Raipur: A flight engineer was killed when an IAF helicopter on poll duty was attacked by Naxals who also gunned down a CRPF personnel during the first phase of Assembly elections in Chhattisgarh on Friday.
Two landmine blasts triggered by Maoists also injured four security men and over a dozen Electronic Voting Machines were looted.
The first of the two-phased elections recorded an estimated 55 per cent turnout, Election Commission said in New Delhi.
In an audacious attack at the conclusion of the first phase. Naxals fired at an Indian Air Force (IAF) Mi-8 helicopter ferrying the sealed Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) to storage centres killing a flight engineer identified as Sergeant Mustafa Ali.
The incident took place near Bijapur in the Naxal-infested parts of the State.
The chopper was carrying EC officials and a few injured BSF jawans from Pedia to Bijapur. Soon after the Mi-8 took off, it came under heavy, indiscriminate fire, the IAF official said.
"The helicopter's rotor blade, engine and fuselage were hit by bullets, but the pilot Wg Cdr T K Chaudhary managed to fly it safety to Jagdalpur, saving the lives of other passengers," he added.
EC sources, however, said: "A bullet shattered the helicopter's windshield and hit a flight engineer, killing him."
The CRPF personnel was killed in Dantewada district when security forces accompanying poll officials at the end of voting were attacked by Naxals.
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