India: Delays Homecoming In Chhattisgarh – Analysis

By Deepak Kumar Nayak

On November 7, 2024, Padam Some (29), a top-ranking female Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) cadre, carrying a reward of INR 100,000 on her head, surrendered to the Police and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in Sukma District. Padam, a resident of Chhote Kedwal under the Chintalnar Police Station limits in Sukma District, was involved in Naxalite [Left Wing Extremism, LWE] activities in Thana Golapalli, Maraiguda, Kistaram, and the Chintagufa area. She was the ‘president’ of the Singhanamdagu Revolutionary People’s Committee (RPC)’s ‘Janatana Sarkar‘ (people’s government of the Maoists) and used to be very active in the organization. 

On October 29, 2024, five CPI-Maoist cadres, including a female Maoist on whom a reward of INR 500,000 had been announced, surrendered in Bijapur District. Those who surrendered include Sushila aka Bujji aka Vimala Hemla, who served as an ‘area committee member (ACM)’ and had joined the organisation in 2009, in the children’s wing of Maoists, and then worked as a ‘militia’ (‘base force’ a secondary force of the Maoists’ people’s army) member in 2013. She was mainly involved in firing on the Police party and Security Force (SF) personnel in January 2018 in Mutvendi village and in gun battles with Police in Pidmel, Jingaon, and Simepalli between 2018 and 2019. She was active till 2023. The other four were Sukhram Modiyam, Suddu Korsa, Lakku Farsa, and Sannu Madvi, who have been involved in serious criminal activities, including murder, attacking the Police, planting spike holes, digging roads, and using lethal weapons such as Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs), for a long time. The surrendered Maoists were associated with the Aheri ‘Area Committee’ of Gadchiroli Division and the ‘West Bastar Division Party’, and included ‘section commanders’ of the Bandepara RPC ‘militia’ as well as the Bodlapusanar Grama Rakshaka Dalam (GRD) ‘commander’.

On October 25, 2024, six CPI-Maoist cadres carrying a combined reward of INR 2.4 million on their heads surrendered before SFs in Sukma District. The surrendered Maoists, who had been active in the district, were identified as Pawan aka Kamalu Hemla, Bandu aka Bandi Sodi, Kunjam Roshan akaMahadev, Dashru aka Kotesh Sodi, and the two women Maoist cadres Kamala aka Bandi Dudhi and Madvi aka Nagul Sushila. 

These recent incidents of surrender are among many more by the CPI-Maoist cadres, who have surrendered citing that they have been troubled by the discrimination, neglect and atrocities on tribals in the Maoist organization. They have also stated that they were influenced by the surrender and rehabilitation policy of the government and decided to leave the path of violence and return to the mainstream to live a peaceful life. 

According to partial data compiled by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), at least 304 Naxalites have surrendered in Chhattisgarh in the current year, thus far (data till November 10, 2024). During the corresponding period of 2023, 159 Naxalites had surrendered in the state. Another, 28 Naxalitessurrendered in the remaining part of the year, taking the total to 187 through 2023. 182 Naxalites had surrendered in 2022 and 328 in 2021. Significantly, since March 6, 2000, when SATP started compiling data on Left Wing Extremism (LWE) across the country, at least 4,435 Naxalites have surrendered in the state. 

An analysis of the surrender data since March 6, 2000, suggests that around 96.39 per cent have taken place in the troubled Bastar Division Bastar Division, which is still considered a significant threat and the ‘Final Maoist Bastion,’ accounting for 4,275 surrenders, as compared to a total of 4,435 in Chhattisgarh. Such surrenders across the country stood at 17,180. 

The Bastar Division, spread over a geographical area of over 40,000 square kilometres, comprises seven of Chhattisgarh’s 33 districts: Bastar, Bijapur, Dantewada, Kanker, Kondagaon, Narayanpur, and Sukma. 

To facilitate the surrender of the Naxalites, some districts in the state launched specific initiatives to encourage insurgents to abandon their fight and to join the mainstream. Significantly, the Lon Varratu (a local Gondi dialect expression, meaning return to your home/village) Scheme was launched by Dantewada District Police on June 12, 2020, and it offered a range of incentives to encourage Naxalites to abandon their fight against the state and clear their names from Police records. So far 204 rewarded Naxalites have surrendered under this campaign, out of a total of 880 Naxalites who have joined the mainstream of society under this campaign (till October 21, 2024). Likewise, the Poona Narkom (a local Gondi dialect expression, meaning New Dawn) Scheme was launched by the Sukma District Police on August 9, 2021, and it offered medical facilities that were organised through medical camps in different places of the district, including the district headquarters, for the tribal villagers of rural areas, in collaboration with the district health department. Though the specific number of surrenders under the campaign have not been released, according to the SATP database, at least 436 surrenders have taken place Sukma district since then.

