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A splinter in the service of police to combat Maoists-Anumeha Yadav
-The Hindu

But both police and Tritiya Prastuti Committee deny claim

Kunda (Jharkhand): All through Monday and Tuesday, cadres of the Tritiya Prastuti Committee (TPC), a splinter group of the banned CPI (Maoist), in the Sarengdah and Kunda panchayats in Chatra district kept track of what their leaders decided to do with the 25 Maoists taken hostage four days ago. In the March 29 attack, the TPC also killed 10 Maoists after a gun battle that lasted over 10 hours at Lakarmanda village, 17 km from Kunda, where the Maoists had stopped en route to Gaya.

"We kept the hostages in a village school. We have released 12 cadres and some of their families came to take them from Chatra and Bihar. We kept 13 back. This is our area and the Maoists cannot enter it," said a close aide of TPC founder Brajesh Ganju in Sarengdah. Another member said they had reports that the police had since arrested two of the 12 Maoists released by the TPC on Tuesday. But the police denied the claim.

"The Maoists are ugravaadi [militants]. The TPC has resolved to finish off Maoist militancy here. We have no enmity with the police or paramilitary forces, we will support them against Maoists," said Mr. Ganju's aide.

In a statement, the Maoists alleged that the police and their "vigilante group" TPC had cooperated in carrying out the operation. "We resolve to avenge the death of the People's Liberation Guerrilla Army martyrs," Bihar Jharkhand North Chhattisgarh Special Area Committee spokesperson Gopal said, calling a Bihar-Jharkhand bandh for April 6 and 7.

Caste clashes

The TPC was founded in 2001 in Chatra by Brajesh Ganju, a Dalit, who had left the Maoists Communist Centre (MCC), citing the dominance of Yadavs in the party leadership and discrimination against Dalits. The TPC, which has cadres from Dalit communities including Ganju, Turi and Bokta, is active in parts of Chatra, Palamu, Latehar, Ranchi and Hazaribagh districts in Jharkhand and parts of West Bengal.

"Caste is not the main factor anymore. Initially the feeling was that gains and funds were going to one caste group though everyone worked equally hard. But we have cadres from all castes, including Yadavs," said a supporter in Chatra, a Dalit, who has helped the group with logistics since its inception and now works as a contractor building the panchayat bhavan building in the area.

While officials had denied taking TPC support in the operation against Maoists in Chatra, deep inside the forest at Lakarmanda in Kunda eyewitnesses said they watched TPC men handing bodies of the Maoists to the Commando Battalion for Resolute Action (CoBRA) troopers who arrived in their village on Thursday morning.

"At 3 p.m. on Wednesday, around 100 TPC men came from Barmanda, surrounded the village and started firing at the Maoists who had just finished eating. The police arrived the next morning at 4 a.m. When the troopers arrived, six TPC men talked to them standing close to the palash tree near this house and handed over the Maoists' bodies to them," said Guddu Kumar Ganju, in his early 20s. "The CRPF did not fire at the TPC at all, they let the TPC take the surviving Maoists with them. The TPC kept the Maoist hostages in our village school for two hours and then took them somewhere else," he said.

"Everyone in this village knows that the police and the TPC are cordial with each other. TPC men can easily go into police stations," said Shanti Mahto, who belongs to one of the three Mahto families in this hamlet of 40 Dalit Ganju households. "The Maoists were in a group of about 40, I cooked for 18 of them. They had rice and dal with them and some people in our village cooked chicken too," she said. "Someone locked us inside our house once the firing started but we heard gunshots all night, then we heard the TPC's call to Maoists to give up arms and surrender. We heard the Maoists coming forward and TPC shooting at them. Police came after that and took the bodies," said Bhagirath Mahto.

Guddu said he was a CPI(Maoist) cadre for eight years but left the party after Brajesh Ganju split to form the TPC. "Two men from our village are TPC leaders. We have relatives in the TPC. Thus, Maoist leaders suspect we leaked information to the TPC. Maoist leader Sandeep or Rupeshji called me on my mobile and threatened to break our ribs," he said.

"The police are encouraging these splinter groups to fight the Maoists. But even if they are able to put the Maoists on the back foot with such tactics, what will be the effect of expansion of these armed groups on people's lives? Or does the government see only Maoists as the greatest security threat," asked Jharkhand Human Rights Movement general secretary Gladson Dungdung.

Jharkhand DGP Rajeev Kumar denied the allegation. "For us, the TPC is another extremist group. We have been on the lookout for the 25 Maoists the TPC took hostage to arrest them," he said.