Dasaru Keye Kolha
Dasaru Keye Kolha (44), a Maoist commander who recently surrendered before the Gadchiroli police, says he did so because of the bad treatment meted out to him by the banned outfit which he served for 20 years.
Kolha, who the police claim is the first Maoist to surrender with an AK-47, was allegedly blamed by the outfit for the surrender of seven members of the combined formation of Chatgaon dalam and Platoon 3 of the CPI(Maoist), which he was then leading, in October last year. “The seven members who surrendered had made up their mind prior to my taking over, when Sukhlal was the commander. So how could I be held responsible,” Kolha, a member of the North Gadchiroli Divisional Committee of CPI(Maoist), considered a senior rank, told The Indian Express.
Kolha was one of the most dreaded Maoist commanders in Gadchiroli, who was booked in 149 cases by Gadchiroli police, including encounters, police ambushes, murders of civilians, etc, and carried a reward of Rs 8.50 lakh on his head.
He says he decided to quit as he was unable to bear the insult. “Police throw pamphlets appealing for surrender and offering benefits such as house, Rs 16 lakh, shop, etc. I found one in my name near Kanheli village near Pendhri in north Gadchiroli. That strengthened my resolve,” Kolha says.
On January 15, Kolha escaped with his AK-47 around 11 pm from a Maoist camp at Kodur village in Abujmad area beyond the Parlkota river and walked for about 14 days through jungle, seeking alms at villages along the way, to reach Warora in Chandrapur district. He hid the gun behind rocks in Parlkota’s banks. From Warora, he called his father at Vikaspalli village in Gadchiroli’s Etapalli tehsil. His father, in turn, called the police and took an assurance that they won’t harm his son who wanted to surrender. Kolha was then brought by the police to Gadchiroli.
The police take their own time to be sure about the intent of any cadre wanting to surrender. They finally declared Kolha’s surrender last week.
“What also pricked me was that senior cadres like Prabhakar, a member of CPI(Maoist) Dandakaranya Special Zonal Committee (DKSZC), believed the complaint by one of my juniors named Rakesh about my leadership… Prabhakar believed Rakesh, which hurt me,” Kolha said. After surrender, Kolha led the police to where he had dumped his rifle. It was still there and recovered by the police.
“Surrender with a weapon is seen as a big setback by Naxals. They frown upon cadres who leave their guns behind after an encounter… It can even be punishable by death,” said Additional SP (Gadchiroli) Ajay Bansal. “And when the weapon is AK-47, it assumes greater significance since Naxals are already feeling an arms and ammunition crunch,” he added.
SP Shailesh Balkawde said, “Our interrogation of several surrendered Naxals have uniformly thrown up one fact — tribal cadres get secondary treatment in the party when it comes to promotion in the ranks. At most, they could get to the level of divisional committee member and very rarely of DKSZC. Most of the higher ranks are reserved for educated Telugu cadre. Also, they don’t allow tribal cadre couples to stay together in one group… Local tribal cadre are not sent out to cities for treatment while Telugu cadre have access to it. They are also not allowed to visit their homes regularly. All these reasons had an effect on tribal cadre disenchantment with the movement.”
Kolha, meanwhile, is happy to be back with his family. “I was married when I left with Naxal commander Joganna in 2000 as I was impressed by the songs of revolution they would sing whenever they came to the village and also by their promise of delivering justice to tribals. But now the movement is finding no support among tribals and getting marginalised in border areas of Gadchiroli. Cadres are surrendering by the dozen, crippling the movement and new recruitment is hard to come by over the past two years. That also weighed heavily on my mind. Now, I would like to settle down in Gadchiroli with wife Sukko and lead a normal life,” Kolha says.