12-day hostage crisis ends, Sukma collector released in India's Chhattisgarh state

Raipur (Chhattisgarh, India), May 4 (PTI) After 12 days in captivity, Sukma Collector Alex Paul Menon was released unharmed by the ultra left Maoists on Thursday night bringing to an end the hostage crisis in the central Indian state of Chattisgarh marked by some anxious moments just before he stepped out of the rebel stronghold. The 32-year-old 2006-batch officer of the Indian Administrative Service, abducted on April 21 at Sukma, about 450 km south of here, while touring a village was handed over to the two Maoist mediators B D Sharma and Prof G Hargopal in the evening and brought by road to a Central Reserve Police Force base camp at Chintalnar, about 150 km from Sukma. Menon, who is an asthmatic and for whom medicines had to be rushed last week, in his first comments after being freed thanked Chattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh, the state authorities, the mediators from the Government and the Maoist side, his family and friends, saying but for their cooperation his release would have been delayed. "I am ok," Menon said when asked how his health was and when pressed further said, "I am tired, shattered. I would like to go home." Menon, whose wife is in the family way and is at Sukma where he is posted, about 150 km from Chintalnar, said he will speak to newsmen later. When asked whether he will like to continue to hold his post in Sukma, Menon said, " I will work wherever government will ask me. If they want me to remain here (in Sukma), I will do so." In Chennai in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, a greatly relieved Menon's father A Varadhas profusely thanked Chhattisgarh authorities for the efforts they took leading to the "happy occasion". N Baijendra Kumar, Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister, said the state government immediately issued orders to form a review committee under an agreement to do so within an hour after the release of the Collector. The agreement that was reached by the two mediators each of the Chattisgarh government and the Maoists at their fourth round of talks on April 30 paved the way for the release of the IAS officer. Under the agreement, the government had agreed to set upa high-powered committee under the chairmanship of NirmalaBuch, one of the two Government mediators, to review the casesof all prisoners languishing in Chattisgarh jails including the cases demanded by the Maoists. Chief Minister Raman Singh said the three-member committee, which also included the state chief secretary and the police chief, will be meeting right away. PTI