The Lost Childhood : Maoist-Naxals' Exploitation of Tribal Children

But the reality is that most of the Maoists in the Maoist organizations are recruited at gunpoint in their childhood.

The tribal children of remote backward areas in the dense forests are not only robbed of their childhood by the communist terrorists, but at such a young age they are separated from their parents and given red terror pamphlets and guns in their hands.

The irony is that the Maoists who rob these innocent children of their childhood also deprive them from attending the funeral of their parents even when they die.

All these things are not part of a strategy to nurture a particular ideology created on paper by intellectuals sitting inside AC rooms and becoming self-proclaimed pioneers of social equality, but are the personal experiences of those people from whom the terrorists of this barbaric organization have snatched their childhood.

All this truth was told by the Maoists who surrendered in the last 5-7 years in a survey conducted by Bastar Police, which was put on the table by Bastar Police in the year 2021.

This survey, which exposes the barbaric face of Maoist organizations, was conducted on those Maoists on whom the government had declared a reward of 5 lakhs or more.

It came out in this survey that to increase the strength of their organization, Maoists forcibly pick up even 15-year-old children from innocent tribal groups at gunpoint. These children also include girls from tribal groups.

By kidnapping children, Maoists not only force them to live with them in the forests but also exploit them mentally and physically at such a young age. Also, from such a young age, their minds are nourished with the confused ideology of red terror.

These children, who are inducted into the organization at gunpoint, are not allowed to go anywhere of their own free will. They have to take care of the needs of the top Maoist cadres along with the challenge of keeping themselves alive in everyday life.

After nearly 2 years of forced rigorous training, guns are handed over to them and by the time they are 20 years old, they become proficient in handling automatic weapons.

In these schools, Maoist teachers not only teach Naxalite lessons to children but also make them do physical exercises. An attempt is made to inspire the minds of students with Maoist ideology from childhood.

A 14-year-old boy present at the district headquarters, while telling his ordeal, said that he was taking training in this school of Maoists for about 2 years. He told that food, accommodation and other facilities were also arranged in that school. The school was completely run by the Naxalites.

In this school of Maoists, no other villager, including the family members of any child taking training, is allowed to enter. Here children are taught Maoist ideology.

Maoists used to run these schools openly in the inner forests, but the raid by Kanker police in the month of March has put the Maoists on the back foot. Kanker police had raided one such school of Maoists, after which the Maoists present in the school were arrested. All the children present in the school had fled to their village.

On the other hand, the refugees present in the district headquarters say that in this school of Maoists, young children are taught Maoist ideology, but older children (teenagers) are also given training in firing guns and 'jungle tactics' in a separate school.

The interesting thing is that the top leadership of these communist terrorists, who cry for social equality, has always promoted Telugu supremacy under the Red Corridor.

The people of tribal groups of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Bihar, Bengal and Maharashtra, who have been forcibly made a part of this so-called revolution, have always faced discrimination at the organizational level.

Many regional Maoists who have surrendered from Jharkhand to Chhattisgarh and Orissa have been vocal in this context and criticized the Maoist top leadership.

In reality, this organization, which dreams of changing the democratic system at gunpoint and establishing a dictatorial communist-Maoist power system, has become just a group of demons who establish the supremacy of regionalism and commit violence and exploitation on the local tribal groups.

It will not be an exaggeration to say that the red revolution that their urban advocates have been dreaming of for years by 'forcibly putting guns in the hands of small children of local tribal groups with the help of financial aid and weapons received from their foreign masters' is never going to come true. The sooner the Maoist leadership understands this, the better it will be for them.