Author: Editorial
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: May 5, 2011
URL: http://www.dailypioneer.com/336369/Wage-relentless-war.html
Maoists deserve neither mercy nor forgiveness
Violent clashes between Maoists and security
forces are by all accounts the norm in areas commonly referred to as India's
'red corridor'. Yet the recent surge in the number of encounters between the
insurgents and the jawans of our paramilitary forces, pointing towards the
ruthlessness of the Maoists, has shocked the nation. On Tuesday morning, eight
CRPF jawans and three men belonging to the State police were killed while
another 26 were injured in the Senha area of Lohardaga district in Jharkhand
after the Maoists lured the security team to a hill-top village and blasted
some 50 landmines that they had been planted around a two km radius. According
to reports, the insurgents demanded the surrender of the security forces,
which included two CRPF companies and two police teams, but instead our brave
men in fatigues and their khaki-clad colleagues chose to take on the enemy
in a headlong firefight. Eventually, after four hours of intense fighting,
the security forces were able to push back the Maoists who then retreated
to their jungle hideouts. In a sense, it was a moment of victory for the armed
forces. Sadly, it was also one that cost us the lives of 11 brave men. Critics
of the bullet-for-bullet policy would call this a setback for the Government
in its war on Maoists. But it is in situations such as these that we must
remind ourselves of the reality: Collateral damage and casualties are inevitable
in the ongoing asymmetric war with the Red terrorists enjoying a certain advantage
as they do not have to follow the rules of engagement or abide by the law
of the land which, much as it may sound silly, the security forces and the
state must follow. In association with the Governments of States that have
been badly hit by Maoist insurgency, the Union Government has launched a concerted
counter-offensive to eliminate what Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has repeatedly
- and rightly - described as the greatest threat to our internal security.
Hence, there will be collateral damage, there will be fatalities, there will
be casualties, such as those in Jharkhand this week. But none of these should
deter either the people or the Government from persisting with hunting down
those who wage war on the state and dealing with them without any trace of
either mercy or forgiveness. Maoists are killers are understand no other language
but that of the gun.
That a counter-offensive is integral to eliminating
Maoist terror has been proven in recent months by the number of successes
our security forces have stacked up. On Tuesday itself, for example, there
was another fierce encounter at a Maoist transit camp in the Jhumara hillocks,
some 65 km from the district headquarters of Bokaro. The four-hour-long firefight
ended with the Maoists fleeing their camp while the police confiscated all
that they had left behind. The Deputy Superintendent of Police of Silli was
shot in the wee hours of Tuesday while leading a successful joint operation
against a Maoist commander in Ranchi district. Terrorism, irrespective of
the shade of the ideology of the terrorists, cannot be countenanced in a democracy
with a plural and open society. It is the responsibility of the state to deal
with terrorists, whether homegrown from foreign shores, with an iron fist.
The war against Maoists must be taken to its logical conclusion.
