SOUTH ASIA INTELLIGENCE REVIEW
Weekly Assessments & Briefings
Volume 11, No. 40, April 8, 2013

INDIA

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Jharkhand: Escalating Dangers
Fakir Mohan Pradhan
Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management

Even as the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) central committee member Arvind Singh alias Arvindji continued to fox the Security Forces (SFs) pursuing him in Jharkhand, the Maoists, in an attack in broad daylight on April 4, 2013, killed five personnel of the Jharkhand Armed Police (JAP) near a crowded bus shelter in Chainpur in Gumla District. The place is hardly 400 yards from the Chainpur Police Station and it was a busy weekly market day. A six-member Police patrol party (including the driver) was returning from the bus stand at about noon when a group of 15 to 20 Maoists, dressed as civilians, opened fire with their AK-47s. While three personnel died on the spot, two succumbed to injuries on the way to hospital. The Maoists decamped with three INSAS rifles, 600 rounds of ammunition and eight hand grenades. Jharkhand Director General of Police Rajeev Kumar, on his way to Gumla, disclosed, “The group of Maoists led by Arvindji has split into smaller groups and we believe this attack was carried out by one such group.”

It is significant that, after the Latehar encounter on January 7, 2013, SFs tracking Arvindji’s squad came close to his group in the Sivil-Roret and Luru regions in the Chainpur Police Station area, on March 13 and 14, and fighting continued intermittently for 24 hours. The Police, along with Jharkhand Jaguar (JJ), Commando Battalion for Resolute Action (CoBRA), Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and JAP troops, took part in the operation. One JJ trooper was killed in the encounter and another two sustained injuries. The intensity of the operation was so great that the SFs found it difficult to evacuate the injured and retrieve the killed trooper’s body.

The April 4 Gumla attack followed the blowing up of the Sreeram Panchayat Secretariat building in Lohardaga in the night of April 2 by a group of some 25 to 30 Maoists. The building was almost entirely destroyed, though no one was killed.

Both the attacks are thought to be part of the Maoists’ ‘protest’ against the killing of 10 of their cadres, including senior leaders – such as Lalesh Yadav alias Prashant, ‘secretary’ of the Bihar Jharkhand North Chhattisgarh Special Area Committee (BJNCSAC), Jaikumar Yadav, ‘platoon commander’, Dharmendra Yadav alias Biru, ‘sub-zonal commander’ of Chatra Palamu, and Prafulla Yadav, ‘sub-zonal commander’ of the Koleswari area – by the Tritiya Prastuti Committee (TPC). TPC is a splinter group of the CPI-Maoist, and had engaged a Maoist contingent at Lakramanda Tola in the Kunda Block of Chatra District in a gun battle that started in the afternoon of March 27, 2013, and continued till early the next morning. Alleging that SFs were backing TPC, the Maoists declared a ‘protest week’ commencing April 1, 2013, and gave a call for a Jharkhand and Bihar bandh (protest shutdown) on April 6 and 7. During the bandh, Maoists blew up railway tracks and Government buildings in Latehar, Gumla and Palamu Districts in Jharkhand, and railways tracks in the Vaishali District in Bihar.

The Tritiya Prastuti Committee (TPC), literally, the Third Preparatory Committee, was formed in 2002 after a number of cadres of the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) in Jharkhand walked out of their parent outfit, complaining of the domination of the Yadav caste in the decision-making process of CPI-Maoist. The TPC cadres were mostly from the Dalit (Scheduled Caste) Bhokta, Turi, Badai, Oraon, and Ghanju castes.

The Maoists were taken completely by surprise in Chatra. Heavily armed TPC cadres suddenly surrounded a group of 35 to 45 Maoists led by Lalesh, when they were resting (on March 27) after taking lunch provided by the Lakramanda villagers. The ensuing gunbattle stopped when SFs reached the spot around 3:00 am the next morning and took control of the situation. Police recovered the bodies of slain Maoists and some arms and ammunition. While ‘retreating’ (after seeing the SFs), TPC abducted 25 of the surviving Maoists. However, at least 23 of them were subsequently released. They were handed over to their family members after extracting a promise that they would dissociate themselves from the Maoists. The remaining two Maoists were not released because their family members failed to appear to receive their custody. Meanwhile, seven of the 10 slain Maoists have been identified, while the remaining three remain unknown. The Maoists have reportedly confirmed the killing of the four leaders.

It is widely believed that TPC was silently backed by the SFs in this operation; and that the group was even ‘allowed’ to take away a part of the sophisticated weapons seized from the Maoists. R.K. Mallick, Inspector General, Jharkhand Police, tacitly admitted this, stating, "If we know that a particular splinter group is looking for the Maoists in a region, we may decide not to venture out in the region for some time." He, however, clarified that no rebel group could ever be a friend of the Police. Media reports indicate the splinter groups like TPC and Jharkhand Jan Mukti Parished have been given some leeway to work against the Maoists in villages.

