Even Shri Manmohan Singh had repeatedly called Naxalism the biggest security challenge for the country, in 11 Oct 2009 at the National Centre for the Performing Arts, Mumbai, on 24 May 2010 at a press conference to mark the completion of one year of UPA-II, etc. Utterances in a Centre for the Performing Arts may have been aroused by the theatrical ambience, but the intentions were not. But he stoutly denied use of Army to tackle the problem. Even the not-so-unsympathetic Supreme Court of India on 5 July 2011 declared the militia to be illegal and unconstitutional, and ordered its disbanding. If police was being ‘butchered’ day in, day out, alternative means like army should have been the natural choice. But are you worried about your vote bank?

A major portion of Dantewada in South Bastar falls under the so-called liberated zone of Dandakaranya, including the Abujmarh hills,spread over an area of more than 3500 sq km,

where there is no physical presence of the civil administration and Maoists run a parallel government. They have been running their Ops at will. An eagle’s eye view is placed below:

On 19 May 2005, two police outposts adjoining the hills, one at Chhota Dongar in Narayanpur and another at Dhau Dai attacked; In July 2006, police party in Rajnandgaon district attacked killing 32 personnel; On 18 March 2007, a police camp at Ranibodli attacked, killing 55 policemen; Immediately after launch of “Operation Green Hunt” by government, on 7 April, (PLGA) killed 76 security persons in an ambush in Chintalnar, forest of Dantewada; In March 2017, 12 CRPF jawans were killed in insurgency-hit Sukma district, In April 2017, a total of 26 CRPF personnel were killed during an encounter at the Burkapal-Chintagufa area in Bastar area; In March 2018, eight personnel of the 212 Battalion of the CRPF killed in the Kistaram area of Sukma district; In October 2018, two police personnel and one media person were killed in Dantewada; In May 2019, 15 police personnel and a driver had lost their lives in a landmine blast in Maharashtra's Gadchiroli; In November 2019, four security personnel were killed after Naxals attacked a PCR van carrying a police party in the Chandwa police station area of Latehar district; In February 2020, Naxals blew up a portion of a school building in Bihar's Gaya district; In March 2020, a total of 17 security personnel of DRG and STF lost their lives in the encounter in Sukma; On 4 Mar 2021, three jawans of the Jharkhand Jaguar (JJ), a special unit of the state police department, lost their lives and two others sustained injuries in an improvised explosive device (IED) blast in the Jharjhara area of the state's West Singhbhum district; On 03 Apr 2021, at least 22 security personnel lost their lives in Bijapur Naxal .

May be PM Modi is being inspired by the gentleman politician Shri Mamohan Singh. Knowing this support of Congress for the cause, there should be no stopping for him to go all out to cleanse the Abujmarh jungle, the "liberated-zone" and an alleged hub of Naxalite-Maoist insurgency but we are disappointed till date. So, when HM Amit Shah visited Chattisgarh on 5 Apr 2021 and thundered oft- repeated slogan of ‘befitting reply at appropriate time’, hardly anyone expected anything.

Field Marshall Slim, Victor in Burma, of World War II fame has crystal clear views about Jungle warfare, - “To our men. . . the jungle was a strange, fearsome place; moving and fighting in it were a nightmare. We were too ready to classify jungle as 'impenetrable' . . . To us it appeared only as an obstacle to movement; to the Japanese it was a welcome means of concealed manoeuvre and surprise . . . The Japanese reaped the deserved reward . . . we paid the penalty.”

Of course, Chattisgarh government has set up a ‘Counter Terrorism and Jungle Warfare College’ at Kanker in North Bastar. But we still have large casualties. So we have to have an ‘out-of-box’ strategy. For mission specific training, we may have to send a crack army team to identifiable location for an advanced technological training. Malayan campaign, Burma campaign, Vietnam War may be out-dated by now. We need to map the entire area and fill it with sensors and AI enabled trackers. BUT WE MUST PUT THIS MENACE TO END.

Having weeded out the poison seed from Kashmir, this would give Modiji an opportunity to re-establish his credentials as ‘Modi hai to mumkin hai’.