Home Minister Shah's Tough Stance Leads to Maoist Surrenders

Over the past fifty years, Amit Shah is the first Home Minister to implement firm measures against Naxalism or Maoism. He asserts that this issue will be fully resolved by 2026, supported by the fact that 1,450 Maoists have surrendered since 2024. Maoists are active in regions from Chhattisgarh to Jharkhand, Odisha, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, and Maharashtra. The problem originated in West Bengal at the end of the last sixth decade and spread to other states. During the sixth and seventh decades, their motto was that power is gained not through the 'ballot box' but by the 'bullet of a gun,' a violent ideology underpinning communism.

Following India's independence, a ban was imposed, allowing Indian communists to participate in elections only after they accepted the constitution and pledged to pursue power through parliamentary and peaceful democratic means, viewing elections as a tool for this purpose. However, the Naxalbari movement began in West Bengal in 1967, leading to widespread violence across the state. The then Chief Minister, Siddharth Shankar Ray, managed to control the movement in the 1970s, but Maoist activities began to spread to other states. This issue has persisted since then, but the current Modi government, led by Amit Shah, is working to eliminate it from its roots.

Mr. Shah's declared policy is that unlike the previous governments, there will be no talks with the Maoists and they will have to surrender by laying down their arms. This tough stand of Shri Shah shows that the days of Maoists, who are running their parallel government on the strength of guns in certain areas of some states in an unconstitutional manner, are now numbered. These Maoists do not allow any government development project to be implemented in their areas of influence and extort ransom. Their intention to establish the rule of guns was shattered in front of Shri Shah when the Home Minister made it clear that what kind of talks and why talks with those who do not follow the Constitution of India? Although in the previous Manmohan government, Prime Minister late Manmohan Singh himself had once said that the problem of Maoists is bigger than terrorism, but the attitude of the Home Ministers of his government towards Maoists was soft and the solution to the problem was found through talks.

This issue was debated several times in both the houses of Parliament between 2004 and 2014 but the result was not significant. Of course, the then Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, late YSR had succeeded in getting some Maoists to surrender. But nothing like this happened in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Maharashtra. Mamata didi also got partial success in West Bengal but Maoists remained active during the 20-year rule of Biju Janata Dal in Odisha. The Home Minister is looking for a solution to the problem of Maoism at the national level and he is not ready to make any kind of compromise in this matter.

I remember very well that when late Hemanand Biswal, who was the Chief Minister of Odisha from 1999 to 2000, was elected to the Lok Sabha on a Congress ticket in the 2009 elections, he participated in the debate on the Maoist problem and said that one way to deal with Maoism is to launch a special campaign to recruit youth from the affected states in the army and establish a separate regiment. He said that the youth who have become Maoists are youth who have gone astray in the zeal of youth and have taken the wrong path. They have come from among us. Therefore, ways should be found to show them the right path. Shri Shivraj Patil, who was the Home Minister of the country from 2004 to 2008, also had a flexible viewpoint. However, before 2004, Shri Lal Krishna Advani, the Home Minister of the Vajpayee government, definitely had the idea of ​​dealing with the Maoists strictly. Due to which he also talked to the Home Ministers and Directors General of Police of Naxal-affected states and also suggested the formation of a joint police command.

When Shri Amit Shah became the Home Minister in 2019, he inherited this problem. He took a tough stand on this from the very beginning and did not consider the way of talking to the Maoists to be correct. Due to this, the strategy he made resulted in the surrender of the Maoists. In 2024, under the 'Niyad Nelnar Scheme', Mr. Shah made a strategy to combat the Maoists by setting up police camps in the villages of Naxalite or Maoist-affected districts. The police of Naxal-affected states have been equipped with state-of-the-art weapons, but Mr. Shah has also made a policy that every surrendering militant will be given Rs 50,000 and will be trained for a particular profession.

On July 12, 23 Maoists surrendered in Raipur, the capital of Chhattisgarh, among whom there were some such militants on whose heads the police had placed a huge bounty. All of them were accused of killing members of the police force and tribal citizens. All of them were active in Sukma district of the state. Eight of them were members of the Maoist organization People's Liberation Guerrilla Army. All 23 Maoists are under 35 years of age. So this is one aspect of Home Minister Amit Shah's personality which creates his image as a tough and straightforward politician but the other aspect of his personality is very captivating and people-oriented.

In the entire BJP, there is no leader like him who is proficient in parliamentary debate in Parliament. He has shown this acumen with great proficiency in both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. This is why he is considered the helmsman of the BJP's boat in Parliament. Along with this, Mr. Shah is also called the Chanakya of his party's politics. The Home Minister is also considered to be the one who sets his party's agenda for every state of India. Assembly elections are to be held in Kerala and Tamil Nadu in 2026. Of these, I have already written about the agenda of Tamil Nadu in this column. His agenda for Kerala is 'Developed Kerala'. But before that, local urban body elections are to be held in Kerala and Shah's target for these is to get at least 25 percent votes in each city. BJP is considered stronger in the state of Kerala than in Tamil Nadu.

The graph of BJP is rising here in every Lok Sabha election. In 2014, it got 11 percent votes which increased to 16 percent in 2019 and in 2024, this vote increased to 20 percent. Therefore, Shah has set a target of 25 percent votes in the urban body. Kerala is the only state in the country where the maximum number of murders of RSS and BJP workers have taken place. Now the Sawan session of Parliament is starting from 21 July. It is considered natural to discuss this topic in this session.