20-year-old killed by IED in Bijapur, India

A 20-year-old male was killed by an improvised explosive device (IED) in Bijapur, Chhattisgarh, India, on Sunday 18 January, prompting a search operation by local security forces.

Indian media have reported that the victim, named as Aayta Kuhrami, had gone to a nearby forest before stepping on a pressure IED that had been planted by Maoist insurgents. Kuhrami is reported to have suffered severe injuries to his legs as a result of the explosion, and succumbed to his injuries while being transferred to hospital for emergency treatment.

Following the blast, security forces launched search and sanitation operations in the nearby forested area and deployed bomb disposal squads to detect and neutralise any other unexploded devices. While civilians use such forest routes for daily activities, police have said that insurgents routinely lay IEDs along the road to target local security forces, making the threat of hidden explosives particularly acute.

The Maoist insurgents, known as the Naxalites, have staged a low-level insurgency against the Indian government as far back as the 1960s, with its peak occurring in the 2000s. In October 2025, the Indian government declared that only three districts were most affected by Naxalite insurgents, down from the previous total of six in March. The most affected districts were named as Bijapur, Sukma and Narayanpur, all in the south of Chhattisgarh.

The death of Aayta Kuhrami followed another incident on 5 January when a 15-year-old boy was injured after stepping on an IED in the same district. According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal, over 12,000 people have been killed in the conflict since March 2000.