NIA arrests banned Naxal outfit’s ‘supremo’ Dinesh Gope

According to the NIA investigations, criminal cases are registered against the accused in Jharkhand, Bihar and Odisha.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has arrested Dinesh Gope, a self-styled supremo of the People’s Liberation Front of India (PLFI), a proscribed Naxal outfit of Jharkhand. The accused was involved in over 102 criminal cases and carried a reward of ₹30 lakh.

A case was registered against Gope by the NIA in a case relate to the seizure of ₹25.38 lakh demonetised notes from the PLFI operatives in 2016. An absconder for almost two decades, he was arrested in New Delhi.

According to the NIA investigations, criminal cases are registered against the accused in Jharkhand, Bihar and Odisha. Most of them relate to murders, abductions, threats, extortion, and raising funds for the PLFI, a militant Maoist outfit formed in 2007. It is a splinter group of the Communist Party of India (Maoist).

Initially, the Jharkhand Police had announced a reward of ₹25 lakh for providing information about Gope. Later, the NIA had also declared a reward of ₹5 lakh for leads on Gope.

On February 3, 2022, an encounter had taken place between a Gope-led PLFI squad and security personnel in the forest area under Gudri police station of West Singhbhum district of Jharkhand. Several rounds were fired in the encounter before the rebels sneaked into the forest.

Gope also managed to escape and had been shifting base since then to evade arrest. He had also been making efforts re-establish the PLFI’s stronghold in Jharkhand.