or reasons best known to them, the Maoists seem to be unable to shun Adilabad or other North Telangana districts as their support base despite suffering tremendous losses in the past in the form of encounter deaths of their top leaders and surrender of numerous cadres.
A 20 to 25 member strong dalam of armed naxalites has reportedly been sighted in the villages in Vaipet forest area of Indervelli mandal of Adilabad and another handful of them at Parkal and Bhupalpalli of Warangal and a few places in Nizamabad in the last few weeks.
The presence of the band of the outlawed organisation gains significance in view of the ongoing Maoist Martyrs Week across the country's naxal-influenced areas. “There however, is little chance of them creating law and order problem in the North Telangana districts under prevailing conditions which are not at all favourable for them to thrive,” opined a police officer associated with anti naxal operations, as he dismissed the perceived threat posed by the Maoist band.
Khammam on the southern tip of the State is where the activities of Maoists seem to be concentrated, much of it being spill over from the neighbouring Chhattisgarh. In the recent months, the naxals seem to have confined their activities to torching property and warning public representatives through posters.
Banners, purportedly written by Mylarapu Adellu alias Bhaskar, Maoist Divisional Committee Member and Atram Shobhan alias Charles, Area Committee Member, sprung up in Tiryani and Somwarpet in Khanapur exhorting people to participate in the Martyrs Week.
Arguably, the Communist Party of India (Maoist) is organisationally in a bad shape in North Telangana.
An eerie calm prevails in Khammam especially in the remote tribal pockets of Bhadrachalam division spread across the long inter-State border with both Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh with the Maoists making renewed attempts to spread their activities and the police stepping up anti-Maoist operations in border areas.
After suffering a setback with the surrender of two district level senior Maoist cadres including Sukhdev, the district special guerrilla squad in-charge, a few months ago, the rebels have focussed their attention on reviving their foothold and expanding their base in Bhadrachalam Agency.
The Bhadrachalam sub-division police have stepped up vigil at the santhas (weekly markets) at Nalabelli and Paidigudem in Dummugudem mandal frequented by Adivasis from the remote tribal pockets situated on either side of the inter-State borders.
Adilabad for one, accounts for the death of 155 Maoists including top notch figures like the Maoist Central Committee member Cherukuri Rajkumar alias Azad and surrender of 259 cadres since the first encounter took place in 1989.
In Warangal, increased vigilance and intensive combing operations by the police drove out the armed naxals from the district into neighbouring state. For the past few years, there has been no disruptive activity by the naxalites in the district what with the police being in a high state of alert.
The only aberration was the recent memorial meeting organized by students unions for the slain naxalite Vivek on Kakatiya University campus. In view of the martyrs’ week celebrations of Maoist party, the district police alerted all those on naxalite target.
In Karimnagar, the successful conduct of Godavari Pushkaralu just before the start of Martyrs Week is a proof of the naxalites being neutralised by and large.
The last time that the naxalites had last conducted an offence of conducting praja court in Mukunuru village of Mahadevpur mandal was in December 2014. A group of 30 armed naxalites visited the village and conducted the praja court for over five hours and later retreated to neighbouring state.
Barring a couple of incidents of poster pasting on walls in the name of Maoists here and there, the naxalite activities came to a grinding halt. Wall posters appeared in villages mostly in Sirikonda, Dharpally, Machareddy, Kammarpally, Domakonda and Kamareddi mandal which are located on the border of Karimnagar and Medak district some time back.
(Reporting by S. Harpal Singh, G. Srinivasa Rao, K.M. Dayashankar, P. Sridhar and P. Ram Mohan)
