Roads, security camps & a bridge put Bastar villages on poll map. Maoists resist with pamphlets & bombs

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Key Points

The students of a primary school in Cherpal deep inside the Dantewada district in Chhattisgarhs Bastars division recently found pamphlets carrying these lines strewn on the floor of their classrooms...

The school will, after decades, serve as a polling centre one of 40 voting centres across the seven districts of Bastar division (Kankel, Narayanpur, Kondagaon, Bijapur, Dantewada, Jagdalpur and Sukma) that are being restored to their original locations after being shifted at a distance for security reasons...

New roads, security camps and a bridge across the Indravati river promise to provide voters a safe and convenient route to polling booths..

Here, according to a senior official of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), the Maoists are setting off locally made bombs in the dead of night.. Himanshu Lal, an assistant commandant of the CRPF stationed at the forces Chhindnar camp by the Indravati river, said the noise of the explosions, amplified by the stillness of Bastars wilderness, is designed to spread fear among the local residents ahead of the election...

As acknowledged by Behera, despite the authorities setting up these new polling booths in areas of Bastar division that were once considered liberated zones under the influence of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), many intended beneficiaries will not be able cast their vote on 7 November...

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