Bhopal: Central Zonal Council; incidents of LWE came down very rapidly after 2019, says Amit Shah

Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Union Home minister Amit Shah said here on Monday that there had been a sharp decrease in left wing extremism (LWE) violence since the NDA government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power at the Centre, as per an official statement from the government.

Shah was addressing the 23rd meeting of the Central Zonal Council here.

Chief Minister, Madhya Pradesh Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Chief Minister of Uttarakhand Pushkar Singh Dhami attended the meeting in Bhopal while Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh Yogi Adityanath and Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh Bhupesh Baghel attended the meeting through a virtual medium as they couldn’t come here due to inclement weather.

Shah said, “When left wing extremist violence (LWE) was at its peak in 2009, the number of incidents of LWE was 2,258 which decreased to 509 in 2021.”

He said since 2019 the incidents of Left Wing Extremism came down very rapidly. In 2009, as many as 1,005 people died in militant violence, while in 2021, 147 people were killed.

He said there had also been a decrease in LWE violence at police stations during this period, from 96 such incidents in 2009 it came down to 46 in 2021.

He said the Central government was further strengthening security forces in LWE affected areas and filling gaps in security, under which 40 new security camps were opened in the last three years and 15 more camps were to be opened.

“It is a great achievement but still the government of India along with the states are committed to fully eliminate the problem of LWE,” he added.

He said the government had opened about 5,000 post offices and more than 1200 bank branches in the last three years in LWE affected areas. Also, to speed up the telecom services, more than 2,300 mobile towers were being installed in the first phase and installation of 2,500 mobile towers in the second phase was going on.

He said there were many development schemes of state governments in Naxal-affected areas and the states, by giving priority to them, should aim for full results of these schemes. “More the development in Naxal-affected areas, the less will be the recruitment of naxalites and the sources of mobilisation of LWE will also be exhausted,” he said.

He urged Naxal-affected states to focus more on dealing with this problem so that it can be rooted out.