New Delhi reminds states about funds to tackle Naxals

The murder of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) MP Sunil Mahato has led the Centre to send reminders to the 12 Naxal-hit states that have not made full use of Central funds for tackling Naxalism.

Jharkhand is, in fact, one of the states which is yet to respond to the proposal of raising its own India reserve battalion "" state-controlled para-military force to be raised with central funds.

The Centre has earmarked Rs 15 crore for the India reserve battalion scheme and Rs 2,020 crore for the modernisation of police forces in this Budget. Interestingly, of the last year's Rs 951 crore allocation for modernisation of police forces, only Rs 520 crore had been used.

At a recent meeting of the empowered group of ministers on Naxalism Home Minister Shivraj Patil had told the affected states to share intelligence to counter the inter-state network of insurgents.

"The states have been asked to study and adapt each others' schemes - like the 'grey-hound' scheme of Andhra Pradesh and a pragmatic surrender and rehabilitation scheme of the Jharkhand government,'' sources in the ministry told Business Standard. "However, things are moving slowly and the joint mechanism is yet to take off, " he said.

'Grey-Hound is a crack force which has started hot-pursuit of Naxalites. Although the state has seen an increase in Naxal violence, the Centre views it as mere hotting up of the battle.

The Jharkahnd government pays Rs 50,000 for surrender by a militant, a montly allowance of rs 2,000 and also a LIC policy of Rs 10 lakhs.

However, security forces engaged in the anti-naxal campaign confess that ''Naxalites with support from their Nepalese soulmates were getting emboldened to launching more organised attacks.'' Sources said the Naxal groups expertise in planing Improvised explosive devices (IED) with deadly impact had was 'unnerving.'

In view of this' the security forces, for the first time are using airpower and UAV (Unmanned aerial vehicle) in counter-insurgency operations in the states. ''We are not attacking militants with planes or UAVs,'' a senior officer of a para-military force told the Business Standard. ''We are using planes to evacuate the injured civilians and troops the UAVs to map the areas for localting arms training camps of the insurgents particuly in the tribal areas.''

According to home ministry, last year, naxalite violence had claimed 669 lives including 153 police personnel in 1594 incidents ''The quantum of naxal violence has shown a marginal increase of about 4% in and toll has gone up by 18.1%. The fact that these insurgents have upgraded their skills and reunited is borne out by the fact that during last two months in merely 246 attakcs, the insurgents have killed 116 persons - a rise of 11.2 per cent.