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Indian Army says no to anti-maoist duty
The demand for deployment of Army to combat the overgrown Naxalite-Maoist menace has been put on hold with the Defence Ministry not favouring any such move.The Defence Ministry made a detailed presentation before the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCCS) on Friday night explaining why the Armed Forces should not be asked to take on Naxal-Maoists. Sources said on Saturday adding the PMO and the Home Ministry were quite keen on Army deployment in the worst-hit Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Orissa and Andhra Pradesh. The Defence Ministry, however, said the Army was overstretched due to its involvement in Jammu and Kashmir and the North-East. Moreover, it contended that the Naxalite problem was a socio-political issue and should be addressed within those parameters. The Home Ministry has, over the last few months, been mooting the proposal for involving the Army in tackling the Naxal problem and National Security Advisor M K Narayanan held a meeting with the Army brass recently to elicit their views on such a move. At the CCS meeting, where the Naxal problem was in special focus, Defence Ministry officials drew attention towards the fact that the Army had been in Jammu and Kashmir for over a decade now. The Pakistan angle, they said, was a major reason for the Army's active role in the troubled border State. Similarly, in the N-E, the Army had been in action for four decades and the situation was only now slowly improving due to sustained pressure on insurgent groups, they added. While against going into Naxal-hit areas, the Defence Ministry was, however, open to the idea of the Army training central para-military forces and State police forces in counter-insurgency operations. In fact, some units of the para-military forces and State police have already undergone training in jungle warfare, fighting terrorism in a rural scenario and in the hinterland at the specialised schools of the Army, sources said. The Jharkhand Government has set up a jungle warfare and anti-insurgency training school in the State and recruited a retired brigadier to head it. The former Army officer was the principal of the Army's elite Jungle Warfare School, Mizoram, before taking up his present assignment. The Armed Forces, officials said, would also be willing to chip in their bit by providing operation-based help like aerial surveillance, ferrying commandos for specific tasks and helping State forces to handle sophisticated communication systems and related duties, sources said. Posted by: john 2006-06-17 |
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