How naxals plan on capturing urban Tamil Nadu?

A decade back, naxals had tried to make inroads in South India and wanted to form a base in the states of Kerala-Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. However the naxal movement saw success to a large extent only in Andhra Pradesh and failed miserably in the rest of the Southern states.

Today, a renewed attempt is being made to breathe life into the naxal movement and the approach taken by them is slightly different and they are planning on targeting the urban areas in these three states with a motive of spreading their ideology in cities too.

This is a complete shift from the earlier strategy that they had adopted where the focus was only on the village areas where they used gullible villagers for logistics and human shields. This offensive by them was beaten down by the security agencies and in all the four southern states they were literally wiped out.

The Sahyadri moutain range

The Sahyadri mountain range acts as a perfect tri-junction for naxals. It connects the three states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka easily. While attempting to set up their training and base camps in this range, they are planning on gradually expanding operations into all the three states.

A document prepared by the Western Ghats Special Zonal Committee titled the Peoples' March runs into several pages detailing their operation for these three states. The document speaks in detail about their future plan for the three states and how they would set up a camp in the mountain range to further their operations in South.

How naxals plan on tapping Tamil Nadu

The naxals have had a presence in Kerala and Tamil Nadu. While in Kerala they have been making inroads through the districts of Waynad, Kannur and Mallapuram, they have had their fair share of success in areas in Karnataka as well.

However in the case of Tamil Nadu, they have not been able to make any inroads. However this time around they plan on roping in people from Tamil Nadu who would be told to focus on areas to further the movement.

However the document reveals that the approach in so far as Tamil Nadu is concerned would be different. They are aiming at focusing largely on the urban belts when compared to village areas. The urban belt according to them would provide them the necessary platform as they need educated people who can spread their ideology.

Intelligence Bureau officials tell OneIndia that the naxals are repeatedly making attempts to tap highly educated persons from the urban areas of Tamil Nadu. They believe that spreading their ideology would be the first step towards them establishing a concrete base.

The Urban Committee

The naxals as per the document have plans on setting up an urban committee through which they would spread their agenda. The urban committee which has been listed in the document under the title Urban Propaganda clearly points towards making inroads in Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka.

They believe that people are looking for a change and hence it is the best time to spread their agenda. The approach would however be slightly different and they are not planning on an immediate arms struggle, the Intelligence Bureau official points out.

They feel that their voices are not being heard enough in the village levels and the arms struggle has not been too effective. Moreover the killings that they have carried out of security agencies have left a bad taste in the minds of the people who have begun questioning their agenda.

The official says make no mistake that the naxals would give up arms. They are just taking it slow and would first want the ideology to spread before they start using their arms. They are tapping sympathizers among the educated class who can slowly but surely progagate for them.

On high alert

The battle ahead for the security agencies is as usual a tough one. Since the propaganda this time around is different, it would need man to man monitoring. We need to keep a close tab on the naxal sympathizers who would by and large be in the urban areas.

The Multi Agency Centre is picking up information and analyzing it before making the intelligence actionable in nature. There is a great deal of monitoring which is also taking place in the Sahyadri range as well to spot movements as the naxals ready to set up base camps.