In the morning of 21st May reports of this massive operation by the security forces surfaced followed by the jubilant Amit Shah applauding the forces for this ‘major breakthrough’. The ‘Operation Black Forest’ comes at a time when there have been repeated appeals by civil society organisations as well as the CPI (Maoist) to the government to declare a ceasefire and make the situation conducive to a process of dialogues. The killing of the general secretary of the party at this time shows the blatant disregard of the Indian state towards initiating any kind of peace process. This brings the death toll in Bastar to about 200 this year alone including alleged Maoists and many innocent Adivasis. Amit Shah has marked the death of comrade Basavaraju as a landmark victory towards making India Naxal-free by 31st March, 2026. As condemnation pours in from all left parties and human rights defenders against this extra-judicial murder, the centre has already given green signal for uprooting the forests in Gadchiroli area for iron-ore processing plants. March, 2026 is thus a deadline for meeting the demands set by the capitalist masters of the current regime to clear off Dandakaranya for unbridled loot of natural resources.
Comrade N Keshava Rao alias Basavaraju joined the communist movement as a student pursuing BTech at Regional Engineering College (REC), Warangal around 1973-74. REC, now rechristened as a National Institute of Technology, used to be a hotbed of Naxal movement in undivided Andhra Pradesh. In that phase RSU played a militant role in thwarting ABVP and establishing REC as ‘Revolutionary’ Engineering College. Since the emergency was imposed, he went underground. He figured in the National Investigation Agency’s most wanted list with a reward of around ₹1.5 crore.
He was martyred at the age of 72 along with 27 other comrades by a joint posse of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and the District Reserve Guard (DRG). It remains unclear whether it was a premeditated case of cold-blooded murder or a fake encounter or a full-fledged clash. This encounter comes close to the heels of the Karregutta operation in which around 24,000 security personnels allegedly killed 31 armed rebels. Later it was revealed by Soni Sori that many of those killed were innocent Adivasi civilians picked up from the local villages to cover up a botched operation in which the security forces killed each other in cross-firings.
As it is now amply clear that ‘neutralising’ Maoists is an excuse for corporate land grab, we urge all progressive, democratic, and patriotic forces to keep aside all political differences and raise their voices to demand:
- An independent inquiry into these extrajudicial murders
- Immediately halt operation Kagar
- Immediate ceasefire and unconditional peace talks with CPI (Maoist)
