'Charging states for Maoist menace not logical'

Disapproving the Union government’s move to ask Maoist-hit states to foot the bill for deployment of central forces, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has asked the Centre to wave the charges.

“The claim of Rs 1,450.29 crore by the Union government towards deployment of central forces appears to be quite unreasonable,” Patnaik said in a strongly worded letter to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh.

“In the present internal security scenario, joint and coordinated operations of the state and central security forces are the need of the hour. Such demands should not take precedence over the urgent operational requirements so far as deployment of central police forces is considered”, the chief minister said in the letter circulated to the media. Requesting the Centre to consider waving the charges completely, Patnaik, who also heads the state’s home department, reminded Singh that Odisha is training its own police force to fight the Maoists at a considerable expense. CRPF’s Director General (DG) had recently asked the Odisha government to pay up Rs 1,450.29 crore as deployment charges for its forces.

Several divisions of the central reserve police force are engaged in operations against the Maoists in Odisha, where at least half of the 30 districts are in the red zone.  “Deployment of central police forces is considered essential to supplement the efforts of state police to counter left wing extremism which covers a large number of states. In this regard, the Odisha government has also recruited, trained and deployed a large number of police personnel for anti-naxal operations bearing huge expenditure from the state exchequer,” Patnaik has said in his letter.

“It is the responsibility of both the Union government and the states to fight the left wing extremism by pooling together their resources”, Patnaik added.