Odishatv Bureau
New Delhi: In light of the Supreme Court`s judgement on disarming SPOs in Chattisgarh, the Centre will soon hold a meeting of Chief Ministers of various states where local people have been engaged in fighting Maoists, insurgency or militancy.

Union Home Minister P Chidambaram told reporters here on Wednesday that he had got a judgement copy late last night and that he had not read it fully.

"I got a copy of the judgement very late last night. I was reading the earlier judgement on black money then this judgement came. I have not yet fully read the judgement. I have read the operative portions of the judgement.

"There are a number of directions issued to the Chhattisgarh government and they (the judges) have asked for a compliance report from the Union government and the Chhattisgarh government within a period of six weeks," Chidambaram said.

The Home Minister said there were many parts of the judgement where there was no controversy but there were "some areas of the judgements which are to be read carefully, reflected upon carefully and I would have to discuss it with the Chief Ministers concerned to see what impact it will have on the anti-Maoists operations."

The court had termed as "unconstitutional" the practice of deploying Special Police Officers in campaigns like Salwa Judum launched by the Chhattisgarh government to fight Maoists.

It had criticised support and funding of SPOs in campaigns like `Koya Commandos` and Salwa Judum, an armed civilian vigilante group whose numbers have gone up from 3,000 to 6,500 within a year.

Chidambaram said that SPOs had been engaged in other states especially in northeast to fight insurgency.

The trend of hiring local villagers in militancy-hit Jammu and Kashmir bore rich dividends in fight against Pakistan-sponsored militancy, according to official sources.

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