Fake encounters, rapes and arrests by police and security forces, beatings (by both police and Maoists) and killings of informers by Maoists seem to be a serious problem all through Chhattisgarh’s Bastar division, a four-member fact-finding team has said.
Painting a disturbing picture of how villagers are caught in the conflict between security forces and Maoists, the team said that these problems are most acute in Sukma district as well as parts of the districts of Bijapur and Bastar.
The delegation comprised Communist Part of India (Marxist) state secretary Sanjay Parate, CPI member Vineet Tiwari of the Joshi-Adhikari Institute of Social Studies, Jawaharalal Nehru University professor and All India Democratic Women’s Association member Archana Prasad, and Delhi University professor Nandini Sundar. It visited the districts of Bijapur, Sukma, Bastar and Kankher from May 12-16.
The delegation claimed that villagers in and around Kanger National Park were being arrested and forced to surrender by the police, apart from being threatened and brutally beaten by Maoists.
Disturbing developments
According to the team, the police are once again holding Jan Jagran Abhiyans, at which villagers are both threatened and promised rewards, including mobile phones, for providing information about the Maoists. In the early 1990s, such meetings proved to be the precursor to the Salwa Judum, an initiative by the authorities to arm villagers to mount anti-insurgency operations. In 2011, the Supreme Court declared that the militia was illegal and disbanded it.
The team reported several instances of how villagers were getting the worse of the conflict.
In Kumakoleng village in March, the team said, 50 people were forced to “surrender” and are now living in various police and Central Reserve Police Force camps.
On April 15, security forces held a Jan Jagran Abhiyan in Kumakoleng. Two days later, Maoists allegedly beat up villagers, including women, for requesting a Central Reserve Police Force camp to be set up near their settlement. Fear has forced two-thirds of the village’s inhabitants to flee.
In neighbouring Soutnar panchayat, the villagers have resolved to keep the Maoists out and have been patrolling the villages with bows, arrows and axes for the last three months. The villagers claim the police have refused to set up camp there, telling them that the Maoists will go away if they patrol the area themselves.
On May 12, villagers from Marjum and CPI leaders Manish Kunjam and Nanda Sori claimed that two innocent youth had been killed and passed off as Maoists by the police. The incident took place a week after two police personnel had died in an exchange of fire with insurgents.
The team has expressed concern that such developments would lead to large-scale divisions and displacement, as happened occurred during the Salwa Judum era.
Heavy police presence
The team observed that all of Bastar district is heavily militarised, with camps belonging to the CRPF, Border Security Force or Indo-Tibetan Border Police every 5 km, and every 2 km in the villages around the Raoghat mines. They claimed that these camps come up at night without permission from the gram sabhas, and farmland is taken over without owners' rights being considered.
They reported that in some places the camps have created a sense of security, with Maoist presence coming down. But in most places, the team claimed, they have severely enhanced the insecurity of the villagers, owing to exploitation and repression by the forces.