Communist rebels pose single biggest threat to India, PM says

Communist rebels roaming India's hinterlands pose the country's single biggest threat, the prime minister said Thursday, calling for the creation of special police forces to combat the increasingly well-armed and organized insurgents.

The communists, known as Naxalites, are undermining efforts to spread India's economic boom to hundreds of millions of people being left behind, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said. "The answers to the problem are well known. We need to cripple Naxalite forces with all the means at our command."

India has long contended with scores of militant and insurgent groups, from Islamic extremists blamed for bombings that have …