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Bodies are seen near the mangled wreckage of a bus which hit a landmine in Dantewada district on May 17, 2010. Maoist rebels blew up a bus carrying police and civilians in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh May 17, killing more than 25 people. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)
Maoists detonated a landmine on a bus in central India on Monday, killing 31 and wounding 27 passengers. The explosion took place in Dantewada District, the state of Chhattisgarh. Indian media reported that a Maoist named Ravula Srinivas, alias Ramana, was responsible. He said in a phone interview that the attack was revenge on Special Police Officers, 30 of whom were traveling on the bus.
The police recovered an aluminum wire used to trigger the mine, which ran 250 meters (820 feet) from the blast site to behind a dam where a Maoist in hiding detonated it. Kalashnikov shells suggested a short firefight between the Maoists and the Special Police Officers.
Since October 2009 Operation Green Hunt has been fighting the rebels after 10 years of passivity, focusing on five states in central India, Maoists control: West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar, Orissa, and Chhattisgarh. On Tuesday the Home Minister P. Chidambaram asked for air support against the rebels, which was rejected, as senior defense officers want to prevent civilian casualties. An attempt to talk to the Maoists was rejected by Ramana. Instead the Maoists called a two-day strike to protest against Operation Green Hunt affecting mostly central and eastern India.
