They said the Maoist party in India failed to involve the masses and the leadership was not ready to adapt to changing times.
Six members, including three women, of the outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist) were killed in an alleged exchange of fire with the elite Greyhounds of Andhra Pradesh Police in Visakhapatnam district on Wednesday, while a fierce gunbattle took place between security forces and Maoists in neighbouring Odisha's Malkangiri district.
Due to the success of the operation, the entire Korchi-Tipagad and Chatgaon-Kasansur Dalams of Maoists have been wiped out, they claimed.
State Home Minister Tamradhwaj Sahu said that in 2013-14, the state had received Rs 50 crore for police modernisation from the Centre. The allocation has come down to Rs 20 crore right now.
Around 150 cases involving that of murder, landmine blasts, abduction and attack on the police were pending against the couple in different police stations, police said.
The Union Home Ministry has drawn up surrender policy for Maoists. It is likely to be a dream project of the United Progressive Alliance. This policy will help "attract the Maoist to reject arms and draw them towards discussion"
Prasant Majhi (23), who claimed to have worked as a bodyguard of Panda for the last over two years, surrendered without any weapons before the Superintendent of Police of Gajapati district Sarthak Sarangi.
In a major blow to the outlawed Communist Party of India-Maoist in Andhra Pradesh, the organsation's state secretary Sambasivudu on Sunday surrendered before a senior police official. Confirming his surrender, Home Minister K Jana Reddy said that Sambasivudu will be produced before the media on Monday. He refused to share any more details. Sambasivudu took over as the chief of the underground organisation in 2006.
Maoist commander of Udanti-Raighar-Sinapali border area committee, operating in Orissa-Chhattisgarh border, Laxmidhar Nayak alias Gundadhul surrendered before police in Nabarangapur, Orissa.
Communist Party of India-Maoist Central Committee member and in-charge of Haryana, Lanka Venkata Papi Reddy alias Ranganna alias Latchanna, surrendered before Andhra Pradesh Home Minister K Jana Reddy in Hyderabad on Saturday. Speaking to newsmen, Papi Reddy, 47, said that he decided to surrender and join the 'mainstream of public life' due to his failing health.
The Bombay High Court has granted bail to researcher Rona Wilson and activist Sudhir Dhawale, arrested in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case. The court noted that they had been in jail since 2018 and the trial was yet to start. The court said the two had spent more than six years in jail as under-trial prisoners. The NIA, the prosecution agency, did not seek a stay to the HC order. Eight other activists have been granted bail in the case, which pertains to provocative speeches allegedly delivered at the Elgar Parishad conclave held in Pune on December 31, 2017.
Efforts to wean away Maoists from the path of violence seems to be making progress going by the response to the government's surrender packages announced in Jharkhand and West Bengal a month back.
To motivate Maoists to return to the mainstream, the government is contemplating a new uniform surrender policy for all states offering Rs 1.5 lakh to anyone who comes over ground and an additional Rs 1.5 lakh for laying down an automatic rifle
Top woman Maoist Suchitra Mahato, who had escaped after Kishenji's killing last year, on Friday surrendered before authorities in West Bengal as Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee used the occasion to renew her call to the ultras to join the mainstream.
Prolonged incarceration without trial amounts to infringement of the right to life under the Constitution, the Bombay high court said while urging a special court to expedite the trial in the 2018 Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday asked Maoists to join the mainstream by laying down arms and promised that her government would provide them compensation and take care of their families.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday appealed to Naxals to give up violence, lay down arms and surrender, saying an all-out operation will otherwise be carried out against them.
The body of Kaka Arjun (52) was found on Wednesday evening on Kongupalli-Ilmidi road in Bijapur, located more than 400 km from state capital Raipur, they said.
Of the ten police personnel who lost their lives in a Maoist attack in Chhattisgarh's Dantewada district, five had joined the force after quitting Maoist violence, a senior official said on Thursday.
He was to surrender on September 5, but filed a plea seeking an extension of the bail and later filed another application seeking permanent bail on the ground of ill-health.
In one of the deadliest blows to Naxalites in Chhattisgarh, security forces on Sunday gunned down 31 rebels, including 11 women, in a fierce encounter in the state's Bijapur district, police said.
