Maoists get new man at the helm

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 8

The Andhra Pradesh Police’s recent investigation has led to a revelation about a change of guard in the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist). Namballa Keshav Rao (63) alias Baswaraj replaced Muppala Lakshman Rao (72) alias Ganapathi around two months ago.

Baswaraj was heading the party’s “central military commission” for several decades. However, neither internal security experts nor Maoist ideologues see any dramatic change in this development.

Change was in the offing for quite some time, says Ajai Sahni, a counter-terrorism expert and Executive Director of the Institute for Conflict Management in New Delhi. “Looking at the ailing health of Ganapathi, we have been hearing this for the past three years. It was also known that Baswaraj can be his successor.”

Politically, he said, “they are on the same page, the only difference is that Baswaraj has a far richer arms training experience”. Both come from districts of Andhra Pradesh known for heroic anti-feudal struggles, says Hyderabad-based journalist Mallepalli Laxmaih, who has studied the Maoist movement.

“Baswaraj entered the Naxalite movement around six years after Ganapathi. They come from the same legacy of militant mass struggle and the change is not an outcome of political differences.” Ganapathi, he said, was a very quiet man. “Now Maoists are confined to the areas where the State is completely absent.”

The CPI (Maoist) was formed in 2004 after merger of Maoist Communist Centre of India (MCCI), which was mainly active in Jharkhand and Bihar, and People’s War Group, which had a strong base in Andhra Pradesh and in some parts of central India.