indian State acts for stopping maoist women

Maoists plan to form women’s group foiled
GUWAHATI: The plan of Maoists to form a women’s group in Assam has been hit after police succeeded to arrest top Maoist leader Aklanta Rabha’s wife Rekha Rani Raha alias Sonpahi in Goalpara recently. Assam Police had arrested Aklanta, the sole central committee member from the state and Siraj Rabha, an arms trainer of the Reds, on April 26. Subsequently, the operations wing of the state police arrested Rekha and two other women Maoist cadres from Goalpara district.
“Rekha revealed that she was acting as an overground member of CPI (Maoist). She had formed an organization called Nari Mukti Sangha to fight against social discrepancy towards backward classes and was propagating the Maoist ideology among women in particular. She confessed that she had managed to recruit at least seven to eight women Maoist cadres in Goalpara and Kamrup districts,” said a policeman.
The state police’s Special Operation Wing (SOW), which has booked the rebels in an extortion case, is currently quizzing them. Police said Rekha went to West Bengal in 2005 and then to Jharkhand for training. During the same time, she got married to Aklanta Rabha. Later, coming back to Assam, she started her organizational activities at Krishnapur and Boko areas of Goalpara district. Settled in Goalpara in 2012, she started a tea stall near the Bhalukdubi area from where she started to form the women’s group via the Nari Mukti Sangha. Police recovered several letters from her possession that contain information about Maoist activities.
Assam Police’s task force, which was formed to deal with the growing Maoist activities, said at least 181 Maoists cadres are active in the state. “Out of them, 23 are women. However, most of them are political workers and not armed cadres,” said Assam police IGP L R Bishnoi, a member of the task force. Investigation revealed that Aklanta was the main facilitator for Maoists and served as a conduit for procuring sophisticated arms from across the border.
He was arrested with a .22 pistol and huge cache of ammunition. “Security forces had encounters with Red rebels on five occasions in Assam. We found sophisticated arms like AK rifles and carbines from them. The Maoists are getting latest arms through ultras in Manipur, Tripura and Nagaland,” added Bishnoi. A close associate of CPI (Maoist) top leader Prashant Bose alias Kishenda, Aklanta is part of the elite group of five top Maoist leaders in charge of operations in Jharkhand, West Bengal and the northeast. Other members include Kishenda, Deo Kumar Singh, Chandraprasad Yadav and Misir Besra.