Bhubaneswar, Nov. 20: Maoists gunned down two persons, including a woman, at Bailigumma village in Badapada panchayat of Chitrakonda block in Malkangiri district, around 650 kilometres from here, last night.

The rebels suspected the duo to be police informers. The village is located in the cut off areas of the block.

Besides, the rebels have called a bandh in the area today demanding withdrawal of security forces and a halt to anti-naxal operations. This has disrupted normality to some extent. But, the district administration informed that they were prepared and security forces had been deployed to counter any violence by the rebels.

The police identified the deceased duo as Laxmi Khara, 37, and Sathirao Hantala, 45.

Sources said the rebels stormed into the village late last night, called these two out of their houses and gunned them down on the spot.

After killing the two, the rebels immediately left the village.

A source in the police said Hantala, who was earlier working for the Maoists, had later snapped ties with them.

Malkangiri superintendent of police A.K. Singh said a police team had gone to the village to probe the matter.

“We got to know that the Maoists have killed two persons suspecting them to be our informers. But, these people were not our informers. We have started a combing operation in the area to track the killers,” said the police superintendent.

The murder coincided with a bandh call given by the Maoists of the Andhra-Odisha border areas demanding removal of security forces from their areas.

The Maoists have also pasted posters at many places at Narayanpatna in Koraput. They have allegedly threatened the local elected representatives with dire consequence if they do not resign from their posts.

As the Maoists of the Andhra-Odisha border areas have called the strike, the intelligence wing is keeping a tab on different inter- state routes where there are fears of the rebels planting landmines.