Police patrol the Goaltore forest after Monday’s encounter. Picture by Samir Mondal

Midnapore, Dec. 7: Three Maoists were caught along with arms this morning for the first time since the police crackdown began in Lalgarh six months ago.

Suspected guerrillas have been held in the past, but never with arms, giving the Maoist-backed People’ Committee Against Police Atrocities the scope to claim they were innocent villagers.

Around 10 last night, police learnt that some 30 rebels were camping at Batashole village near Goaltore after committing a murder at Pingboni, about 5km away.

Three hundred state and central force personnel set off from three camps — at Kadashole, Ramgarh and Goaltore — at 3.30am. They left behind their vehicles at Pingboni and began a quiet trek through a thick forest. It took them an hour and, at 5am, they were on the fringes of Batashole. It was still dark when they started taking up positions around the small village, in a forest clearing.

Barely had they done that when shots rang out. The Maoists had got wind of the raid. The police retaliated and the gun battle went on for the next three hours.

Around eight in the morning, the Maoists realised they had been outnumbered. The guerrillas started to flee, firing while they retreated. But the police had surrounded most of the village by then.

“Halfway through the gun battle, the Maoists had started to flee in ones and twos. So, when we finally surrounded the village, we didn’t expect to find anyone,” an officer conceded. However, a door-to-door search started.

When the search was nearing its end, the forces suddenly found three men trying to sneak out of a rundown hut.

The three stopped at the door as they realised the police were all around them. Inside the hut were three single-barrel guns.

“The three Maoists had run out of bullets,” said district superintendent of police Manoj Verma. “All three guns were licensed single-barrel rifles stolen from villagers.”

The captured trio have been identified as Asit Mahato, Biswajit Rajak and Buddheswar Mahato. They had fled their homes in neighbouring Nishchindipur village around the time the joint forces began their operations in June.

“We knew they had turned Maoists,” Verma said. “The squad they joined killed scho-olteacher Satyanarayan Hansda recently. Last night, they shot dead Sanatan Pratihar in Pingboni.” Hansda had been trying to build a villagers’ resistance against the rebels.

The police were checking out on the Pingboni murder when they got the tip-off that led to the arrests.

Verma said: “This is a huge boost for us. We can’t anymore be accused on not being able to capture armed Maoists. This proves we are getting closer to busting their operations.”

In another incident, the police caught a suspected Maoist while he was planting an improvised explosive device at Dherua, about 40km from Lalgarh.