Hyderabad: Seven militia members of the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist), who were allegedly involved in 18 cases, were arrested in Mulugu district and explosive materials seized from their possession, police said on Tuesday.
Police took up combing operation in Pamunuru forest area on Monday and found some armed men planting explosives with intention to kill police personnel, they said. After seeing the team, they tried to escape, but police nabbed seven of them, Mulugu district superintendent of police Sangram Singh Patil said.
On interrogation, they revealed that they have been working as militia members for the CPI (Maoist) party for the last few years, the SP said.
They assisted the naxals in their activities by providing food and shelter and informing them about police movement in the area. They were given training by the naxals on how to handle and plant land mines and spikes in order to kill police personnel and also regularly provided with explosive material and spikes, police sources said.
Accordingly they planted landmines in several areas near their villages and in deep forest area in order to target police personnel and to deter their movement,sources said.
As per the directions of senior leaders of Telangana State committee of CPI (Maoist) party, militia members were going to assemble in Pamunuru forests to plant land mines for killing police combing teams, when they were caught, police said.
Police seized nine crude land mines besides detonators, electric wires, batteries and other items from two places.