8 April 2013.
A World to Win News
Service: Following is from the Revolutionary Democratic Front of India, dated
29 March, 201;
The media has reported the claim made by the Jharkhand police that
ten [Communist Party of India (Maoist] cadres were gunned down by the Tritiya
Prastuti Committee (TPC) during a "fierce gun battle" that started in
the afternoon of 27 March 2013 and continued till the next morning in the
Lakarbandha forests in Chatra district of Jharkhand, which falls under Kunda
police station limits. Around 25 other Maoists have been abducted after the
battle as per media reports. Lalesh Yadav, alias Prashant, Secretary of the
Bihar Jharkhand North Chhattisgarh Special Area Committee of the CPI (Maoist);
Jaikumar Yadav, Platoon Commander; Dharmendra Yadav, alias Biru, Sub-Zonal
Commander of Chatra Palamu; and Prafulla Yadav, Sub-Zonal Commander of
Koleswari, are reported to be among the dead.
According to the police version of the incident, it had received
information about an ongoing gun battle between the CPI (Maoist) cadres and TPC
members in the evening of 27 March. Around a hundred armed men of the CoBRA
battalion of the CRPF and District Armed Police left at 10pm on the same
evening, who reached the site of the encounter at 3 am in the morning. The
paramilitary and police forces engaged in a gunfight from 3 to 4 am in which
they fired 80 to 90 rounds of bullets. By daybreak, the police claims, the
belligerent CPI(Maoist) and TPC cadres retreated from the spot. During a search of the area, the police is said to have recovered ten bodies of
CPI (Maoist) members, nine in uniform, along with seven weapons, cane bombs,
empty cartridges and Maoist literature from the encounter site. Though the
police have said that two TPC members died as well, the bodies of the
supposedly dead TPC members have not been recovered by the police.
CPI(Maoist), however, has refuted the police story. A spokesperson
of the party in his telephonic statement to the PUCL Jharkhand told that there
was no encounter or gun battle as claimed by the police. According to him, it
was a joint operation planned and executed by the central paramilitary forces
and state police in collusion with the TPC. The state armed forces and the TPC
used covert operatives to mix poison in the food served to the Maoists. When
they were in an unconscious state after consuming the poisoned food, their arms
were first taken away and then were selectively killed by the TPC and the armed
forces. The rest of the 20 to 25 Maoists were later abducted and taken away by
the TPC men. The spokesperson also confirmed that the four leaders named by the
media are among the dead. The spokesperson has also confirmed that there were
200 armed personnel in the operation from TPC and paramilitary and Jharkhand
police.
The facts and circumstances of the incident, the modus operandi of
the state's armed forces and the history of the notorious TPC in Jharkhand
indeed point strongly towards a covert operation, a staged
"encounter" and cold-blooded murder of the ten Maoists. It is
difficult to believe that ten members in a large team of 30-odd armed Maoists
fell in a gun battle while all of the TPC goons and the armed forces engaging
them survived without any casualties. The police itself have admitted that none
of their troops sustained even injuries. The claim by the police that two TPC
members were killed and one was injured in the "encounter" is highly
doubtful, given the fact that the police did not recover the bodies of the TPC
members. In spite of the contrary claims by the government, the collusion
between the Jharkhand police, the paramilitary forces and the TPC in conducting
operations against the Maoists is well known. Therefore, it can be assumed that
the state's armed forces had full knowledge of the Maoist team’s presence in
Lakarbandha forest, and that they directed and participated in this dastardly
covert operation from the beginning to the end. TPC, a mercenary vigilante gang
propped up by the government, was one of the instruments in executing this
extrajudicial killing.
