IED event in Odisha, Rourkela in Sundargarh District area, India on Mon 11th October 2021

Meanwhile, the Rourkela Police arrested three criminals, identified as Banti alias Basista Mohanty, Jangyasi Swain alias Rony and Amit Kumar Sahoo, who were running a major extortion racket at the behest of a hardcore cadre of the Peoples' Liberation Front of India (PLFI), a splinter group of the Communist party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist), operating from across border in Jharkhand, inRourkela in Sundargarh District of Odisha on October 11, reports Odisha TV. The trio mostly targeted industrialists and other businessmen in the Civil Township area in Rourkela and other parts of the Steel City. Police said three 7mm pistols and around 55 rounds of ammunition including few of Self Loading Rifle (SLR) automatic weapons and some Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) were recovered from the criminals. Rourkela, superintendent of Police (SP), Mukesh Bhamoo said that around 6-7 cases had been registered against Banti who confessed to have been working for PLFI cadre Arjun Rana. All the three arrestees were working on the instruction of Rana who mostly operates from Jharkhand. He used to hire criminals to run his extortion and other organised crime syndicate in Rourkela. “Most of these criminals work in small groups. Each of them has specific roles. While some would conduct recee, the others would threaten businessman by firing or hurling bombs to extort money,” said SP, Bhamoo, adding that the criminals used to smuggle Ganja to Jharkhand from Odisha. Similarly, they used to procure firearms from the neighbouring State.