Bhubaneswar/Raipur, March 28: The police superintendent of Chhattisgarh's Sukma district today said that John Szlazak, the Canadian national who went missing in a forest in the area close to the Odisha border, was "safe" in the custody of tribal villagers.

Sukma superintendent of police Abhishek Meena today told an Odia news channel that Szlazak, who was on a bicycle expedition from Mumbai to Bastar, was safe in the insurgency-hit district's Kistaram village, where the local tribals had detained him as they failed to understand his language.

"The villagers got suspicious as they could not communicate with him," Meena said.

The Canadian national had left Mumbai on March 14 and reached the south Bastar district of Sukma yesterday.

He probably had travelled on the route from Bhadrachalam in Telangana to reach Kistaram in Sukma where he was spotted for the last time, a police officer said.

Initially, it was suspected that Maoists had kidnapped Szlazak as the rebels are active in the remote area.

Szlazak had left Mumbai on March 14 and entered Chhattisgarh via Gadchirauli in Maharashtra. A massive search operation was launched in Chhattisgarh and Odisha to trace him.

Following reports of kidnapping, external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj had sought a report from the Odisha government about the incident.

The Union minister had then tweeted: "We are seized of the matter. I have asked for a report from Government of Odisha."

After speaking to chief minister Naveen Patnaik on the issue, Swaraj again tweeted last evening:

"I have spoken to Shri Naveen Patnaik, Chief Minister reg the reported abduction of a Canadian national in Koraput district of Odisha."

At that point of time, the administration thought that Szlazak was somewhere in Odisha's Malkangiri.

Meena said that instead of resorting to police action to rescue the Canadian, the administration was trying to send a message to the village where he was being detained to assure the tribal villagers that he was a "neutral citizen".

Sources in the Chhattisgarh police said Szlazak, a Canadian social worker, was touring Chhattisgarh's Bastar region on a cycle.

He had gone missing last evening from Singanmadgu forest in Sukma. After the villagers "detained" him because of a communication gap, he generated an emergency alert on the global positioning system (GPS) installed in his bike.

Shortly after his GPS alert was intercepted, the Chhattisgarh police launched an operation to trace him.

"We only have information about a Canadian national named John Szlazak being spotted in South Sukma area yesterday. We are trying to verify the facts," inspector general of police (in-charge) Bastar Range Sundarraj P told PTI today. "Only after establishing contact with the foreign national, we would be able to say whether he was abducted by someone or he lost his way."

Additional police superintendent of Sukma Jitendra Shukla said search for the foreigner was carried out even though no formal missing complaint had been lodged.

"He seems to be carrying something like a GPS transmitter with him," he said.

Odisha director general of police K.B. Singh said: "Chhattisgarh police are on alert and we have also alerted all our police stations in the border areas as well."

Malkangiri police superintendent Mitrabhanu Mohapatra, who is in regular touch with Sukma that is just 30km away from Malkangiri town, said they had no official information about the Canadian national being in their area.

Both Malkangiri and Sukma are Maoist strongholds. The rebels had stunned Odisha government in 2011 by kidnapping the then Malkangiri collector, R. Vineel Krishna, who they released after a week with the government conceding some of their major demands. A year later, Chhattisgarh Maoists also abducted the then Sukma collector, Alex Paul Menon.