In fight against Naxals, waging a losing battle
The govt’s action plan that counts on aggressive campaign and deployment of heavy forces to uproot the Naxals will not yield desired results, writes R Krishna Das
The govt’s action plan that counts on aggressive campaign and deployment of heavy forces to counter the Naxals would not yield results, writes R KRISHNA DAS
On May 10, two days after Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh announced a major aggressive operation against Naxals, an IL-76 aircraft of the Indian Air Force landed in Raipur with men and machines. Within an hour, to the surprise of security agencies, the photograph of machines being unloaded from the aircraft went viral on the social media. While scribes ran after the story, television channels were flashing “breaking news”, beaming special operation against Naxals as soon as the equipment had reached Chhattisgarh — the country’s worst Left-wing extremism affected state.
The story hogging the headlines was not just about the leak of information; the incident overtly underlined the government’s strategy and unpreparedness in designing and executing the plan to deal with the Naxal issue. The movement, which officials later called a routine exercise, could have been kept a top secret.
“This is the biggest flaw that should be avoided as Naxals get ample room to redesign and plan counter strategy when they get to know about our plan,” a senior Indian Police Service (IPS) officer associated with the anti-Naxal operation said. Ironically, on May 8, the home minister himself asserted the approach to tackle Naxalism, underlining that “aggressive” operation against them was on the cards.
In the series, the information about shifting the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) command headquarters back to Raipur from Kolkata was also disclosed that was actually not required. Because of “logistical and connectivity issues”, the command was shifted seven years ago from Raipur to Kolkata.
The central zone, an operational field formation, was raised on August 7, 2009, and was tasked to oversee deployment of CRPF personnel across the entire Left-wing-extremism-hit states of West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
The shifting of headquarters would facilitate an additional director general (ADG) rank officer in Chhattisgarh to command the antiNaxal operation of the para-military force in place of the inspector general of police. It would indeed help in establishing better coordination for operation besides executing the plan “immediately” that was earlier sent to command headquarters for approval.
“The biggest challenge is the urban Naxalite as they fight legally and democratically after finding loopholes in the system”
Rebels are ready But experts are sceptical about the results. The development would only help intensify the field operation for which the rebels might have started preparation to counter. The command headquarters and the ADG were posted earlier also. The real challenges, which are manifold, however, lie elsewhere.
“The biggest challenge is the urban Naxalite as they fight legally and democratically after finding loopholes in the system,” said Inspector General of Police SRP Kalluri at an academic function recently while responding to students’ queries. The urban cadre is reportedly the brain behind collecting the leaked information and passing them on to the field cadre after preparing strategy accordingly.
For the forces, engaging in gun battle with the Naxals in jungles is easier than dealing with their urban cadre, he added. The urban cadre had been a major problem for the security forces combating the Naxal menace.
Kalluri, who had put the Left-wing extremism on the back foot during his tenure as IGP of Bastar, had been under the scanner of rights