Malkangiri, Orissa: Naval divers on Monday joined the search for 35 personnel of an elite anti-naxal force, who were feared drowned in a reservoir on the Orissa - Andhra Pradesh border after Maoists rained bullets on a launch carrying them and sank it.
Search and rescue operations were intensified with the naval divers pressed into service at the site, where a joint operation of the Andhra Pradesh and Orissa's fire brigade and police personnel is underway to look for the missing jawans and the sunk vessel, Malkangiri superintendent of police S K Gajbhiye said.
Out of the 64 people, mostly from the Andhra Pradesh's elite Greyhound force besides two Orissa police constables, who were on board the launch, as many as 29 have so far managed to swim to safety, while 35 others still remained untraced, he said.
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Reddy said that the greyhounds personnel there did what they thought was correct and it is not an intelligence failure.
A red alert was sounded in the entire Chitrakonda area following the incident at the Balimela reservoir near Alampekka village in Orissa's Malkangiri district.
A massive combing operation was also launched in Chitrakonda and adjoining areas in Andhra Pradesh by security personnel from both sides, Gajbhiye said.
Three launches, including two ambulance vessels, several motor boats and ordinary vessels were involved in the operation to trace the missing personnel, he added.
Senior police officers from Orissa and Andhra Pradesh were supervising the operation.
The launch carrying the jawans, was pounded by bullets from hilltops near Alampetta village yesterday while sailing to Chitrakonda across Balimela reservoir on the border with Andhra Pradesh for a joint operation against the Maoists.
On Sunday, in a major Maoist attack, over 36 jawans of the elite anti-Naxal force are feared dead in Orissa's Malkangiri district.
Around 65 people, most of them belonging to Andhra Pradesh's greyhound force were travelling to Chirakonda by a motor boat across the Balimela reservoir on the Orissa-Andhra border.
They came under fire from the Maoists from a hill-top while 28 of them swam to safety, others remain missing.