CPI (Maoist) | The guns fall silent
November 18 marks what is likely the final chapter of the decades-long Maoist insurgency in India. Deep in the Papikonda National Park in Andhra Pradesh’s Alluri Sitharama Raju district, security forces killed Madvi Hidma, the elusive commander of the Central Military Commission (CMC) and the Maoists’ last hope for a military revival. His death, which comes six months after General Secretary Nambala Kesava Rao alias Basavaraju was assassinated in May, marks not just a tactical defeat but also the effective collapse of the armed struggle that once threatened to engulf vast swaths of India’s forest heartland.
Hidma’s murder is significant not only because of who she was – a tribal leader in the dominant Telugu-speaking party leadership and a person who quickly rose to the upper echelons of the CPI (Maoist) – but also because of where it happened. He fell not into the familiar terrain of dense forests of Bastar, which he knew “like palms”, but in the unfamiliar region of Andhra; This is a testament to how far the movement has been pushed from its strongholds. This death, shot dead along with his wife Madakam Raje and four of his trusted bodyguards, was followed by the elimination of seven other cadres, including Metturi Joga Rao, alias Tech Shankar, and the arrest of 50 Maoists in Andhra Pradesh within 24 hours.
the last warrior
Born in Purvati village in Chhattisgarh’s Sukma district in 1981, the Gondi-speaking Hidma joined the movement at the age of 16 and quickly became a tough, motivating and excellent strategist, described by surrendering Maoists as a “skilled warrior”. Although he lacked formal education, he was tech-savvy, always carried a laptop or tablet, and had legendary communication skills that helped him get the best out of his squads. Basavaraju, himself an expert in guerrilla warfare and said to have been trained by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in the 1980s, recognized Hidma’s talent early and elevated her to command the Dandakaranya Special District Committee. He became the only tribal leader from Bastar to reach the Maoist Central Committee.
Following Basavaraju’s death during an encounter, Hidma assumed control of the CMC and its leading combat unit, the 1st Battalion of the People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army (PLGA). Its record was devastating: at least 26 major attacks, including the 2010 Tadmetla attack that killed 76 CRPF personnel, the 2013 Jhiram Ghati ambush that killed Congress leaders Mahendra Karma and Nand Kumar Patel, the 2017 Burkapal attack that claimed the lives of 25 CRPF personnel, and the Tekulguda ambush that left 21 security personnel dead.
For all her courage, Hidma was commanding a dwindling force. CPI(Maoist), which boasted of 45 Central Committee members in 2010, now has only 10-12 members left. Since 2024, around 2,120 Maoists have surrendered and more than 560 people, including senior leaders, have been killed. The statistics tell a story of inexorable decline.
final defeat
To understand this outcome, it is necessary to return to the movement’s origins in the Dandakaranya forests of Chhattisgarh. The Maoist presence here began not as an attack but as a strategic retreat. Following the collapse of the Naxalbari movement in the 1970s, leaders concluded that they had made a mistake in not preparing a “background” for regrouping. In 1980, seven teams comprising a total of 49 cadres were sent to the “Dandakaranya region”, an area of approximately 100,000 square kilometers covering four states. Their mission was to make it a safe rear sector for the Telangana guerrilla zone.
The cadres won the tribe’s trust by handling grievances by forcing contractors to raise tendu leaf prices, fighting abuses in the forest department, and confronting sexual harassment by officials. A high-ranking Maoist tribal leader once explained the real issue: Tribals felt they were not “treated like humans” and that their language, religion and way of life were not respected. Despite infrastructure such as school buildings and electricity poles, there were no teachers and no electricity.
Ironically, state-sponsored counter-insurgency campaigns proved to be the movement’s best recruiters. The Jan Jagran Abhiyan, which arrested and killed suspected Naxal sympathizers in the 1980s, prompted tribal leaders to advise youths to join the Maoists for safety. The 2005 Salwa Judum campaign, which was declared illegal by the Supreme Court, forced the villagers to choose sides and many of them chose the Maoists, causing the party to grow manifold.
As the number of tribal arrivals increased, military operations also increased. The first PLGA company was founded in 2001, followed by the formidable Batur-1 (later led by Hidma) in 2009. This period witnessed devastating attacks: the 2007 Ranibodli attack killed 55 personnel and the 2010 Mukram ambush claimed the lives of 75 CRPF.
But the movement always carried the seeds of its own destruction. As academic Nirmalagshu Mukherji noted in 2010, instead of organizing tribals into cooperatives or building health and educational institutions, the Maoists maintained the exploitative contractor system to generate taxes and revenue. Their aim was not socio-economic development, but to recruit personnel for the armed struggle. This emphasis on armed struggle resulted from a misunderstanding of the Indian state and its determination to copy China’s revolutionary path in the 1920s. Former Chief Secretary Ganapathi warned against “getting stuck in legalism and economism” and forgetting that “the masses must be ready to seize power”. This heavy-handed grip on Abujhmarh created discontent among the tribes, which further intensified as the tribes gained greater contact with the outside world in the 2010s and 2020s.
The province’s comprehensive counter-strategy combined security operations with development assistance. The Union Ministry of Home Affairs set up a special Left Wing Extremism Division in 2006, which provides financial support for strengthening police stations and strengthening state forces. CPI(Maoist) was banned under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act in 2009. More importantly, social distribution measures (Public Distribution System stores, Anganwadi centres) were routed through new forward security camps near Maoist areas. By the mid-2010s, the same tribal leaders who had encouraged joining the Maoists became wary of their presence. The 2024-25 period was decisive. More than 50 new forward camps in South Bastar and Narayanpur restricted the PLGA’s movement, while around 2,000 local ‘Bastar Warriors’ with superior knowledge of terrain and languages significantly addressed the Maoist threat. ‘Operation Kagar’, launched in April 2025, systematically targeted the leadership; He captured Basavaraju in May and Hidma in November.
In August 2024, the Maoist Politburo, acknowledging the nationwide disruptions and failure to achieve 2020 targets, reshaped its strategy towards tactical retreat and protecting the party. He restructured the battalions into smaller units to avoid encirclement. But even this could not save Basavaraju or Hidma.
The road ahead
Just before Hidma’s death, surrendered Central Committee Member Mallojula Venugopal aka Sonu (younger brother of former Maoist senior leader Mallojula Koteswara Rao aka Kishenji) appealed to the remaining Maoists to lay down their arms, clearly stating that the armed struggle was “no longer viable” and that their forces were “no match for the existing well-trained and well-equipped security forces”.
The party’s Central Committee responded by expelling Venugopal as a “traitor” and promising to “never surrender to the enemy” in a statement in October 2025. But such defiance cannot hide the collapse of the movement; The statement itself acknowledged that the enemy had “gained an advantage” and acknowledged the need to rebuild while “protecting the Party.” The rebel party is currently led by Thippiri Tirupathi alias Devuji, but its Central Committee is yet to meet to approve this decision for fear of retaliation from security forces.
As the guns become increasingly silent, the difficulty also changes. Focusing only on security may create new grievances. Only a welfare-oriented approach that allows tribes to integrate with dignity can prevent revival. The movement faces its most serious crisis for the Maoists, whose leadership has been exhausted by aging, imprisonment or death. The story of their change should suggest a serious rethinking of their understanding of the Indian state and the futility of armed struggle that sidelines mass mobilization and socio-economic organization. It seems that the dream of revolution finally died in the jungles of south-central India.
It was published – 23 November 2025 02:17 IST