This is not the first time that covert and deceptive means of
poisoning was used by the Indian state to eliminate Maoist leaders and cadres
by planting moles and informers. Three Central Committee members of the
erstwhile CPI(ML) Peoples' War [one
of the two main parties that later formed the CPI (Maoist)]– Shyam, Mahesh and
Murli – were first poisoned by using an informer in Bangalore, abducted and
flown to Andhra Pradesh, tortured and later shot dead in December 1999. Then
the police floated the story that the three were killed in an
"encounter" in Karimnagar district of AP. A villager residing near
the so-called encounter site was also picked up and killed by the police and
shown as a squad member to bolster their Goebblesian lie. The demand by the
civil rights organizations and democratic forces for a judicial inquiry into
the incident was declined by the government. The guilty police officers and
their political bosses are yet to be brought to book for this fascist murder,
and indeed enjoy full state protection.
Similarly, Chhattisgarh police claimed to have killed 14 members
of a Maoist squad in Bijapur district on 18 March 2008 after a "fierce
encounter", even though not a single policeman was even injured as a
result. The villagers who were eyewitnesses later told the media and civil
rights organisations that the police story of the ‘encounter’ was to cover up
the fact that the squad members were poisoned by using spies and killed. The
government and the police have never acknowledged this covert and cold blooded
mass murder, and rather hailed it as "the biggest ever counter-insurgency
operation in the state". These are just two of the innumerable instances
of fascist murder by the state's forces against the revolutionary movement
using spies, coverts and vigilante gangs, and then boasting of shooting down
revolutionary leaders, cadres, sympathisers and civilians in "heroic"
battles. The latest killing of ten Maoists in Chatra district of Jharkhand
points to a similar cold-blooded murder for which the Indian state and its
armed forces are equally responsible as its foot-soldiers, the TPC. This covert
operation smacks of the fascist former CRPF boss K Vijay Kumar's involvement,
who is presently the advisor to the governor of Jharkhand and virtually running
the home ministry in the state which is presently under President's rule.
TPC was formed by renegades of the CPI(Maoist) after deserting the
party in 2001. The Indian state, its armed forces and intelligence agencies
were instrumental in its formation and continued presence in Chatra, Latehar
and Ranchi districts. TPC has established a reign of terror in these districts,
indulging in killings, kidnapping, extortion and torture – all under the
patronage of the state and its armed forces. It has particularly targeted the
revolutionary organizations and their mass base during the twelve years of its
existence. This is because TPC considers the revolutionary masses and their
movement as the biggest impediment for its expansion, which is coterminous with
the safeguarding the political power of the reactionary ruling classes
comprising of the feudal forces and the comprador big bourgeoisie.
TPC is only one of the vigilante gangs run by the ruling classes.
In Jharkhand itself, the Indian state has promoted other fascist execution
squads which go by the names of Jharkhand Prastuti Committee, Shanti Sena.
There is hardly any difference between TPC of Jharkhand and the Salwa Judum of
Chhattisgarh, Ranvir Sena of Bihar, Sendra and Narsi Cobra of Andhra Pradesh,
Shanti Sena of Odisha, Ikhwan of Kashmir and Sulfa of Asom. They are all
sponsored, nurtured and used by the Indian state to crush the democratic and
revolutionary movements of the oppressed peoples and nationalities. Only, TPC
claims itself to be a "Maoist" group, and the state too conveniently
portrays them as such!
RDF demands that a judicial inquiry be immediately conducted to
inquire into the killing of ten Maoists in Chatra, Jharkhand, so that the facts
of the incident can be brought to light and those guilty of this cold-blooded
murder be brought to book. We also believe that the lives of the twenty people
kidnapped by the TPC are in danger. Whether they are presently in the custody
of the TPC or the police, all measures must be taken to save their lives. All
of them must be produced before a magistrate immediately. In addition, TPC must
be disbanded without delay, and the Indian state must stop its patronization of
vigilante gangs in the country, including TPC in Jharkhand.
1 comment:
Nice blog here! Also your website loads up fast!
What web host are you using? Can I get your affiliate link to
your host? I wish my web site loaded up as quickly as yours lol
my weblog http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCkK9-pzu_o
Post a Comment