As many as five former Naxals were on Friday given appointment letters under the surrender policy framed by the State Government for encouraging ultras to shun arms and join the mainstream society. The newly-appointed constables (former ultras), on occasion, described the harrowing tale of exploitation and methods used by left-wing extremist organizations for indoctrinating youngsters to turn them against their own Government.
All surrendered ultras were once active members of the banned CPI (Maoist) and have been associated with the unit under the command of dreaded naxal Kundan Pahan. Significantly, once a member of anti-establishment force the surrendered Naxal will now become part of the State police to put the extremism to end.
“Extremist organisations lure youngsters of Jharkhand into their outfit. Nobody is a born Naxal. Our Government is making efforts to link them Government and we will keep on making efforts in this direction,” said Chief Minister Hemant Soren.
Soren emphasised on the necessity to make governance trickle down to the remotest area and end alienation of people living in inaccessible areas of Jharkhand incidentally more prone to naxal ideology than what is followed in the State. Suresh Munda, a 21 year-old former naxal, underscored the need to counter the means of the MCC to propound the ideology that forms the guiding principle for the left-wing extremist organization. Munda was a member of the squad led by Kundan Pahan.
“We were taught the ideology of Mao Tse-tung. We were told that a labourer produces from needle to ship yet he gets nothing and to fight to change the system. This is reality but lately I realised that irrespective of the reality the means adopted by the organisation is not right,” said Munda.
Munda a resident of Sarjamdih in Bundu was taken away at the age of 15 and during the stint with MCC, which ended in 2010, was directly involved in six encounters with police. He was also trained in making arms ultimately used to target own people. But his surrender was a result of pressure from police and from family members to shun the path of violence and chose a peaceful life instead of a life of nomad.
Ironically, profounder of an ideologically that envisaged to iron out class differences has a wicked face carrying expressions that best describes deviation from the path and the brute reality of exploitation by the ranks of exploiters of poor people. Women were used for recreation activities and entertain cadres of MCC to end fatigue.
“I never lifted a gun and I used to entertain fighters. There were many girls like me besides few boys in the squad,” said Geeta Ganjhu of Burhmu.
Other people to receive appointment letters on Friday were Pandu Pahan, Sunita Kumari and Indi Pahan, all resident of different villages under Namkum block. The event was attended by Minister, department of Home, Rajendra Prasad Singh, Principal Secretary Home, NN Pandey and senior police officials. Incidentally, Soren shared several other programmes being planned by the State Government and intended to bring people serving sentence into the mainstream. The Government’s initiative will be focused on imparting training that can provide means of livelihood to those who chose a path of violence over peace.
Notably, the benefit under the surrender policy of the State has been given to 58 who naxals surrendered between 2010 and 2013 besides distributing about `1.23-crore among the as many number of ultras surrendred. The State Government has initiated process to provide the benefit to another batch 14 naxals who surrendered in 2014.
Meanwhile, State Government is likely to begin categorisation of cadres of extremist organization — one category will include ultras upto the rank of Zonal Commander who will become eligible for `5 lakh for surrendering while cadres below the rank will fall under different category and will be given `2.5-lakh for laying their arms. Also, as per the direction issued by Central Government a surrendered naxal undergoing professional training could receive honorarium of `3,000 to `5,000 per month for a period of one-year and it can be extended for one more year. The amended surrender policy also proposes to provide monetary assistance to children of naxals shunning violence. Children of naxals returning to the main stream will be given education allowance from Class VI (`12,000) upto post-graduate level (`25,000).
TennFIJor@IJhich concluded at Kalinga Stadium here on Friday, being organized by Odisha Tennis Players Parents Association (OTPPA).
Similarly in the U-12 girls singles events final, Sanjana Sirimala of Andhra Pradesh defeated Shreya Chakraborty of West Bengal by 6-1,6-2 and bagged the title. local girl top seed Rutuparna Choudhury thrashed her Statemate Alisha Samal by 6-3,6-4 and grabbed the U-14 singles title. Similarly in boys final, second seed Ch Sreeharshit of Andhra Pradesh pipped top seed Mahesh Mohapatra of Odisha by 4-6,7-5,6-4 and emerged champion. In the girls U-14 doubles title claimed by Alisha and Rutuparna of Odisha by defeating West Bengal duo Punyatoya Mohapatra and Ishika Gupta by 4-1,5-3. In the boys U-14 doubles trophy won by CH Sreeharshit and Addul Kareem Khan both of Andhra Pradesh by defeating Mahesh Mohapatra of Odisha and partner Ashish Sinha of Jharkhand by 5-3,5-4(6).
Padmini to participate in National Premier Chess
Bhubaneswar: Odisha’s chess queen WGM Padmini Rout has been selected to participate in the National women Premier Chess Championship to be held at Sanghli at Maharashtra from October 25 to November 5. Top eight ranking holders of this year National challenger which was held from September 5 to 15 at Goa had qualified for National Premier. National champion of this year will be selected for Asian, World and Olympiad championship. WGM Padmini Rout of Odisha had qualified by becoming 4th in recent concluded National challenger. Altogether 12 players would participate in the 11 rounds meet.
Koraput, Bolangir wins in Sahani Cup
Bhubaneswar: Koraput, Bolangir registered their second victory by defeating Ganjam and Paradip Port Trust (PPT) respectively in the league round matches of the 56th Senior Men Inter District Football Championship for Sahani Cup on Friday. Bolangir defeated PPT by 4-3 goals via through tie breaker at Jharsuguda .The match ended in 1-1 draw in the regulation time. The match was conducted by K Jagarnath Rao,Sujit Patra, Bibhuti Behera and G Suresh Kumar as referee.
Similarly in Brajarajnagar venue, Koraput defeated Ganjam by 2-0 goals. Dasrathi Desnaik of Sanjeet Khara of the winining team netted a goal each in the second and third minutes respectively. In a high scoring league match of the day at Belpahar venue, Gobinda Behera of Khurda netted three goals in the 29th,50th and 70th minutes and powered the team to thrash Kalahandi by 7-1 goals.