Chhattisgarh Police may get custody of woman Maoist leader Sujatha wanted in several attacks in Bijapur district

Nearly after a year her arrest, Chhattisgarh Police may finally get the custody of a woman Maoist leader from Telangana, who was produced before the Bijapur district court on Thursday. The woman Maoist, Sujatha alias Nagaram Rupa alias Lokesh Saramma, wife of another Maoist leader Azad alias Koyda Sambaiyya, was wanted in a couple of Maoist incidents in the LWE-sensitive Bijapur district of Chhattisgarh. [caption id=“attachment_7408931” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Sujatha aka Nagaram Rupa. Image courtesy: Debobrat Ghose[/caption] Sujatha (32), who was a member of a divisional committee of CPI (Maoist) and carried a prize of Rs 8 lakh on her head, was arrested in Warangal by Telangana Police in October 2018. According to a source in Bijapur district police, the arrested Maoist has been brought to Chhattisgarh from Central Jail in Warangal on a production warrant. “She was arrested by Warangal police in October last year and since then she has been in the Central Jail in Warangal. After we came to know that she’s in prison, we have brought her to Bijapur on a production warrant. As the Bijapur (district) police wants her custody, she was presented before the chief judicial magistrate today. We’re waiting for the court to decide on her status,” the police source told Firstpost. The Bijapur district police want her custody to know more about her alleged involvement in some of the Maoist incidents in Bijapur district. If Chhattisgarh Police gets Sujatha’s custody (she’s expected to be in judicial custody), it may bring some relief to them, especially after the recent blast in Kanker that killed three people. Chhattisgarh Police apparently came under pressure after the Maoists blew up an oil tanker by triggering an IED blast that killed three people in Kanker district on 24 September — a day after the Dantewada bypoll. Though the bye-election was peacefully conducted and security forces were hailed for the same, the police was caught unaware about the incident the very next day. Who’s Sujatha? Sujatha, who belongs to Rudraram tehsil in Jayashankar Bhupalpalli district of Telangana, was a divisional committee member of Telangana unit of CPI (Maoist). According to Bijapur district police, Sujatha had been actively involved in Maoist cadre since 2000. Though she was based in Telangana, her area of operation in Chhattisgarh was Dandakaranya Special Zone in South Bastar (Pamed and Basaguda in Bijapur district). She’s allegedly involved in a couple of Maoist incidents in Bijapur. Besides Telangana and Chhattisgarh, she had also operated in Maharashtra and Odisha.