India’s Anti-Maoist Operations Set to Intensify in Coming Months

India’s counterinsurgency operations in Maoist strongholds in Chhattisgarh state’s Bastar region suffered a major setback on January 6, when eight security personnel of the District Reserve Guard (DRG) of the Chhattisgarh police and their civilian driver were killed in an IED blast triggered by Maoists.

The January 6 attack on security forces in the forests of Kutru was the deadliest in Bastar since April 2023, when an IED explosion claimed the lives of 10 security personnel and their driver.

Mineral-rich Chhattisgarh and especially its predominantly tribal Bastar region have been the epicenter of the Maoist insurgency for decades, and Bastar has been the focus of India’s anti-Maoist operations for around 15 years.

These operations have intensified in Chhattisgarh since late 2023, when India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), known for its muscular and militaristic approach to the Maoists, came to power in the state. “With BJP governments at the central and state levels in sync on the question of waging all-out war on the Maoists, the security forces have weakened the Maoists substantially in the past year,” an official in India’s security establishment told The Diplomat on condition of anonymity.

Highlighting the Narendra Modi government’s achievements in eliminating Maoists from the country, India’s Home Minister Amit Shah announced in a speech at Chhattisgarh’s capital, Raipur, on December 15, 2024, that 287 Maoists, including 14 top leaders, were “neutralized” and 1,000 arrested, while another 287 surrendered to the government in 2024. Fatalities among security personnel had dropped by 73 percent over a decade and civilian deaths have seen a 70 percent decline, he said. Shah asserted that “Maoism will be completely wiped out of the country” by March 31, 2026, a deadline he has reiterated several times over the last couple of years.

Is India’s Maoist insurgency nearing its end?

Since its peak in 2010, the ferocity of the Maoist insurgency in India has declined considerably. Maoist numbers have dropped, with security forces having eliminated thousands of cadres and leaders, several of whom carried large bounties on their heads. Tribal support for the Maoists is said to have declined, as evident from voting patterns in recent general and state assembly elections. The area under Maoist control has also shrunk significantly over the years. And in what is considered a huge breakthrough in India’s anti-Maoist operations, in 2024, security forces breached the Maoist stronghold of Abujhmad – 4,000 sq km of forest extending from south Bastar in Chhattisgarh to Gadchiroli in Maharashtra, which was hitherto impenetrable by the Indian state.

The January 6 attack in the Kutru forest underscores the Maoists’ continuing capacity to carry out strikes against the security forces in areas where they are active. However, the security official said that the Maoists’ capacity to inflict damage on the security forces is “a fraction of what it used to be.” The security forces, he said, are “confident that what remains of this capacity will be destroyed” within Shah’s deadline.

In recent weeks, the security forces have further intensified the anti-Maoist operations in Chhattisgarh. Since January 1, at least 40 Maoists have been killed by Indian security personnel. In one operation in South Bastar on January 16, which a senior police officer cited by The Hindu described as “the biggest in recent times in terms of scale and preparation,” 18 Maoists were killed. Four days later, another 14 Maoists were killed along the Chhattisgarh-Odisha border.

But are those being killed really Maoists?

A rights activist based in Jagdalpur told The Diplomat that “several of the so-called Maoists killed by security forces are in fact tribal civilians.” With the government waging an all-out war in Bastar, civilians, including women and children are being killed, injured, or jailed, she said.

In December, seven people were killed in Narayanpur district in what police described as an “encounter” with Maoists. The four children injured in the “encounter” were being used as human shields by the Maoists, police claimed.

The rights activist pointed out that five of the seven people killed in the incident were villagers working in their fields.

It is likely that as the March 31, 2026 deadline nears, authorities will increase pressure on security personnel on the ground to deliver results. This will prompt an increase in the frequency, size, and scale of the anti-Maoist operations in Bastar.

Large operations could prove counterproductive. Following a Maoist ambush in Sukma district in Bastar on April 3, 2021, when 22 police and paramilitary personnel were killed and another 30 injured, security forces launched a massive, multi-force operation against the Maoists. I wrote at the time that “fighting the agile Maoists requires small teams of nimble-footed fighters, not a bumbling and blundering elephant that walks headlong into traps.” This applies to India’s current anti-Maoist operations as well.

There is a danger, too, that as security personnel are pressured to report more Maoist deaths, the number of fake encounters and civilians killed or arrested will rise.

The coming months may see a further weakening of the Maoists. They could be cornered and confined to a shrinking space of forest area. However, ruthless attempts to meet Shah’s March 31, 2026 deadline could result in a surge in tribal anger, especially if civilian casualties rise.

Ultimately, India’s overly military strategy is unlikely to fully end the conflict. The Maoist problem is a political one. It needs a political solution.