Digvijay against use of air power against naxals

Mirzapur (UP), May 18 (PTI) Senior Congress leader
Digvijay Singh Tuesday disfavoured use of air force in dealing
with naxalism, a day after India's Home Minister P Chidambaram
said he was trying to "convince" the Cabinet on providing air
support to anti-naxal operations.
"Those who talk about this do not know the terrain of
the area (Dantewada)," Singh told reporters here when asked
whether he favoured the use of air force or army in anti-naxal
operations in the wake of Monday's Maoist attack in
Chhattisgarh state in central India.
His views came a day after Chidambaram said security
forces and Chief Ministers of Bengal, Maharashtra, Andhra
Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Orissa states were asking for
air-support and he had tried to "convince" the Union Cabinet
on the issue.
The AICC General Secretary, who had recently criticised
the approach of Chidambaram and the Home Ministry in tackling
naxalism in a newspaper article, advocated talks and a
multi-pronged strategy to deal with the problem.
"Even the Prime Minister and the Home Minister have
talked about using a multi-pronged strategy," he said.
Singh underlined the importance of development at
the lowest level to fight the naxalites. "We have to win over
the people of the area..." he added.
On Monday's attack by naxals in Dantewada, the
Congress leader attacked the Chhattisgarh government, saying
the incident was a result of the "utter failure" of the state
government.
He asked where the Chhattisgarh police was and why
operation to detect landmines in an important road was not
carried out.
Singh contended that the strategy adopted by the Raman
Singh government was not realistic.
He said more than 800 villages and 70,000 tribals have
been displaced to places away from their villages which have
been abandoned. "The whole area has been handed over to the
naxalites," he said.
The former Chief Minister of the united Madhya Pradesh,
however, appreciated the role of the central government saying
it had "fulfilled its responsibility" by providing
paramilitary forces and funds whenever required.
Referring to the neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, Singh said
the government there won the confidence of the people by
adopting pro-development strategy.
"Chhattisgarh has to take lessons from the Andhra
Pradesh government," he said, adding that the Bhartiya Janata
Party (BJP) does not know how to tackle the issue. PTI