Ashok Chakra for Odisha Police Officer who sacrificed life fighting Naxals

Pramod Kumar Satpathy, an Assistant Commandant of the Odisha Police’s Special Operations Group (SOG) has been awarded the Ashok Chakra posthumously for sacrificing his life while fighting the Naxals, home ministry officials said on Sunday.

Satpathy laid down his life on February 16, 2008 during a fire-fight between the security forces and the Maoists in the Gosama jungle of Ganjam district and adjoining areas of Phulbani district.

Keeping in view his heroism and bravery, Satpathy was awarded the gallantry medal Ashok Chakra posthumously. The Ashok Chakra is the country’s military award for valour, courage action and self-sacrifice. It is first in order of precedence of peacetime gallantry awards.

On February 15, 2008, at about 10.30 PM, more than 500 heavily armed Naxals carried out simultaneous and multi-pronged attacks on the police training school (PTS) armouries located in Nayagarh police station, two other police stations and one outpost of Nayagarh and one police station and one outpost in Ganjam, the officials said.

Naxalite cadres, many of them from Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh and Jharkhand, participated in the operation in which more than 1,200 weapons of various categories, including sophisticated ones, were looted and 14 police personnel and one civilian lost their lives.

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