Zonal commander of splinter Maoist group held in Jharkhand

A zonal commander of the banned People’s Liberation Front of India has been arrested in Jharkhand’s West Singhbhum district following a gunfight, police said on Saturday.

Acting on intelligence inputs, a joint team nabbed Santosh Kandulana while he was on a visit to his in-law’s house at Sanga village under the Naxal-affected Bandgaon police station area on Thursday, it said.

The 25-year-old opened fire in an attempt to flee, following which the team retaliated. He surrendered eventually as the area was cordoned off, an officer said.

An AK-47 rifle, two magazines, 103 live cartridges, and eight mobile phones were among the items seized, Superintendent of Police Ashutosh Shekhar said at a press conference in Chaibasa.

Kandulana has 33 cases, including six murders and 16 attempts to murder, registered against him in West Singhbhum and Khunti districts, the SP said.

The PLFI commander, who was carrying a bounty of Rs 2 lakh, has been associated with the splinter Maoist group for the past 10 years, police said.

The team that conducted the operation included the district armed police, special task force, and a CRPF battalion A case has been lodged under the Indian Penal Code, Arms Act, and the Criminal Law Amendment Act, it added.

The arrest was a day after 27-year-old Novel Sandipurty, an area commander of the PLFI, was nabbed with an AK-47 rifle and over three dozen live cartridges from the same police station area.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)