Moreover, on February 15, 2024, Chief Minister Vishnu Deo Sai disclosed that the Chhattisgarh government had decided to launch amenities and welfare schemes for villages in Maoist-affected regions of the state. Sai announced the Niyad Nellanar, scheme which emulates the Centre’s Pradhan Mantri Janjati Adivasi Nyaya Maha AbhiyaN (PM-JANMAN)scheme, catering to the socio-economic welfare of particularly vulnerable tribal groups (PVTGs). The initiative, which has been taken from the local Dandami term meaning ‘Your Good Village’, extends essential services and welfare benefits through security camps in Bastar. The ambit of these benefits is to extend to the villages situated within a five-kilometres radius of security camps.

Chief Minister Sai stated, “These security camps will act as not only the police camps, but also as multi-faceted development camps wherein the government will ensure the availability of over 25 basic amenities besides extending the benefits of 32 individual-focused government schemes in the Maoist-affected villages… The government has provisioned an additional Rs.20 crore for this scheme and, if needed, more funds will be provided by both central and state governments.”

In recent times, Bastar has seen the establishment of at least 14 new security camps, and these have been opened near the villages so that the people living within a radius of 5 kilometers will be provided the same facilities as the beneficiaries of the PM JANMAN Yojana implemented for special backward tribes. In these villages, all the families are provided housing facilities under the Prime Minister’s Housing Scheme, ration cards to all, free rice, gram-salt, jaggery and sugar to all, 4 free gas cylinders under the Ujjwala scheme, Anganwadi (rural child care centre) and community hall, similar to the special backward tribes, Sub Health Centre, Primary School, Irrigation pumps including bore wells for irrigation of farms, hand pumps, solar pumps, sports ground in every village, free electricity, bank Sakhi (women trained to facilitate banking operations), ATM, skill development, forest rights lease, mobile tower, DTH and TV. Facilities including helipads and bus facility till block the headquarters are also to be provided. 

In the interim, on October 7, 2024, as a final offer for Maoists to shun violence and join the mainstream, Chief Minister Sai announced that his government would soon come up with a surrender policy incorporating the best practices implemented by different states. In the proposed policy, the surrendered Maoists would be housed together in a colony under central schemes such as the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana.

Sai disclosed, further, “All surrendered Maoists could be housed together in such a colony, which could be in the district headquarters. They will be provided security in that place. It is still in a policy stage. Our deputy CM is visiting different states to study their surrender policy and incorporate the best practices. He has already been to Assam. They (surrendered Maoists) will be given jobs and training once the policy is introduced. We urge Maoists to join mainstream otherwise our forces from both Centre and state are fully prepared on the ground.”

Meanwhile, on September 20, 2024, Union Home Minister (UHM) and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah, while appealing to the Maoists to give up violence, lay down arms and surrender, set March 31, 2026, as the date to end Naxalism in the country. UHM Shah appealed to LWEs to abjure the path of violence and join the mainstream of society. Addressing 55 victims of Naxal violence 55 victims of Naxal violence , from Chhattisgarh under the aegis of Bastar Peace Committee at his residence in New Delhi on the same day, UHM Shah declared, 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has decided that Naxal violence and ideology will be wiped out from the country. March 31, 2026, has been fixed as the last day of Naxalism in this country and I ensure that we will finish Naxalism before that… I want to appeal to those who have picked up guns to surrender. In the Northeast and Jammu and Kashmir, many have surrendered and joined the mainstream. But if it does not happen, we will initiate operations and will ensure it is successful. 

Meanwhile, as many as 3,752 Naxalites have been arrested and 1,608 have been killed in the state in the current year, thus far (data till November 10, 2024). 

The number of surrenders of disillusioned Maoists are increasing gradually from the troubled Bastar division and erstwhile stronghold areas of the rebels in the state. With both the governments – state and union -comprehensively implementing the proposed surrender and rehabilitation policies, along with aggressive developmental initiatives, particularly in roads, infrastructure and communications, there is increasing likelihood that the remaining Naxalitesmay join the mainstream and lead a peaceful life in the state and across the country.

• Deepak Kumar Nayak
  Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management