Home Minister P Chidambaram has reviewed anti-Maoist operations and coordination amongst state police and paramilitary officers of Naxal-affected states. He chaired a high-level meet of Directors General and Inspectors General of Operations of states like Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Bihar, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra, and chiefs of paramilitary forces like CRPF, BSF, ITBP and SSB. Sources said, issues like joint operations in close coordination of forces along inter-state borders, general synergy and improvement of living conditions of the force personnel deployed for anti-Naxal operations were discussed in the meeting which was held at the CRPF headquarters in New Delhi yesterday. Logistical arrangement, air support for supplementing troops and casualty evacuation were also said to have been discussed during the meeting.

The Minister was also shown a presentation on the present deployment of security forces and Naxal hotbeds in these states. The meeting also discussed deployment of additional helicopters both government as well as private to aid the operations. The effectiveness of Unified Commands structure in some states was also discussed threadbare. More than 60,000 central paramilitary forces have been assisting the state police forces in these states to undertake counter-Maoist offensives.

The success of the forces in the last few months was largely attributed to the joint coordinated efforts of the police forces of the states as well as the Centre and better intelligence networks. Government has been maintaining that accelerated development and calibrated police action are the two pillars of its anti-Naxal policy.