The senior most leader of the outlawed Communist Party of India-Maoist in Andhra Pradesh K Ilaiah alias Sambasivudu, who surrendered before the police on Sunday night, said that he took the decision to come out of the underground movement because of his ill health and loss of interest in the armed struggle.
Ten Naxalites were killed in an encounter with security personnel in Chhattisgarh's Sukma district on Friday, a senior police official said. The gunfight broke out in the morning in a forest within the jurisdiction of the Bhejji police station when a joint team of security personnel was out on an anti-Naxalite operation. The operation was launched based on inputs about the presence of Maoists belonging to Konta and Kistaram area committees of Naxalites on forested hills of Korajguda, Dantespuram, Nagaram and Bhandarpadar villages. Chief Minister Vishnu Deo Sai hailed security forces and said the era of peace and progress has returned to the Bastar region, which includes Sukma.
Urging Naxals to shun violence, Shah announced that the Chhattisgarh government would announce a "new look" surrender policy in 1-2 months.
With this incident, 154 Naxalites have been gunned down by the security forces in different encounters in Chhattisgarh so far this year, the police said.
The surrendered top Maoist leader in Andhra Pradesh Sambasivudu was today allowed to meet his family after which he visited a house in Vanasthalipuram area where his parents and daughter were staying with relatives and met them after several years. It was an emotional reunion as tearful parents and daughter Swarnalatha received him
'The strategy of frontal organisations of the Maoists is to create unrest and ensure that such unrest leads to a law and order problem.' 'To cover such acts it was necessary to bring in a different definition of unlawful activities which is different from the definition of unlawful activities in the UAPA.'
The members of the insurgent groups -- United Liberation Front of Assam, National Democratic Front of Boroland, Rabha National Liberation Front, Kamtapur Liberation Organisation, Communist Party of India-Maoist, National Santhal Liberation Army, Adivasi Dragon Fighters and National Liberation Front of Bengali -- joined the mainstream in front of Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal at a programme.
Terming Naxals the biggest human rights violators, Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday said security forces have been carrying out 'offensive operations' instead of defensive against the insurgents and have achieved big successes in recent times.
The Bombay High Court on Thursday said poet-activist Varavara Rao, an accused in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case, need not surrender before the Taloja prison authorities until October 28.
The National Investigation Agency on Monday urged the Bombay high court to direct poet-activist Varavara Rao, an accused in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case, to surrender before the Taloja prison authorities, saying that several 'other old people' in need of medical treatment were also in prisons.
A bench of Justices Nitin Jamdar and SV Kotwal extended Rao's time to surrender from December 2 to December 6 after the National Investigation Agency (NIA) failed to get Rao medically examined at the private Nanavati hospital in compliance with the previous order of the high court.
"With the death of RK, the outlawed CPI (Maoist) has lost its three central committee members and as many other senior cadres in the last two years. These deaths would certainly deplete the strength of the Naxal movement which has been losing its ground. Security forces would make an all-out attempt to soon bring an end to the five-decade-long mindless violence by ultras in the region," Inspector General of Police (Bastar range) Sundarraj P said.
Scholar-activist Anand Teltumbde, an accused in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case, is an 'active member' of the Communist Party of India-Maoist and 'deeply involved' in furtherance of the outfit's agenda, the National Investigatoin Agency (NIA) has told a special court in Mumbai.
The Bombay High Court on Tuesday said poet Varavara Rao, an accused in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case who is on interim bail, need not surrender before the Taloja prison authorities until November 18 and adjourned the hearing on a plea filed by him to next month.
Intensifying operations against the Naxals and chocking the flow of funds to them were the two key issues discussed at a high-level meeting chaired by Union home mAmit Shah and attended by six chief ministers and top officials of four other states here on Sunday, sources said.
Naxalites blew up the mini-goods van in which the security personnel were travelling by using an Improvised Explosive Device (IED), police sources said.
Despite major setbacks, the Maoists' ability to inflict damage on the State and maintain its position as the saviour of the tribals will keep them relevant, says Bibhu Prasad Routray.
The Bombay high court on Friday extended till February 5, the date of surrender for poet Varavara Rao, an accused in the Elgar Parishad-Maoist links case who is currently on medical bail, before Taloja prison authorities in Maharashtra.