The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : "Let people mull over Maoists issue"

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Mar 03, 2005

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

"Let people mull over Maoists issue"

By Our Staff Reporter

KURNOOL, MARCH 2. The Home Minister, K. Jana Reddy, today said the Government would examine the issue of re-imposing the ban on the CPI (Maoist) if there is public demand.

Talking to reporters after consoling the families of those killed by Maoists at Vempenta in Kurnool district today, he said the Government was facing many questions from the public whether negotiations had any purpose when `genocide' continued.

Mr. Reddy said all the political parties, people's organisations and intellectuals who had great hopes in the dialogue process should introspect now and advise the Government properly. Condemning the brutal killing of eight persons at Vempenta, the Home Minister said the victims did not in any way qualify for the status of landlords. Five of them belonged to the backward castes, two Scheduled Castes persons and only one was a forward caste person.

A majority of the victims owned land below five acres and in the entire village, farmers who held more than 10 acres were less than a dozen. There had been neither feudal landlords nor half-landlords in the village.

Fate of talks

Asked whether intelligence failure led to the massacre, Mr. Jana Reddy said it was due to loss of mental balance and lapse of critical judgment by Maoists. Stating that killing of innocent persons was serious violation of human rights, the Home Minister said the killing went against the cause of equal society and neo-democracy espoused by Maoists.

He said the Maoists failed to resolve the issues among the poor and dragged them into bloodbath.

On the fate of the second round of talks with the Maoists, Mr. Reddy said it all depended on the stand of all stakeholders and the public. The Government believed that harsh stand alone would not solve a complex problem such as extremism, and initiated talks which ensured peace for six months.

The people who believed that negotiations were a futile exercise should know that the path tread by the parties and governments in the last 20 years also failed to bring about any result. Mr. Jana Reddy promised all help to members of the bereaved families, and announced an ex gratia of Rs. 5 lakhs, free education to children and job to one of the eligible members. He promised steps to ensure peace in the area.

Statement in House

Our Special Correspondent in Hyderabad reports:

Mr. Jana Reddy, later making a statement in the Assembly on the killings, said that the police bandobust had been arranged to maintain law and order in the village.

He said he had consoled the families and attended the last rites of the victims.

Tracing the differences between two groups in the village and the subsequent killings, including the latest one, he said that Vempenta had attained notoriety for extremist activities.

C. Rajeswara Rao(TDP), while stressing the need for establishing permanent peace in the village, objected to naming of castes in the Minister's statement.

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