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Journalism of Courage
Badly injured in an elephant attack in the forests of Kerala early last year, Maoist leader Angadi Suresh, alias Pradeep, surrendered to the police. The 49-year-old was part of the Western Ghats Zonal Committee (WGSZ) of the CPI (Maoist) and among a group of 19 Communist insurgents from Karnataka who moved to the neighbouring state around 2016. As Suresh’s life on the run came to an end in February 2024 after 21 years, he wrote to his wife and fellow rebel Vanajakshi B from prison, beseeching her to also surrender.
At the time, the 55-year-old Vanajakshi was part of a group of eight Naxals, including several from Karnataka, who had returned to the state after nearly eight years.
Over the past year, as intelligence agencies and the Anti-Naxal Force (ANF) in Karnataka began a serious effort to get these eight to lay down their arms, dozens of copies of Suresh’s letter were distributed in the villages of the Western Ghats in the hope of reaching out to Vanajakshi and the others when they visited the homes of former sympathisers, friends, or family.
“Vanajakshi did not believe that her husband had written the letter. She thought it was a police ploy to get her to surrender,” said a senior police officer familiar with the operation lasting over a year. Finally, on January 8, Vanajakshi and five other Maoists surrendered at Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s office in Bengaluru, over 200 km from the forests.
The others who gave up arms were Mundagaru Latha, 45; Sundari Kuthlur, 40; Marappa Aroli alias Jayanna, 49; Jisha, 34; and Ramesh alias Vasanth, 38. Apart from Jisha who is from Kerala and Ramesh who is from Tamil Nadu, the others are from Karnataka. While Latha, Sundari, and Vanajakshi are from tribal and backward communities in the Western Ghats, Aroli is a Dalit from Raichur.
“All but one of the Karnataka Naxals have surrendered. Only Kotehunda Ravi has not surrendered, but he does not have any weapons and is also expected to surrender soon. This is the last of the armed Naxals in Karnataka,” said a senior police officer.
Suresh’s letter may not have played a direct role in his comrades laying down arms, but it was part of the state government’s strategy to bring Naxals into the mainstream after observing changes in their ideological landscape.
The rebels had moved to Kerala around 2016 following the surrender of nine rebels during the rule of the Congress government in Karnataka from 2013 to 2018.
As per multiple police officers, they suffered one setback after another, and eventually fell out with the Maoist leadership in Kerala.
After 2021, with the arrest of WGZC secretary and key Karnataka leader B G Krishnamurthy alias Gangadhar, 50, anti-Naxal operations in South India picked up pace. In September 2023, in another massive blow, CPI (Maoist) Central Committee (CC) member and WGZC head Sanjoy Deepak Rao, 51, was arrested in Hyderabad. Two months later, a Naxal from Andhra Pradesh, Kavitha alias Lakshmi, was shot dead in an encounter with the Kerala Police. Then, last November, the Karnataka group’s de facto leader, Vikram Gowda, was shot dead by the ANF.
“The whole process of the surrender of the Naxals in Karnataka began in a way following the arrest and interrogation of Central Committee member Sanjoy Roy Deepak,” said a police source. “We learned then that the Karnataka group of Naxals had fallen out with the Kerala group headed by C T Moideen.”
Sources said the Karnataka group lost trust in Moideen – who was closely allied with Roy and arrested in Kerala in September 2024 – because of his aggressive tactics and monopoly over resources from the Central Committee. “We anticipated at this time that the Karnataka group will return to familiar territory to make efforts to renew operations,” said a police source.
The early recognition of the evolving situation meant the state intelligence agencies moved fast and set up a new Naxal Surrender and Rehabilitation Committee and policy. There was no surrender policy in place since 2018, when the previous Congress government lost power. Writer Banjagere Jayaprakash agreed to chair the committee, while advocate K P Sripal and journalist Parvathish Bilidale joined as mediators.
The ground in Karnataka too had shifted. “The Naxals realised that they still enjoyed sympathy and respect in the forests, but that people were against an armed struggle,” said Bilidale.
