Thaindian News

Raipur, June 7 (IANS) The Supreme Court’s verdict against using tribals as special police officers (SPOs) will harm the anti-Maoist operations in Chhattisgarh, the state’s police chief said Thursday.

“It’s a setback and we are trying to overcome the situation. The SPOs were very helpful,” Director General of Police Vishwa Ranjan told IANS.

He said the state at present has 5,128 SPOs, including about a hundred women.

Roughly 4,000 SPOs were deployed in the state’s violence-hit Bastar region, comprising Bijapur, Dantewada, Bastar, Narayanpur and Kanker districts.

“Some 800 out of the 4,000 SPOs in Bastar were used for anti-Maoist drive while others were guarding Salwa Judum relief camps,” said Ranjan, who took over as the police chief of India’s worst insurgency-hit state in July 2007. He will retire in March next year.

Salwa Judum, which means ‘peace march’ in the tribals’ Gondi language, was launched in June 2005 in Bastar. The state government says it is a “spontaneous peoples’ movement against Maoists”, a claim countered by activists, who say the armed tribals are funded by the state to attack Maoist sympathisers and those who do not toe the official line on Left insurgency.

Ranjan said he would complete the SPOs’ disarming process within six weeks, as asked by the court.

“There is general opinion that SPOs should be absorbed in police force based on their merit and qualifications. But it is up to the state government to take a final call on the issue,” he said.

Official sources say the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government is planning to file a review petition in the court against the verdict.

The state police chief said that hand-written pamphlets were found Thursday in the jungles of Kanker in which the outlawed Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) has appealed to the SPOs to “take advantage of the court order and leave the police force”.

The Supreme Court Tuesday slammed the Chhattisgarh government for using tribals as SPOs in anti-Maoist movement.

The court held that the appointment of SPOs to perform any of the duties of regular police officials was unconstitutional.

Maoists, who control vast swathes of rural India along its eastern flank, claim to fight for the rights of poor peasants and landless labourers. Rebels virtually run a parallel administration in the forested rural belts in half of Chhattisgarh’s 18 districts.

The state has witnessed more than 2,200 casualties in Maoist violence since it came into existence in November 2000.