Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh, who won a third term in office in the November Assembly elections, has called for a co-ordinated approach among the six Maoist affected States to deal effectively with the insurgency, and said that at present the Centre is not doing much to facilitate such co-ordination.
“Six States are affected [by the insurgency]. A co-ordinated approach is necessary to curb Naxalism, and it is difficult to manage unless we have co-ordination among us,” Mr. Singh said in an interview to The Hindu.
There was “not much help coming from the government of India” towards this, he said, expressing the hope that the BJP would form the next government at the Centre, and “then we will be able to do a much better job [of curbing insurgency]”.
Mr. Singh said his government had launched several development projects in the tribal areas — such as construction of roads and distribution of free food grains — where the Bharatiya Janata Party did badly in the recent elections, and would win back the people of these areas slowly.
The BJP’s loss in the Maoist affected tribal areas, where the party’s seat share went down from 19 in the last elections to 11, could not be attributed to the impact of Salwa Judum, the Chief Minister said.
