Two women among four Naxalites surrender in Chhattisgarh’s Dantewada district

Four Naxalites, including two women and one of them carrying reward of Rs 1 lakh on her head, surrendered before security forces

Dantewada: Four Naxalites, including two women and one of them carrying reward of Rs 1 lakh on her head, surrendered before security forces in Chhattisgarh’s Dantewada district on Friday, an official said.

The Naxalites, who were active in Jiakodta village panchayat under Katekalyan area committee of Maoists, turned themselves in before the police and CRPF officials, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP anti-naxal operation) Govind Diwan said.

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They said they were impressed by the police’s rehabilitation drive ‘Lon Varratu’ and disillusioned with “hollow” Maoist ideology, he said.

The surrendered Naxalites — Hungi Sodhi (28), her husband Bhimaram Kartam (27), Hidma alias Hiralal Markam (27) and another woman cadre Kumari Deve (27) — were village-level members of the banned outfit CPI (Maoist), he said.

Sodhi also headed the Krantikari Mahila Adivasi Sangthan (KAMS), a front organisation of Maoists, in the Jiakodta area and carried a reward of Rs 1 lakh on her head, Diwan said.

With this, 615 Naxalites, 159 of them carrying bounties, have so far quit violence in the district under the ‘Lon Varratu’ (return to your home/village) campaign, launched in June 2020, said the DSP.

Under the ‘Lon Varratu’ (term coined in local Gondi dialect) initiative, the Dantewada police have put up posters and banners in the native villages of at least 1,600 Naxalites, most of them carrying cash rewards on their heads, and appealed to them to shun the path of violence and return to the national mainstream. Surrendered Naxalites are also being provided skill development training in different disciplines as part of rehabilitation efforts, the official said.