Kokrajhar: A top Maoist commander who was planning to establish a base for the banned CPI (Maoist) in Assam, was killed in an encounter with the police early on Saturday.
He has been identified as Ipil Murmu alias Rohit Murmu. There are 10 cases registered against him in Jharkhand, the police claimed.
Murmu apparently used an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) to blow up two feet of railway tracks in Kokrajhar on Thursday morning. Fortunately, the damage was detected before a passenger train could pass over that stretch. A derailment could have caused loss of life.
According to Pushpraj Singh, SSP, Kokrajhar, a search was launched on Friday night and contact made with the group led by Murmu. The Naxalites opened fire on the police and a fierce gun battle ensure.
“While the others fled, we found an injured person at the location. He was shifted to a government hospital where he died during treatment,” Singh said.
Murmu is said to have suffered severe injuries during the encounter that took place in the Nandangiri area of Salakati in Kokrajhar.
Singh said that Murmu, originally from Kokrajhar, left home in 2013 to join a Maoist group in Jharkhand. “He was involved in a similar blast in Jharkhand’s Sahebganj in 2024 and was also engaged in illegal activities such as extortion and kidnapping there,” the SSP said.
Murmu was listed among the top Maoist commanders in Jharkhand. His body has been sent for post mortem analysis and a search operation is underway to track down his comrades.
“We recovered firearms and explosives from the site. There was a possibility of further attacks by this group. The investigation is ongoing,” Singh added.
Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had said on Friday evening that one person had been identified for the railway track bombing. Describing him as a Maoist leader, Sarma said that Murmu had come to Assam to establish a networks in the state and cause large-scale disruption by damaging railway infrastructure.
“The track was damaged, but we were fortunate that the goods train which passed through that section did not derail. If it had been a passenger train, the consequences could have been disastrous,” he said.
