Hyderabad:
Operation Greenhunt to flush out Maoists in Chhattisgarh has put the Andhra Pradesh police on tenterhooks.
The police are worried that after a lull in Naxal violence in the state for the last three years, there could be trouble in the offing as many Maoists may re-enter the border districts.
Andhra Pradesh Police is upping the vigil in the border districts of Telangana, apprehensive that Maoists on the backfoot in Chhattisgarh may make their presence felt in these areas.
Police officers posted on the Andhra-Chhattisgarh border admit increase in Maoist presence along the Godavari River and the forest areas of Karimnagar, Warangal and Khammam districts.
There are reports of local guerilla squads, which means groups of three armed Maoists, visiting villages, enquiring about their problems and threatening informers.
"There is some spurt in their activities and some incidents also have occurred in the recent past," said R R Girish Kumar, DGP, Andhra Pradesh.
Maoist sympathiser Varavara Rao says the Maoist retreat from the Telangana region in 2006, was at best temporary.
"They are trying for a long time to re-enter north Telangana, particularly because north Telangana, the leadership is not lost. The entire leadership is intact, guiding from outside," said Varavara Rao.
Andhra Pradesh is also apprehensive that Operation Greenhunt in Chhattisgarh may also bring a huge influx of tribal refugees.