Naxal in uniform at the encounter site along with an Insas Light Machine Gun (LMG), retrieved for the first time in Bastar, and China-made hand grenades.
The deceased Naxal was believed to be resident of Katagaon under Warrangal district in Telangana, Bastar police said.
Ramanna, who carried a bounty of Rs one crore on his head by various state governments, had led an ambush on a CRPF party at Tadmetla in south Bastar district of Sukma on April 6, 2010 killing 76 jawans. He had claimed before media then that he used his Kalashnikov he had purchased in 1988, for Rs 100,000 in the attack.
The Maoist leader, a resident of Bekkal in Warrangal, was sent to Bastar region in 1995. Known for his ruthlessness, he later rose in the cadre to head the DKSZC, the most powerful unit of CPI (Maoist).
Hidma, who carried a reward of Rs 40 lakh on his head, had masterminded several major operations including abduction of IAS officer Alex Paul Menon in 2012 when the latter was Sukma district collector.
