A photo essay on the plight of tribals in Chhattisgarh because of the conflict between militia and the Naxalites
Harikrishna Katragadda, Mint
New Delhi On a cloudy evening, Madkam Kose prepares to leave Durla village in Dantewada in Chhattisgarh. She wants to head back with her family to the nearby Dornapal relief camp, her home for the past three years. "There is nothing to do in the camps during the day," she says. "We just come back to our gutted house during the day and pick mahua flowers in the forest."
Dantewada district in Chhattisgarh is a hotbed for Maoist insurgency. Decades of government neglect and oppression by the forest officials gave Maoists entry into villages and a swelling cadre of angry tribals.
To counter the Maoist influence, a government-backed militia—Salwa Judum—was let loose on the tribals in Dandakaranya forests of Chhattisgarh. Waves of forced migration followed when tribals were forced into relief camps, guarded by security forces and paramilitary groups. Nearly 150,000 tribals have been displaced since 2005, when the conflict began. Some fled to relative safety in nearby Andhra Pradesh, while those who resisted were abducted, tortured, raped and killed.
This week, the non-profit Human Rights Watch, an international agency that has been monitoring events in the region, released a report highlighting the failure of governance, and social and economic lapses as the root cause of the Naxal problem. The report documented the violence and abuse of local communities in Chhattisgarh by both Salwa Judum and the Maoists, and recommended that the Salwa Judum be disbanded.
source:cgnet.in
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