RAIPUR: In a boost to Chhattisgarh govt’s surrender policy and a setback for banned CPI (Maoist), 103 Naxals, including 49 carrying a cumulative reward of Rs 1 crore, laid down arms before senior police and paramilitary officials in Bijapur district of Bastar division Thursday.Each surrendered cadre was given a cheque of Rs 50,000 as immediate assistance under the surrender and rehabilitation policy.“This is not merely a surrender of weapons, but the defeat of a Maoist ideology sustained for decades through violence,” said Dantewada range DIG Kamlochan Kashyap, who, along with CRPF Bijapur DIG B S Negi and Bijapur SP Jitendra Kumar Yadav, presided over the ceremony.SP Yadav said the rehabilitation scheme offers Maoists and their families a chance to live peacefully in the mainstream. Revolutionary people’s committees, once Maoists’ parallel governance structure, are collapsing as members return in large numbers. The killing of senior commanders in encounters and the surrender of top cadres have deepened the leadership vacuum, forcing lower-level members to give up arms, Yadav added.Appealing to remaining Maoists still active in jungles, the SP urged them to avail themselves of the policy.Since Jan 1, 410 Maoists have surrendered, 421 arrested, and 137 have been killed in Bijapur.

Reds hack villager to death in Bastar

A group of Maoists barged into a villager’s house, dragged him out, and hacked him to death in front of his family and relatives, accusing him of being a police informer, in Bijapur dist of Chhattisgarh’s Bastar division Wednesday night. Villagers alerted police, who rushed to the village and sent the body of Madkam Bhima for autopsy. Cops described the killing as another instance of Reds targeting innocent villagers to spread fear, particularly as security ops intensify in Bastar.