At least 41 security personnel, including 17 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) men, were missing and nine injured in a fierce gun battle with naxals in Dantewada district of Chhattisgarh. "Twenty-two Special Police Force personnel, 17 CRPF men and two personnel of the district police are missing after the last night gunbattle with naxals in Elampatti-Regadgatta jungle, about 550 km from here," a top police official told the Press Trust of India (PTI) over phone from Dantewada Tuesday. "As many as 115 personnel had gone for the joint anti-naxal operation in the area. While 71 personnel came back in the night and three returned this morning, 41 are still missing," the official said. Among the returnees, nine are injured, officials said, adding that the condition of three of them is stated to be serious and that they have been shifted to a hospital in Jagdalpur, divisional headquarters of Bastar district.
