 "Personnel belonging to the District Reserve Guard (DRG) and the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF). Source: Representative Image/PTI.")
Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) chief GP Singh has dubbed the anti-Naxal operation ‘Black Forest’ as the “the beginning of the end of Left-Wing extremism”, according to The Times of India.
The Left-Wing Extremism (LWE) is how the Union government formally calls the Naxalite or the Maoist insurgency. Singh’s remark comes after Union Home Minister Amit Shah set March 31, 2026, as the deadline for eliminating Naxalism from the country.
The 21-day operation in Karregattalu Hills on the Chhattisgarh-Telangana border has been dubbed as the largest-ever anti-Naxal operation.
Under the operation that concluded on May 11, the security forces took control of Karreguttalu Hills area, which had earlier been under the exclusive control of Maoists. The operation involved around 26,000 security personnel from CRPF and state police forces.
Operation Black Forest a blow to Maoist movement
The authorities have said that 31 Naxals have been killed in the operation.
However, the ToI reported sources as saying that only 31 bodies of Maoists killed in Operation Black Forest were recovered and the estimate suggests up to 40-45 fatalities. As senior CRPF officer involved in the operation said that at least two “very senior Maoist cadres” were also killed whose bodies could not be recovered.
Sources further said that the forces succeeded in breaking up some of the strongest Maoist military units into formations into disjointed, dislocated units. They said such units will be pursued in the coming days in follow-up intelligence-led operations.
Impact Shorts
View AllThe newspaper reported that follow-up operations will be at smaller scale as Maoists are now hiding in smaller groups and are scattered across pockets of Indravati national park area, western Bastar, southern Bastar, and in Telangana, and in a small portion of few other states.
A senior Chhattisgarh Police official told the newspaper that operations are already ongoing in several states.
“Anti-Naxal operations are currently under way in Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Jharkhand, Bihar and Maharashtra as part of a multi-front offensive to wipe out the vestiges of Maoist setups there. Already, five-six appeals have been made by CPI (Maoist) requesting a ceasefire and dialogue, indicating their desperation,” the official said.
The newspaper reported that, to achieve the deadline set by Home Minister Shah, the forces are focussed on:
Keeping up the pressure on Maoists by continuing to overwhelm them with sustained operations
Cornering them so that they are left with just two options of surrendering or getting killed
Blocking all avenues for the Maoists to regroup and re-enter areas