Killing spree continues in Dantewada ! When would the death of innocents come to an end ?

The killing spree of Maoists in Dantewada district of Chattisgarh going to polls in two phases on coming Monday and November 20 with 18 with other naxal infested districts viz Bastar, Kanker, Sukma, Bijapur, Dantewada, Narayanpur, Kondagaon and Rajnandgaon also going to polls simultaneously, the situation has become tense with voters extremely terrified given an unambiguous impression that the tribal electorates of the Maoist dominated areas will hardly come to polling stations fearing attacks thus serving the purpose of the Maoists who believe in gun than democracy.

Just a week and a half ago on 30th October, prior to yesterday’s despicable killings of four civilians and one paramilitary Jawan through planting of Improvised Explosive Devices, a cameraman of Doordarshan Achyutanand Saha and three paramilitary troopers were also killed in Nilavaya vilage of tribals near Suneli camp who were likely to participate in the polling after twenty years.

The village was two kilometres away from the Dantewada city and the Doordarshan team wanted to show the tribals participating in democratic elections after more than two decades. The Maoists do not want the villagers to defy their orders of boycotting the democratic elections and would not toletrate anyone who trangresses their territory n directives.

Yesterday’s explosion of IEDs planted on the way by the Maoists in Dantewada that killed 5 people in all, is a second brutal attack in just two weeks and that too a day before the visit of both the prime minister Narendra Modi and the Congress leader Rahul Gandhi who’ll be campaigning and addressing several public meetings in Chattisgarh in favour of their respective party candidates.

These fatal attacks of the Maoists are in a way a direct response to the union and state governments against the democratic elections of the state which deserves strongest condemnation.

Dantewada and several other districts of Chattisgarh which have been naxal affected sinve long, having witnessed 72 paramilitary Jawan killings several years’ ago including bludgeoning of the Congress leaders, several journalists and paramilitary jawans in land mine explosions from time to time despite the fact that the saffron party’s Raman Singh government is ruling the state for the last fifteen days.

Dantewada, Sukma, and Bastar are the worst affected districts where Maoist killings have become the order of the day shockingly. The incumbent government at the centre have been too serious in countering the increasing Maoists invasion and killings of the innocents in Chattisgarh and other naxalite affected districts of several states of the country.

According to the MHA report of April 2017 about thirty districts of five states of the country are dominated by the Left Wing Extremism.

The states are Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Oddisa and the districts are : Vishakhapatnam in AP, Aurangabad, Jamui, Gaya, Laksi Sarai in Bihar, Bastar, Bijapur, Dantewada, Kanker, Kondagaon, Narayanpir, Rajnandgaon, Sukma in Chattisgarh, Bokaro, Chatwa, Garhwa, Giridih, Gumla, Hazari Bagh, Khunti, Latergarh, Lohardaga, Palamu, Ranchi, Simdega West, Singhbhum in Jharkhand, Kolhapur, Malkangiri in Jharkhand and Garchiroli in Maharashtra.

As per the report about 2, 329 mobile towers have been installed in the Maoist affected areas of the above districts in order to improve the cell phone connectivity including construction of wide network of roads and eight bridges with a cost of more than one thousand crores.

The government is working on its multi pronged strategy which involves construction of schools, roads and cell phone connectivity and completion of various other people oriented developmental projects.

The government has so far constructed about 4, 544 kilometres of roads and work on 5, 411 kilometres is in the offing with the total expenditure of 10, 780 crores.

Several other efforts to make the maoist infested areas fully equipped with police stations and hi tech equipments of defence for the security forces and attacks on the naxals are already on the anvil with the government trying to pump maximum financial support for the socio economic development of the tribals to make them economically viable and self reliant.

According to a report published in Indian Express last year on 17th April, the MHA report claims that incidents of naxalite violence have witnessed a 20% decline in 2017 as compared to 2013 with 34% decline in related deaths.

The geographical spread of Left Wing Extremism has also shrunk from 76 districts in 2013 to 58 districts in 2017.

Sounds ironical that on the one hand the government talks of diminishing Maoist influence in the country, Dantewada witnesses the incessant killing spree thus shrugging off the govt’s claims of improvement in Maoist killings.

It may be recalled that the previous government of UPA has also formed the Cobra Cammando Force deployed in several naxalite infested areas of the country meant particularly for fighting the naxalites with a heavy investment. It has in the past shown excellent results in counter naxalite operations.

The government should widen the network and area of operation of this anti naxalite cammando force as the nation definitely needs a specialised full fledge force to effectively deal with this menace as thousands of crores worth of budget has already been incurred in anti naxalite couter operations and in making of this specialised tactical outfit. The problem has now assumed a critical dimension and the unabated killing spree is on with innocent civilians and security forces becoming the regular victims of the Maoist onslaughts.
What’s your take friends?