NEW DELHI — At least 23 Indian security forces were killed in an ambush by Maoist militants in the central state of Chattisgarh, officials said on Sunday, reviving concerns around a decades-old insurgency that appeared to have been largely contained in recent years.
A large force of Indian security personnel had been carrying out a clearance operation in a densely forested area on the edges of the Bijapur district when they were ambushed by the insurgents on Saturday in a firefight that lasted four hours.
Avinash Mishra, the deputy superintendent of police in Bijapur, said an additional 31 security personnel were wounded in the attack.
He said that the militants, often referred to as Naxalites, also suffered heavy casualties, adding that one insurgent’s body remained at the site while the rest were cleared by tractors. Mr. Mishra said the insurgents had managed to seize the dead soldiers’ weapons.
reach was once so widespread, and their attacks so frequent, that in 2006, India’s prime minister declared them the country’s “single biggest internal-security challenge.”
However, the Indian government has shrunk the space where the insurgents operate over the past decade by combining military operations involving tens of thousands of paramilitary forces with economic packages to the areas the insurgents used as a base for activity and recruitment. Where the insurgents once operated in about 200 districts at their peak, they are were confined to less than 50 districts last year, according to official figures.
The government has hunted insurgent leaders, killing a large number or forcing them to surrender, and insurgent attacks have declined in frequency and potency.