Barely 24-hours before the first phase of polling in Chhattisgarh’s Maoist-infested districts of Dantewada, Rajnandgaon, Sukma, Bastar, Kanker, Kondagaon and Bijapur on Monday, security forces recovered an additional 100 kg of explosives during extensive combing operations in the area; an IED exploded in Kanker, injuring two personnel of the Indo Tibetan Border Police, but the polling party the team was escorting reached its destination safely.
Senior officials feel polling may pass relatively peacefully in view of the high security and relocation of 167 polling booths by the Election Commission last week, but anticipate attacks on the security forces when they return from polling duties, from attempts to snatch ballot boxes (EVMs) to ambushes to steal weapons and demoralize them. Previously, on the morning of November 7, when Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and Congress president Sonia Gandhi addressed election rallies in the State, security forces recovered two IEDs of 25-kg each on the road between Dornapal and Jagargunda near Chintalnar in Sukma district, the site of the deadly 2010 ambush in which 76 police officers were killed.
In all, in the first week of November alone, a staggering 500 kg of IEDs was recovered. The explosives were mostly planted along highways (to target candidates, polling officials and security vehicles) and kutcha village roads (to prevent villagers from voting). Most IEDs were ‘command wire’ and can be detonated at a range of 50-60 metres away. Most were made of ammonium nitrate (a fertiliser) which is readily available with villagers, though some were made of gelatin ‘stolen’ from mining companies in the State and neighbouring Jharkhand.
It is pertinent that Suhas Chakma of the Asian Centre for Human Rights has for years warned the Centre that Maoists acquire huge amounts of explosives and detonators from mining companies. In a presentation to the parliamentary Standing Committee on Coal and Steel in 2011, he pointed out that between January 2009 and September 2010 alone the Maoists snatched 54,500 kg of explosives, according to security forces. This easy access to explosives has enormously empowered the Maoists. Chakma observes that as mining companies operate successfully in Maoist-infested districts, it needs to be investigated if Maoists in any way help the companies engage in illegal mining (beyond the licensed area) by keeping locals and snoopy officials at bay.
Intelligence agencies have alerted the State about fresh reports of Maoist commanders holding meetings in order to disrupt the polls. As is already known, the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-M) chief Ganpathy (Mupalla Laxman Rao) personally visited Abujmad forests on October 8; in recent days, large numbers of cadres have reportedly entered the area from Nepal, Bihar, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand and Odisha.
A day before polling, Inspector General (Bastar Range) Arun Dev Gautam, appealed to the Maoists for a truce. The police fear that the large deployment of Central Para Military Forces for election duty may offer additional “human targets” to the insurgents. But the Maoists have shown no signs of relenting on their boycott call. Graffiti has appeared on walls warning people against voting and claiming that pressure bombs have been planted in the polling booths, which can triggered by remote control. They have also threatened to chop off the fingers of those who vote.
On November 9, eight boats at Kodnar Ghat, that are the sole means of transport for several villages to access weekly markets, were suddenly sunk so that the villagers were stranded and cannot vote. At the same time, to retain their local support, the Maoists have reportedly conveyed the locations of the pressure mines (IEDs that explode when a person steps on them) on village roads so that villagers can avoid those tracks.
The fight to win the Maoist belt has been unusually bitter this year, with Congress heavyweights blaming the Raman Singh regime for the May 25, 2013 attack in which almost the entire State Congress leadership was wiped out. On November 9, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh attacked the BJP Government for failure to prevent the ambush, said law and order had deteriorated under its watch, and that it had failed on the development front as well. He alleged misuse of Central funds.
Previously, on November 8, Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi charged that the former PCC chief Nand Kumar Patel was killed to stop him from becoming the (next) Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh. “Nobody could have stopped him. There was no way to stop him. There was only one way and that he was eliminated”, he alleged, without offering any evidence, though six months have elapsed since the massacre. On November 7, Congress president Sonia Gandhi lambasted the BJP regime for the ambush, “the Chief Minister was forced to admit to his government’s failure. But, I want to ask, what is the use of shedding crocodile tears”?
But, speaking in Bastar and Rajnandgaon the same day, the BJP Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi robustly defended Raman Singh, comparing his conduct with that of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who arrogantly refused to order a probe to ascertain if negligence had led to the planting of at least 18 bombs in and around the BJP rally in Patna on October 27. The top BJP national and state leadership was endangered by these blasts, allegedly engineered by the Indian Mujahideen. In contrast, he pointed out, Dr Raman Singh, who was on a tour, immediately cancelled his yatra, ordered a judicial probe, and visited the families of the deceased. In Patna, though six people died, the State Government showed no remorse, shunned responsibility, and did not visit the families of the victims.
Focusing on the Congress-led UPA, the Gujarat strongman challenged Sonia Gandhi to speak up on the coal and 2G spectrum scams which, he taunted, were the best examples of the work which Congress did ‘silently’, without broadcasting. He alleged that the party was misleading the nation on issues of development, inflation and employment generation. Rebutting Congress claims that the UPA had brought the food security legislation, Narendra Modi pointed out that the BJP Government in Chhattisgarh had successfully implemented such a scheme long before the Central legislation.
Mocking at Rahul Gandhi’s remark that “poverty is a state of mind”, the BJP veteran said “Such leaders make fun of poverty. Those who have not seen poverty, what will they know of the pain of the poor? I have been born in poverty, I have suffered in life.” He rebuked the Planning Commission for its claim that anyone earning Rs 26 a day is above the poverty line, saying “these are such people who spend Rs 100-200 for a bottle of water in a 5-star hotel. Such people don’t have the right to rule this country”.
Chhattisgarh is a State where the Congress feels is has a fighting chance despite in-fighting in the party; hence this is a no-holds-barred contest.
Niticentral.com, 11 November 2013
http://www.niticentral.com/2013/11/11/chhattisgarh-votes-amidst-maoist-threats-156266.html