A Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) cadre, identified as Ratan Kashyap alias Salam (31), involved in the killing of three Policemen and carrying a reward of INR 500,000 on his head, was killed in a gunbattle with Security Forces (SFs) in the forest near Mangnar village under Barsur Police Station limits in Dantewada District of Chhattisgarh on January 16, reports Deccan Herald. Personnel of the District Reserve Guard (DRG) and Bastar Fighters (BF), both State Police units, and the Central Reserve Police Force's (CRPF) 195th battalion were out on an anti-Naxal [Left Wing Extremism, LWE] operation after receiving intelligence inputs about the presence of armed Naxals of the Aamdai Area Committee in the Mangnar Forest, a senior Police official said. Kashyap was the Todma ‘Militia Platoon Deputy Commander’ as well as an Aamdai ‘Area Committee Member (ACM)’ of the outlawed Maoist organisation, the officer added. In 2020, Kashyap was involved in an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) blast in which two Policemen were killed and in the murder of a Policeman elsewhere in the Mardum area of Bastar District, the official said. Kashyap was involved in a total of nine Naxal violence incidents in Dantewada and Bastar Districts, he added.