Maoist Attack and Demand for Telangana State Essay

Telangana is a region in the state of Andhra Pradesh in India. It has borders with states of Maharashtra on the north and north-west, Karnataka on the west, Chattisgarh on the north-east, Orissa and Coastal Andhra region on the east and Rayalseema region of Andhra Pradesh on the south. This region has an area of 1,14,840 square kilometres and a population of 3,52,86,757 which is 41. 6% of Andhra Pradesh state population. The Telangana region has 10 districts: Adilabad, Hyderabad, Khamam, Karimnagar, Mahbubnagar, Medak, Nalgonda, Nizamabad, Rangareddy and Warangal. The Krishna and Godavari rivers flow through the region from west to east. The Telangana movement refers to a group of related political activities organized to support the creation of a new state of Telangana, from the existing state of Andhra Pradesh in south India. The Telangana Movement The movement to create Telangana has been continuing from 1952 onwards. In February 2009 the in February 2009 the state government declared that it had no objection, in principle, to the formation of separate Telangana and that the time had come to move forward decisively on this issue. To resolve related issues, the government constituted a joint house committee. In the lead-up to the 2009 General Elections in India, all the major parties in Andhra Pradesh supported the formation of Telangana. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) again announced that they would create two more states, Telangana and Gorkhaland, if they won the election. The Congress Party said it was committed to Telangana statehood, but claimed that Muslim minorities were opposed to the creation of separate state, along with the majority of the people. The MIM party and Muslim leaders within Congress felt that the new state would jeopardize the interests of minorities, the safety and welfare of Muslims, and the future of the Urdu language. The Telugu Desam Party promised to work for Telangana statehood. Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) joined a Mahakutami (â€Å"grand alliance†) with the TDP and other parties to defeat the Congress party for denying statehood. The Praja Rajyam Party (PRP), founded in August 2008 by film star Chiranjeevi, pledged support to Telangana statehood if it becomes inevitable. The Nava Telangana Praja Party announced that it would merge with PRP after it concluded that there was not enough political space for two sub-regional Telangana parties that had Telananga statehood as their main agenda, Devender Goud later quit PRP and returned to the Telugu Desam Party. In the 2009 elections, Congress returned to power both at the center and state. It won 154 out of 294 Assembly seats and 33 out of 42 Parliament seats. Within Telangana, Congress won 50 out of 119 Assembly seats and 12 out of 17 Parliament seats. On 29 November 2009 TRS president K. Chandrashekar Rao (KCR) started a fast-unto-death, demanding that the Congress party introduce a Telangana bill in Parliament. He was arrested by the government of Andhra Pradesh. Student organizations, employee unions, and various organizations joined the movement. General strikes shut down Telangana on 6 and 7 December. Student organizations planned a massive rally at the state Assembly on 10 December. The government warned that the rally did not have permission and deployed police troops throughout Telangana. The apparent decline in KCR’s health led to a sense of urgency to the issue. The Communist Party of India (Maoist) is a Maoist terrorist organization in India which aims to overthrow the government of India through violent means. It was founded on 21 September 2004, through the merger of the People’s War, and the Maoist Communist Centre (MCC). The merger was announced to the public on October 14 the same year. In the merger a provisional central committee was constituted, with the erstwhile People’s War Group leader Muppala Lakshmana Rao alias Ganapathi as General Secretary. The CPI (Maoist) are often referred to as Naxalites in reference to the Naxalbari insurrection conducted by radical Maoists in West Bengal in 1967. They claim to be fighting for the rights of the tribes in the forest belt around central India. That region contains deposits of minerals which are of interest to mining companies like Tata and Essar. There have been numerous human rights violations of the tribal people at the hands of government agencies. Naxals have been charged by the government of running an extortion economy in the guise of popular revolution, extorting vast amounts of money from local branches of mining companies and other businesses. They have been involved in several cases of blowing up schools and railway tracks, and accused of keeping the areas under their control away from modernity and development, so they can impose their will on the uneducated rural populace. In 2006, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh referred to the Naxalites as â€Å"the single biggest internal security challenge ever faced by our country. The Indian government, led by the United Progressive Alliance, banned the CPI (Maoist) under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) as a terrorist organisation on 22 June 2009. As of June 2010, Indian Government has identified 83 districts in 9 states as â€Å"Naxal-hit†. Currently it has presence in remote regions of Jharkhand and Andhra Pradesh as well as presence in Bihar and the triba l-dominated areas in the borderlands of Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Orissa. The CPI (Maoist) aims to consolidate its power in this area and establish a Compact Revolutionary Zone from which to advance the people’s war in other parts of India. A 2005 Frontline cover story called the Bhamragad Taluka, where the Madia Gond Adivasis live, the heart of the Naxalite-affected region in Maharashtra. The current general secretary of the party is Muppala Lakshmana Rao alias Ganapati. The highest decision making body of the party is its Politburo, comprising 14 (or 13) members, 6 of whom were either killed or arrested between 2007-10. Amongst those arrested, Kobad Ghandy is the senior-most member. Other arrested Politburo members include Pramod Mishra, Ashutosh Tudu and Amitabha Bagchi. Cherukuri Rajkumar alias Azad, the spokesperson for the party, who was gunned down in Andhra Pradesh was another Politburo member. Prashant Bose alias Kishan-da, Mallojula Koteswara Rao alias Kishenji and Katakam Sudarshan alias Anand are the three prominent members of its Politburo. Kishenji and Anand currently head the Eastern Regional Bureau and the Central Regional Bureau of the party respectively. The Central Committee of the party, which takes command from the Politburo and passes on the information to its members, comprises 32 members. The party hierarchy consists of the Regional Bureaus, which look after two or three states, the State Committees, the Zonal Committees, the District Committees and the dalams (armed squads). The military wings of the respective organisations, People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army (military wing of MCCI) and People’s Guerrilla Army (military wing of PW), were also merged.