Naxals taking up employment in urban areas: Govt

Government has received reports that Naxals have undertaken employment in urban areas in order to earn livelihood and evade police action, Parliament was informed on Tuesday.

"There is no intelligence or information to suggest that Naxal organisations are infiltrating through security agencies and factories to expand their network in the urban areas. However, a few cases have come to notice where the CPI (Maoist) cadres have undertaken employment in urban areas primarily to earn livelihood and also evade police arrest," Minister of State for Home Affairs R PN Singh said in a written reply in Lok Sabha.

He said the front organisations of the banned CPI (Maoist) party as well as organisations sympathetic to the outfit have been supporting the cause of the workers employed in factories.

"Their objective is essentially to exploit the situation to gain a foot-hold among the working class," he said.

Singh said that the strategy of CPI (Maoist) for urban areas is documented in a paper titled 'urban perspective'.

"Briefly stated, the strategy for urban areas of the country includes mobilisation and organisation of the working classes, building a united front of classes similarly placed to the working classes and military tactics involving sabotage actions and select assassinations by 'action teams'," he said.

The minister said Naxals have not been successful in their designs "primarily on account of the revulsion of the urban population towards mindless violence and atrocities perpetrated by the Maoists in their strongholds in central India."

He said that due diligence and caution is usually exercised while employing people in the factories by the management.

"However, the activities of front organisations are closely monitored and suitable action, wherever warranted, is taken by the government," Singh added.

In a separate reply, Singh said a total of eleven helicopters, of the BSF and Indian Air Force, have been deployed to support security forces tasked for duties in Naxal violence affected states.

Image: People travel atop a bus in Naxal-hit Kandhamal district in Odisha

Photograph: Reuters