Centre's revamped Naxal strategy working? Only 58 districts affected by Left-Wing Extremism in 2017, reveals MHA report

The Centre’s revamped strategy to tackle the Naxal menace seems to be bearing fruit, with statistics showing a significant improvement on the ground. There were only 58 districts affected by Left-Wing Extremism (LWE) in 2017, said a report on The Times of India, as against 75 districts in 2015 and 67 in 2016. The report quoted data compiled by the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) to say that 90 percent of the attacks took place from just four states: Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Odisha. Officials attributed this to a redrawn anti-Maoist strategy, under which they are targeting senior leadership of the extremists and their informers. [caption id=“attachment_2026131” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. PTI[/caption] “The past year, we have hit the Naxals in their den. Our coordination with state police, intelligence agencies and armed forces has been exceptional. The focus has been on leaders, over ground operatives and sympathisers. The Naxals are not able to move arms, funds and their senior leaders from one place to another,” CRPF director general Rajeev Rai Bhatnagar was quoted as saying in the report. The Ministry of Home Affairs also uploaded details of LWE violence on its website. It reported a reduction in LWE violence in all states of the country, with the only exception being Andhra Pradesh. In Andhra, there were 26 incidents reported in 2017 as against 17 in 2016, but it did report a drop from 2015, when there were 35 incidents of LWE in Andhra Pradesh. But in every other state, the number of incidents have dropped significantly. In Chhattisgarh, the worst affected state, there were 395 incidents in 2016, which came down to 373 in 2017. The biggest drop was reflected from Jharkhand, where the figurewent from 323 in 2016 to 251 in 2017. However, though there were fewer incidents of LWE in Chhattisgarh in 2017, more lives were lost. In all, 130 lives were lost in 2017, up from 107 a year earlier, the home ministry report said. Similarly, in Odisha too, there were 29 persons who lost their lives in 2017, two more than in 2016, though the total number of incidents went down from 86 to 81. Find full report here: