Jharkhand police chief rules out Naxal threat on Dhoni

Jharkhands Director General of Police J B Mahapatra has denied reports that cricket star Mahendra Singh Dhoni faced any Naxal threat.

Ranchi, May 28 : Jharkhand's Director General of Police J B Mahapatra has denied reports that cricket star Mahendra Singh Dhoni faced any Naxal threat.

"There is no danger or threat to Dhoni," Mahapatra said.

According to a report published in an English daily, Jharkhand Police were probing the authenticity of a letter that stated that Naxalites from Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh intended to eliminate skipper Rahul Dravid, Dhoni and three Indian Cricket Board officials -- Sharad Pawar, Niranjan Shah and Rajiv Shukla for promoting an upper class sport like cricket, which was affecting development.

The letter was found during a raid on a Naxalite hideout in Chhattisgarh's Dantewada last Friday.

"We don't know anything about it," the DGP said when asked whether any such letter was being scrutinised by the State police.

The Union Government had last year spelt out a policy to combat the challenge posed by Naxals. The 14-point policy calls on States to adopt a collective approach and pursue a coordinated response to counter it.

It also emphasises that there will be no peace dialogue between the affected State Governments and the Naxal groups unless the latter agree to give up violence and arms.

The affected States have also been told to further improve the police response, pursue effective and sustained police action against Naxalites and their infrastructure individually and jointly.

According to the Government, Naxalism is not merely a law and order problem.

"The policy of the Government is to address this menace simultaneously on political, security, development and public perception management fronts in a holistic manner," the policy says.

The counter-strategy also refers to modernisation of the State police, revision of security-related expenditure, supply of mine protected vehicles, long-term deployment of Central Para-Military Forces, deployment of Sashastra Seema Bal along the Indo-Nepal border, revision of guidelines to permit 40 per cent recruitment in Central forces form the border areas and naxal-affected areas.

Dwelling upon the social, developmental and political measures, it said the Centre has provided financial assistance of Rs. 2,475 crores for 55 naxal-affected districts in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal under the Backward Districts Initiative (BDI).

On the incidents of violence, the White Paper shows while 515 people died in 2003, the number of deaths went up to 566 in 2004, 669 in 2005 and 749 in 2006.

ANI