The Central Reserve Police Force has decided to withdraw its elite CoBRA force from Jammu and Kashmir following objections to its deployment from some senior officials of the paramilitary force, sources said on Thursday.

The anti-Maoist Combat Battalion for Resolute Action (CoBRA) had been deployed for the first time in the Union territory in mid-September.

“Some senior CRPF officers objected to the CoBRA deployment in Kashmir saying the unit was specifically trained to counter Maoists in jungle warfare,” a CRPF official said.

The CRPF, which has over 3 lakh personnel, is the leading internal security combat unit and has been deployed in Jammu and Kashmir for counter-terror operations.

Sources said some CoBRA companies had been removed earlier this year from Bihar and Jharkhand and sent for further training in Kashmir following a decline in Maoist violence in the two states. After three months’ training they were deployed in the Union territory.

“The move did not go down well with some senior officers, who said the threat of Maoist violence was not over yet,” another CRPF official said.

Sources said Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand had together accounted for over 70 per cent of the Maoist violence in the country over the past few years.

Some 22 security personnel were killed in April 2021 after the rebels ambushed them inside a forest in Chhattisgarh. This was the biggest casualty suffered by the security forces at the hands of the Maoists since April 2017, when 25 CRPF personnel were killed in an ambush in Sukma, Chhattisgarh.

In 2008, the Centre raised the 10,000-strong CoBRA force under the command and control of the CRPF to counter the Maoists. The elite force was trained in Maoist intelligence techniques and strategy. CoBRA teams are now deployed across Maoist-affected regions.

The CoBRA force is headquartered in the National Capital Region and has battalion headquarters in every Naxalite-hit state including Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.

Sources said the Centre was considering raising another special force, on a par with the Greyhounds in Andhra Pradesh, to take on the Maoists in Chhattisgarh, Odisha and Jharkhand.

The Greyhounds were established in 1989. They are a dedicated anti-Maoist force for Andhra Pradesh, where the Maoist movement suffered multiple setbacks before
being forced to move into neighbouring Chhattisgarh and Odisha.