East Champaran superintendent of police Ganesh Kumar. Picture by Ajit Kumar Verma

Motihari, May 25: East Champaran superintendent of police (SP) Ganesh Kumar has received a text message, purportedly sent by the Maoists, threatening to kill him. The same message has been sent to a journalist working with a Hindi daily.

The message reads: “Stop atrocities on our fellows, or be prepared for an open war.” The message further said that if action against “our people” does not stop in the next eight hours, the SP would have o face dire consequences.

The sender did not specify where he was messaging from ot which organisation he/she belonged to. Neither did the message specify against whom they intended to fight the battle.

Meanwhile, even though the language of the message was quite vague, it indicated that it came from a member of the CPI(Maoist). The SP is facing ire of Maoists because he has launched a drive against the Naxalites. Six guerrillas were killed at Darmaha village under Kesariya police station on March 13.

The text message was first sent to the scribe at 4.41pm on May 21 and thrice yesterday. The same SMS was even sent to the SP yesterday. The message read: “Teen dino ke andar maara jayega SP Ganesh Kumar (SP Ganesh Kumar will be killed in the next three days).” The messages were sent from the same cellphone number (9097564145).

Ganesh Kumar confirmed to The Telegraph that he has received the threat message yesterday.

“I believe this message is the handiwork of some criminals,” the SP said.

He said an investigation has been started in this matter and efforts are on to trace the person who sent the text message. Ganesh said there have been various instances of criminals using cellphones of innocent and illiterate persons to send such messages. “Such acts are often used to vex others. The culprit would be nabbed soon,” the SP said.

The people of the district, who have come to know about the messages, have been shocked, more so as such a thing has never happened before.

“People are shocked to see such a daring act of the criminals during chief minister Nitish Kumar’s susashan, where they are threatening the top police officer of a district,” R.P. Sharma, a teacher, said.

RJD district president Bachha Prasad Yadav said: “No SP of any other district has ever been threatened with such text messages under the past governments.”