Purulia, Aug. 12 -- A special operation launched last Thursday in the Bandwan forests to capture top fugitive leaders of the West Bengal Maoist brigade, was halted Tuesday by the Purulia district police due to heavy monsoon rains.
Police from both West Bengal and Jharkhand suspect the Maoist squad has been constantly shifting locations between the forest covers of Bandwan and East Singhbhum for the past month with five top leaders remaining at large. They included Ashim Mondal, alias Akash alias Timir.
Yesterday, authorities from both states decided to suspend the ongoing combing operations.
Intelligence inputs indicate that Akash has been actively trying to rebuild the CPI (Maoist) presence in West Bengal through fresh recruitments over...