Apart from the TPC’s role in this incident, what proved to be the undoing for the Lalesh Yadav-led group was that the Maoists were hounded relentlessly by the SFs through the forests, ultimately forcing them to take shelter in a TPC stronghold. Maoist Central Committee (CC) member Arvindji, the mastermind of the Latehar encounter, who had been moving about with a 200-strong force, had asked his men split into smaller groups to evade the SFs. During the process, Sandeep, another senior leader and one of Arvindji’s close aides, was separated from the remaining force, and was holed up in Chatara, from where he was to be taken back to Bihar. The contingent led by Lalesh had come from Gaya to Chatra to provide cover to Sandeep. En route, the group ran into a CoBRA team in the Dumaria area of Gaya on March 25, 2013, leading to a fierce gun battle that raged for hours. Though no casualties were reported, both sides expended a great deal of ammunition. It is believed that some Maoists were injured in that encounter. The loss of ammunition and injuries to comrades, necessitating medical aid, ultimately proved fatal, when the group’s location was exposed while they sought medical aid. Insufficient ammunition also hindered their response when they came under TPC fire. It is still not clear what forced the Maoists to take shelter in a TPC stronghold.

It is evident is that the Maoists had little inkling of the changing loyalty of Lakramanda villagers. This fatal error of judgement reveals the changing conflict dynamics of the region. Lakramanda village, which has long served as a pit-stop for Bihar Maoists on their way to Saranda, has an extended history of association with the Maoists. Parasji, a Maoist ‘zonal commander’ and one of the few Ghanju caste leaders in the CPI-Maoist, hailed from the village. Parasji was killed in an encounter with SFs on July 21, 2012. Ghanju-dominated Lakramanda has since gradually allied itself with the Ganjhu-dominated TPC.

The debate over the implications of extending tacit support to anti-Maoist extremist groups by the SFs is not going to end soon. However, there are more urgent worries over the Maoists’ return to the Saranda Forest area in West Singhbhum District, which was purportedly ‘liberated’ from ‘Maoist control’ through ‘Operation Monsoon’ in August 2011. Evidence of increasing Maoist activity in the area is now accumulating.

The Maoists killed six villagers in a ‘Jan Adalat’ (‘people’s court’, an euphemism for a Maoist kangaroo court) at Manmaru village of the Bandgaon Block in West Singhbhum District on March 13, 2013. The area falls under Porahat Forest area. News reports indicate that this is part of the Saranda Forest area. However, it is certainly not part of the core Saranda area, where the Government’s Saranda Development Plan is being implemented since its ‘recovery’ after Operation Monsoon. The killings were apparently intended to avenge the killing of the two suspected Maoist sympathizers – Somu Bodra and Hangera Hansa Munda, residents of Tetai village and Desai village, respectively, in the Gudri Block of the District. Police recovered the bodies of the victims of Jan Adalat executions on March 16, after an encounter with the Prasad Guru squad of the Maoists on March 15, 2013, at Kudabeda village in the Sonuwa area of the District. Four Maoists were injured in the incident. One of the injured Maoists, identified as Dhanai, succumbed to injuries on way to the CRPF Lodhai camp. The SFs also recovered three sophisticated rifles and some ammunition from Kudabera, though the Police did not disclose the number of the arms.

There are clear indications of a Maoist escalation in Jharkhand, and the SFs are looking for ways to rein them in. Jharkhand has, thus far in 2013, left other Maoist-affected States far behind in terms of the visible intensity of Maoist violence. According to partial data collected by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), Jharkhand has already recorded a total of 58 Maoist-linked fatalities – more than half the total for the country – including 18 civilians, 18 SF personnel and 22 Left Wing Extremists (LWEs). 

Meanwhile, the Union Government has deployed two battalions of Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) to step up anti-Maoist operations and lead development works in Jharkhand. The State already has CRPF 16 battalions deployed for anti-Maoist operation, in addition to State Police Forces.

After some indications of improvements – specifically, a continuous decline in fatalities since 2009 – it appears that matters are slated to take a turn for the worse in Jharkhand. At such a time, a temptation to short cuts – the reliance on and tacit patronage of Maoist splinter groups – is a natural temptation. Such tactics have yielded short term gains in other theatres in the past, but have inevitably yielded to the larger detriment of the state, creating far more problems than they can ever be imagined to solve. The fight against the Maoists is an onerous burden which the state’s Forces must fully accept. It is not something that can be ‘outsourced’ to groups whose violence is not bound by any constraints of law, and whose activities are as much an assault against the authority of the state as those of the Maoists, who they are being used to attack.

