Massive security in place to ensure smooth polling

Adequate security personnel have been deployed for the poll and all precautions taken to thwart any evil designs of the Maoists,” said Jharkhand Director General of Police (DGP) Rajiv Kumar.

He added that 230 companies of paramilitary forces will man the first phase election. This includes 102 companies of CRPF, 38 companies of CISF, 30 companies of BSF, besides Shashatra Suraksha Bal, Indo-Tibet Border Police and State Auxiliary Police.
The police chief was all the more cautious as during the Lok Sabha election earlier this year, Maoists had attacked a police party in Dumka on April 24 in which eight persons, including seven policemen, were killed. This attack was preceded by an attack on Assistant

Superintendent of Police of Chatra on March 13 in which seven policemen, including the IPS officer, sustained grievous injuries.

Sources in the Jharkhand Police said at least three top leaders, including two former chief ministers, were on the Red radar. “Former chief ministers Babulal Marandi and Arjun Munda, besides former deputy chief minister Sudesh Mahto, are on the top hit-list of the Maoists,” an intelligence source told Deccan Herald in Ranchi. Marandi has already lost his son in a Maoist attack.

Jharkhand has a history of such attacks where Maoists have gunned down politicians. The then Jamshedpur MP Sunil Mahto, CPI-ML MLA Mahendra Singh, former
minister Ramesh Singh Munda and All Jharkhand Students’ Union leader Tileshwar Sahu are some of the prominent leaders killed by Maoists in recent times.

In the first phase, 13 most vulnerable constituencies, including Lohardagga, Latehar, Chatra, Gumla, Bishnupur, Manika, Panki, Daltonganj, Bishrampur, Garhwa, Chattarpur, Hussainabad and Bhavnathpur, will go to the polls.