26-year-old Maoist held in Delhi

New Delhi: A 26-year-old Maoist, wanted in Jharkhand for ambushing a police patrol party in 2014, was arrested in the national capital, Delhi Police said on Monday.

Chandeshwar Yadav, carrying a reward of Rs.5 lakh on his head, was taken into custody following a tip off from west Delhi's Kapashera area overnight on Sunday, Deputy Commissioner of Police Sanjeev Yadav told IANS.

Yadav, the sub-zonal commander of banned Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-M), hails from Bihar's Gaya district. He was absconding after carrying out an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) blast and firing in an ambush on a patrolling police party on December 23, 2014.

One policeman died and another was injured in the attack at Itkhori town in Chatra district, around 150 km from Ranchi. Police said Yadav was the key executioner of the ambush.

"The security forces were on Yadav's trail after the ambush, but he had been elusive and had shifted to Delhi in March. A Rs.5 lakh reward was declared for his arrest by the Jharkhand government," the official said.

Police said Yadav had taken shelter in a Kapashera colony where most of the dwellers are from Bihar and Jharkhand.

Yadav told police that he joined the Maoist group in 2013 to avenge his thrashing by his uncle over a dispute over a cattle shed.

In May 2014, he was taken to the Baroti jungles by a senior Maoist Kaushal where he met Indal Singh and Alok Yadav, two other senior Maoists, who indoctrinated him in the Maoist philosophy.

Soon, he became an important figure of the CPI-M organisation and began visiting villages to spread the banned organisation's message.

(IANS)