Odisha govt removes five districts from Naxal SRE scheme

The Odisha government has approved the removal of five districts -- Angul, Boudh, Sambalpur, Deogarh, and Nayagarh -- from the Naxal Security Related Expenditure (SRE) Scheme, an official statement said on Friday.

"Thus, eleven districts have so far been assessed to be free of Maoist activities in a span of two years, largely due to the impact of security response and good governance by the State Government," Odisha Police said in a statement.

It said that robust security response, as well as focused developmental activities, have brought about a turn around in the situation in the state, especially in the last few years.

"In April 2018, six districts -- Jajpur, Dhenkanal, Keonjhar, Mayurbhanj, Gajapati, and Ganjam -- were declared as free from Maoist activities and those districts were removed from the Central Govt. sponsored Security Related Expenditure (SRE) Scheme, a scheme exclusively meant for capacity building for Maoist affected districts," the statement said.

"The progressive fizzling out of the Maoist influence in the state is indicative of the growing acceptance by the people to the developmental agenda of the State Govt. and their disenchantment towards the obsolete Maoist ideology," it added.

Odisha has been experiencing the scourge of Naxal activities for more than three decades.

As many as 19 of the 30 districts in the state were earlier declared as SRE districts, it said.

( With inputs from ANI )