According to persons involved with the process, what had also changed was the deep penetration that intelligence and ANF personnel had been able to make among tribals in forest villages between 2016 and 2023. “Every move of the Naxals after they returned was mapped… There was a constant flow of information to the ANF and police,” sources said.
A senior police officer said: “In March 2024, when we got information that a group of the Naxals had visited a house on the edge of the forests in the Kodagu region, we moved to get the new surrender policy approved by the government.”
Based on intelligence data from 2003 to 2024, the police then distributed copies of the new surrender policy among 250 houses in the forests the rebels were expected to visit. Subsequently, intelligence and ANF personnel narrowed the list to 30 and the intermediaries got to work.
Activists such as former Naxal Noor Shridhar, who surrendered in 2014 following an initiative by slain journalist Gauri Lankesh and freedom fighter H S Doreswamy, and civic groups such as the Citizens Initiative for Peace and Jan Shakti also began talking to these families.
The police caught a break in October 2024 when it nabbed two youths from Dharmasthala town in Dakshina Kannada. They were the links between the Central Committee and the Karnataka group.
“The arrests meant that the group was cut off from the CC. The CC would not trust the Karnataka group as it was compromised. This meant that there would be no funds either; otherwise they received Rs 2,000 per person,” said a police officer.
An audio clip that emerged after the January 8 surrender showed that 44-year-old Vikram Gowda was against surrendering, telling a sympathiser that it would be a betrayal of people for whom they had been fighting.
“They (the government) want reconciliation. They are promising us lakhs and crores of money. We will not accept this,” the person believed to be Gowda is heard telling the sympathiser.
On November 19 last year, Gowda arrived in a village in Udupi district to collect provisions, for which he had paid a sympathiser. But he walked into a trap laid by the ANF and was killed in a shootout. “Vikram Gowda may have prevented surrender by the others due to his ideological stand,” said a police source.
After the killing of Gowda, Siddaramaiah called on the other Naxals to surrender, and they decided to join the negotiations. As a first step to gain their confidence, the ANF and police were pulled back to the edges of the forest they were in.
“After the Naxals contacted us, they presented an eight-page charter of demands. Many of the demands were related to issues of the people and one demand was about their health issues,” Bilidale said.
The demands included changes to forest and environment policies of the state, introduction of “pro-farmer initiatives”, and closure of cases against Naxals in Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu. “The government was of the view that the surrender should be unconditional and that all issues could be considered later,” said a source.
Under the surrender package, each Naxal was offered Rs 7.5 lakh in three instalments, but had to face trial in the cases filed against them, with the state providing legal assistance.
The Karnataka Police recovered one AK 56 rifle, three .303 rifles, one 12 bore Single Barrel Breech Loading gun and one countrymade pistol, along with 176 rounds of ammunition.
“The past two times that Naxals have surrendered in Karnataka, they have come forward and the surrender has only been facilitated by the state. It is for the first time that the state has sought the surrender of the Naxals and facilitated it,” said a police officer, while adding that the government needed to address the factors that led to the emergence of the Naxals in the Western Ghats in the first place, including “development gaps in remote regions”.
Soon after the surrender, the BJP criticised it, saying the Siddaramaiah government had just helped “forest Naxals” become “Urban Naxals”. There have also been questions about the rebels surrendering before the CM and whether Gowda’s death could have been avoided had the new surrender policy been in operation since March 2024.
“Is Siddaramaiah close to the Naxals, or are those close to Naxals close to him?” asked BJP leader Sunil Kumar Karkala, who represents a region near the Western Ghats.
“If Maoists are surrendering and their issues are being resolved, it is commendable. But, should the CM himself play a role in this process?” BJP MLC N Ravikumar asked last week.
However, senior police officers point out that Union Home Minister Amit Shah himself met Naxals who had surrendered in Chhattisgarh last month, as part of the Centre’s policy to end Naxalism by 2026.
Karnataka Home Minister G Parameshwara said the surrender was part of the Congress government’s “Naxal-free policy”, and that it would keep the ANF in operation “to prevent a situation where other groups fill the vacuum left by their exit”.
