Telangana government bans 16 ‘front’ organisations of the outlawed CPI (Maoist) for one year

Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhara Rao.

The Telangana government has banned as “unlawful” 16 so-called front organisations of the outlawed Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist). As per the government’s orders the 16 organisations will remain banned for a period of one year with effect from March 30. News of the ban was only made public on April 23.

According to the government order, the front organisations declared unlawful are: Telangana Praja Front (TPD), Telangana Asanghatitha Karmika Samakhya (TAKS), Telangana Vidyarthi Vedika (TVV), Democratic Students Organisation (DSU), Telangana Vidyarthi Sangham (TVS), Adivasi Students Union (ASU), Committee for Release of Political Prisoners (CRPP), Telangana Raithanga Samithi (TRS), Tudum Debba (TD), Praja Kala Mandali (PKM), Telangana Democratic Front (TDF), Forum Against Hindu Fascism Offensive (FAHFO), Civil Liberties Committee (CLC), Amarula Bandhu Mithrula Sangham (ABMS), Chaitanya Mahila Sangham (CMS) and Revolutionary Writers’ Association (RWA).

The government contends that these organisations allure people into their fold with inflammatory statements, meetings and rallies and by highlighting various issues such as the UAPA Act, the farm laws, CAA/NRC. The government also believes that members of some of these organisations, acting at the behest of the CPI-Maoist leadership, have been protesting against the “so-called state repression on front activists” and demanding the release of activists such as P. Varavara Rao, Prof G.N. Sai Baba, Rona Wilson and others.

Reads the Government order: “The activists of these front organisations have been regularly in touch and meeting the Maoist leadership in the forest area of Chhattisgarh. On the directions of CPI-Maoist, they are organising various protest programmes on barren lands and against so-called state repression on front activists besides demanding the release of P Vara Vara Rao, Founder, VIRASAM, Prof G.N Sai Baba (extremist convict), Rona Wilson and other leaders of various front organisations who were arrested in Bhima Koregaon case, and repealing UAPA Act, farm laws, CAA/NRC etc.”

As per the Government Order these organisations have been encouraging or aiding persons to commit acts of violence and intimidation and are habitually committing acts of violence. The order further states that activists of these organisations are moving into urban areas, adopting urban guerrilla tactics in a bid to wage war against the state. The National Investigation Agency had, on April 1, reportedly carried out searches at the residences of at least 20 activists belonging to civil rights organisations such as the Human Rights Forum, the Andhra Pradesh Civil Liberties Committee, Virasam (Revolutionary Writers’ Association) and others.

The announcement of the ban comes days after a top leader of the outlawed CPI-Maoist, Muttanagari Jalandar Reddy, who carried a reward of Rs.20 lakh on his head, surrendered before the Andhra Pradesh Police. According to the police, it was Muttanagari Jalandhar Reddy, who went by many aliases like Maranna, Krishna, Karuna and Sarath, and hailed from Siddipet in Telangana, who had led the second assault team (of Maoists) in the Balimela ambush on June 29, 2008, in which 38 commandos of the Greyhounds of Andhra Pradesh Police were killed. According to the Andhra Pradesh Director General of Police (DGP) D.G. Sawang, Muttanagari Jalandhar Reddy had surrendered due to “disillusionment with the obsolete Maoist ideology, lack of local public support and lack of recruitment from local adivasis”.