BASTAR: The Maoist rebellion that once held sway over nearly a third of India is being bulldozed into submission in its final forest fortress. Thick clouds of red dust billow skyward as earthmovers cut roads through the Abujhmad hills of India&#39;s central Chhattisgarh state, the last holdout of a nearly 60-year insurgency that has cost 12,000 lives. Security forces are strangling the final remnants of the revolt with a network of 450 fortified bases and surveillance hubs linked by roads driven deep into the dense forest. New Delhi said last month that it had effectively defeated the insurgency, which at its height held a large swathe of northern and central India with up to 20,000 fighters, after villagers rose up against their feudal lords. &quot;Roads were made and security forces opened camps inside the jungles,&quot; local police chief Sundarraj P, who spent years fighting the insurgency, told AFP. The last rebels, who had been forced into a pocket of hilly jungle about twice the size of London, said they were fighting for the rights of the marginalized Indigenous people in the mineral-rich region. Once all but inaccessible, Abujhmad has been put on what Home Minister Amit Shah calls &quot;the path of development.&quot; It used to take three days to get to the nearest town of Narayanpur and back. Now &quot;we take the morning bus, and return by the evening one,&quot; said 60-year-old farmer Dasrath Netam, from the forest village of Mohandi. But many locals worry that the roads may also open up the iron-rich hills to massively increased mining. &#39;All out on mining&#39; &quot;Big roads are being constructed to give a message that the (security) forces can move anywhere quickly,&quot; said Manish Kunjam, a former Chhattisgarh lawmaker and tribal rights activist. &quot;But they are also being built keeping in mind the mines,&quot; he insisted. Extraction began nearly 60 years ago, but the insurgency meant some of India&#39;s highest-grade iron ore was left untouched. Hundreds of trucks laden with ore now rumble from a newly operational mine on the forest fringes. Leaders from Prime Minister Narendra Modi&#39;s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which controls the state, say that is not what the new roads are about. &quot;There is nothing here that is about minerals,&quot; Chhattisgarh Deputy Chief Minister Vijay Sharma told AFP, adding the mining has been going on &quot;for the last 50 years.&quot; But court records and corporate filings show significant expansion of the mining footprint. At least two mines on the edge of Abujhmad, stalled for years by Maoist violence, have become operational over the past five years. Extraction began at Amdai Ghat around 2021, and at Rowghat in 2023. More than 10 million tons of additional production has been approved in other existing mines in the last three years, stretching across roughly 900 hectares of forest. &quot;I really think the government is going to go all out on mining,&quot; said Shalini Gera, a lawyer who has worked with tribal communities in Bastar. &quot;This is the only development that they have in mind.&quot; For the region&#39;s marginalized tribes, who are almost entirely dependent on the forest for their livelihoods, it is an alarming prospect &mdash; even if most say the Maoists did them no favors either. &quot;We are glad they are finally gone, because they ruled by fear,&quot; said 25-year-old Sonuram Gutta, who said he was conscripted into the insurgency, but was allowed to leave after a few years of fighting. &quot;But mining will make everything around us dirty. Our forefathers taught us to protect the forest; it is everything to us.&quot;

India

Thick clouds of red dust billow skyward as earthmovers cut roads through the Abujhmad hills of India's central Chhattisgarh state, the last holdout of a nearly 60-year insurgency that has cost 12,000 lives.

India strangles final Maoist bastion as mining looms

NEW DELHI:&nbsp;Indian security forces have killed 16 Maoist fighters, including a senior commander, in the eastern state of Jharkhand as authorities step up efforts to quash the long-running insurgency, reports AFP. More than 10,000 people have died in the decades-long rebellion waged by the guerrillas, who say they are fighting for the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/i-am-indian-last-words-of-a-24-yearold-stabbed-by-mob-in-india" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">rights of marginalized</a>&nbsp;indigenous people in resource-rich pockets of India. Six decades old&nbsp;New Delhi has launched an all-out campaign against the insurgents, also known as Naxalites after the village in the Himalayan foothills where the Maoist-inspired insurgency began nearly six decades ago, and vowed to end the rebellion by March 2026. Since 2024, more than 500 Maoist fighters&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/report-documents-209-minority-hate-crimes-across-india-during-november-2025" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">have been killed</a>, including some of the top commanders, according to government figures. The latest gunfight was reported from West Singhbhum district in Jharkhand state, Indian Home Minister&nbsp;Amit Shah said in a social media post late Thursday. Indian minister on Naxalism&nbsp;One of those killed was a &ldquo;notorious bounty-wanted Naxal Central Committee member&rdquo; named Patiram Manjhi, Shah said.&nbsp; He&nbsp;had a bounty of over $100,000 on his head. &quot;We are committed to eradicating Naxalism, which has been synonymous with fear and terror for decades, before March 31, 2026,&quot; he claimed.

More than 10,000 people have died in the decades-long rebellion waged by the guerrillas, who say they are fighting for the rights of marginalized indigenous people in resource-rich pockets of India.

Articles tagged with "Maoist Fighters"

India strangles final Maoist bastion as mining looms

Indian security forces kill 16 Maoist fighters