INDIA

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Assam: Surrender Saga
Giriraj Bhattacharjee
Research Assistant, Institute for Conflict Management

A total of 2,009 cadres of the Dilip Nunisa faction of Dima Halam Daogah (DHD-N) surrendered on March 9, 2013. Those who surrendered include 691 armed cadres (39 of them women) and 1,318 overground workers known as ‘public relations officers’. The cadres deposited a total of 144 assorted weapons, including AK-series assault rifles, Light Machine Guns (LMGs), M-16 rifles, grenade launchers, besides rockets, grenades, and 137 magazines and 4,408 rounds of ammunition. Dissolving the outfit, its ‘chairman’, Dilip Nunisa, pledged all cooperation with the Government for the implementation of ongoing development projects in the areas of the group’s influence.

Earlier, Jewel Garlosa, the head of the Jewel Garlosa faction of DHD (DHD-J), also known as Black Widow (BW), had formally disbanded the DHD-J / BW on November 26, 2012. Garlosa had then told reporters of the decision to dissolve DHD-J and float a new group in the form of a non-governmental organisation to “focus on bringing socio-economic development in the Dima Hasao Autonomous Territorial Council (DHATC). I want the people of Dima Hasao District to maintain peace and join hands on the road to progress.”  

The formal disbanding of both the factions followed the joint signing of a Memorandum of Settlement (MoS) with the Central and the State Governments on October 8, 2012. The MoS noted that “as part of the restructuring and empowerment process, the existing North Cachar Hills Autonomous Council (NCHAC) will be renamed as the Dima Hasao Autonomous Territorial Council (DHATC)”. It further stated that “a special economic package of INR 20 billion (INR 4 billion per annum) over and above the Plan fund over the next five years will be provided to the yet to be formed DHATC to undertake special projects by the Council.”

The original (undivided) DHD was formed by remnants of the first Dimasa militant group, Dimasa National Security Force (DNSF). The DNSF, formed in 1990, surrendered en masse on November 17, 1994, under the leadership of its ‘chairman’ Bharat Langthasa. In 1996, however, Jewel Garlosa formed the DHD, with a principal demand for a separate state for the Dimasa tribe, Dimaraji, comprising the Dimasa inhabited Dima Hasao District (then known as North Cachar Hills District); parts of Karbi Anglong, Nagaon and Cachar Districts, and the Dimapur area of Nagaland.

The DHD suffered a split when Pranab Nunisa, the head of DHD’s ‘military wing’, ousted Jewel Garlosa, the then DHD ‘president’, and replaced him with Dilip Nunisa, on June 24, 2004. The split led to a turf war between the two resulting groups. 14 militants, nine of DHD-N and five of BW, were killed in fratricidal confrontations between the two sides between 2004 and 2009. No such incident has been reported since.

Nevertheless, the security environment deteriorated significantly, with a total of 188 insurgency-related fatalities reported in the District between 2004 and 2009. Of these, 181 were linked to the DHD alone, while four of the remaining were connected with the Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland-Isak-Muivah (NSCN-IM); two with the Khaplang faction of NSCN (NSCN-K); and one wth the Hmar People's Convention-Democracy (HPC-D). Since 2010, a total of 18 such fatalities have been reported: three in 2010; six in 2011; nine in 2012; and none (till date) in 2013. While five of these killings were linked to DHD, four each were linked to the Dimasa National Revolutionary Front (DNRF) and NSCN-IM; three to NSCN-K; and one each to Hill tiger Force (HTF) and Dimasa National Democratic Front (DNDF).

The number of fatalities in the District dropped sharply after 2009 due to the arrest of DHD-J / BW ‘chairman’ Jewel Garlosa from Bangalore on [June 4, 2009]. Subsequently, about 372 DHD-J / BW rebels laid down arms in September 2009. The outfit deposited 136 weapons, including AK-47 and M-16 rifles, rocket launchers and grenades.  The interim bail granted to Jewel Garlosa by Gauhati High Court on November 20, 2012, is believed to be the reason behind the ‘early’ disbanding of the group on November 26, 2012, as compared to the DHD-N’s dissolution on March 9, 2013, after the signing of the MoS on October 8, 2012. DHD-N had earlier planned to disband in December 2012, hoping that the amended Territorial Council Bill would be passed by Parliament by then. A three-point memorandum was submitted to Union Home Minister (UHM) Sushil Kumar Shinde, demanding that the bill be passed in the winter session of Parliament and the DHAC elections be held on time. Although, both the conditions are yet to be fulfilled, the group has now been disbanded.

With the two groups formally dissolved, and both factions, for the time being, giving up their principal demands for a Dimasa State and for the inclusion of more than 90 Dimasa villages in neighbouring Districts of Cachar and Nagaon, it is expected that there will be some respite from violence in Dima Hasao District, a troubled terrain extending across 4,890 square kilometres.

There are, nevertheless, some enduring impediments.

First, despite the two groups coming together to sign the joint MoS with the Government, the reconciliation between them remains tricky, given the animosity between the factions. Second, even within the DHD-J / BW leadership, there are differences regarding the sharing and use of financial and other organisational assets. The cases pending against the leaders of these two factions are another irritant. The DHD-J / BW leadership is hoping for an amnesty on the pattern that was extended to the Bodo Liberation Tiger (BLT) cadres. A close aide of DHD-J / BW ‘commander-in-chief’ Niranjan Hojai observed in November 2012, "We are not yet aware of the steps the Government will be taking regarding the cases against us. Cases against members of the BLT outfit were withdrawn after the signing of the peace pact. We hope the Government would take a similar approach in our case too,". In a written reply in the State Assembly on March 25, 2013, Panchayat & Rural Development, Environment & Forest Minister, Rockybul Hussain stated that criminal cases registered against members of the DHD-N and DHD-J / BW outfits for ‘non-heinous crimes’ may be withdrawn by the State Government as per procedure established by law. Hussain, however emphasised that criminal cases registered for ‘heinous crimes’ would be reviewed ‘case by case’ in consonance with the existing policy on the subject, and, wherever feasible, steps for withdrawal of such cases would be initiated by the State Government.

Another potential roadblock is the divide amongst the Dimasa and non-Dimasa tribesmen. The District’s population of 213,529, according to the 2011 Census, is distributed between Dimasa, Kuki, Zeme Naga, Baite, Hrangkhawl, Vaiphei, Karbi, Khasi-Pnar and Khelma tribesmen. Besides, non-tribal groups, including Nepali and Bengali settlers, also inhibit the District.

A section of non-Dimasa tribesmen is opposing the MoS. The Indigenous People’s Front (IPF), an organisation of non-Dimasa tribes, claims that non-Dimasa communities outnumber the Dimasas in the District, and wants a separate autonomous council. Atheng Luingthang, the IPF President, states, “We want a separate council for the Dimasa and another one for us.” Luingthang warned that if the present Territorial Council is not abolished and bifurcation is not done, the State and Central Governments will be responsible for another round of ethnic turmoil. The tribes and communities in the District have polarised since the renaming of the North Cachar Hills District as Dima Hasao District on April 1, 2010. This action compounded earlier grievances that culminated into two major ethnic clashes – Hmar-Dimasa in 2003 and Dimasa-Zeme Naga in 2009. While more than 50 persons were killed in clashes in 2003, over 70 lives were lost in the 2009 clashes.

Further, a host of smaller Dimasa militant formations, including the National Dimasa Protection Army (NDPA), DNRF, Dima Jadi Naiso Army (DJNA) and Dimasa National Liberation Front (DNLF), still continue to operate in the District, in addition to non-Dimasa groups such as NSCN-IM, NSCN-K and HTF. Security Forces (SFs) reportedly recovered 31 arms in Dima Hasao during 2012, and seized some 2,967 rounds of ammunition from the two Hill Districts of Karbi Anglong and Dima Hasao, out of a total of 9,373 rounds of ammunition recovered across the State.

In addition, given the nature of past agreements/surrenders, in the Northeast, it will be premature to judge the outcome of the latest surrender saga. ‘Surrendered’ groups in the past have reneged; others have retained their armed cadres and engaged in extortion and other criminal activities; elements within ‘surrendered’ groups have ‘gone underground’ again; lopsided ‘peace agreements’ have become the centre of a fractious ethnic politics; unresolved issues have suppurated into overt ethnic conflagrations; and the best of ‘solutions’ in the Northeast have failed to produce a semblance of good governance.

Nevertheless, the dissolution of the DHD factions is another positive development in Assam, a State that has witnessed a declining trend in insurgency-related fatalities, from a peak of 783 in 1998 to 91 in 2012. At least four major militant formations operating across Assam have surrendered over the past years, and another 12 have joined peace talks. It remains to be seen whether the State and Central leaderships have the sagacity and competence to translate the opportunities of the moment into an enduring peace.

Civilians

Security Force Personnel

Terrorists/Insurgents

Total

BANGLADESH

Islamist Extremism

INDIA

Manipur

Meghalaya

Left-wing Extremism

Jharkhand

Maharashtra

Odisha

Total (INDIA)

PAKISTAN

Balochistan

FATA

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

Sindh

Total (PAKISTAN)