India’s Narendra Modi regime is relentless in its fascist attacks against the Adivasi people, democratic forces, and revolutionary groups in the name of Operation Kagaar. The brutal counterinsurgency operation is now on its 15th month and has claimed the lives of at least 400 civilians, most of whom are Adivasi or indigenous people and revolutionaries.

According to reports, 287 were killed in 2024 and 113 so far in 2025. One third (1/3) of the victims are indigenous Adivasi while 40% are women. Many of the killings are made to appear as “encounters” between the reactionary Indian state armed forces and the People’s Liberation Guerilla Army (PLGA) of the Communist Party of India (Maoist).

Infants and children were not spared from the Modi regime’s dirty war. In 2024, 14 children aged 14 years and below were killed, including a 6-month-old infant.

Operation Kagaar began in January 2024 in Abujhmaad, a mountainous and forested region in the south of the state of Chhattisgarh in central India. The operation is most intense in seven districts of Bastar. It targets Adivasis who resist the intrusion of multinational corporations into their ancestral land.

In 15 months, at least 13 major military operations have been conducted in Bastar, each using at least 1,000 forces. Hundreds of cases of human rights violations were recorded during that period. Because of this, the area has been dubbed the “Bastar Killing Fields.”

Bastar has 300 military camps, an estimated 50 of which were built during Operation Kagaar. Nine military camps are in Abujhmaad area. With so many, there is a camp every 2-3 kilometers. These serve as centers of counterinsurgency operations in remote areas. There is one state force for every nine civilians in Bastar.

To denounce state terrorism, groups led by the Forum Against Corporatization and Militarization (FACAM) gathered in Delhi on March 26. According to Prof. Saroj Giri of FACAM, the fascist attacks of the Brahmanical Hindutva fascist Modi regime in Bastar are intensifying because of the organized resistance of the Adivasi and peasants. Their struggle hinders the plunder of large corporations in the region.

The war on the Adivasi and Operation Kagaar are part of the overall Indian state’s intensification of fascism under the Surajkund Scheme (2022). It fuels religious fanaticism for fascist repression. It uses the veil of “Vision 2047 for Viksit Bharat” to build a “Hindu Rashtra” or Hindu nation.

Call for peace

Amid the attacks, democratic sectors gathered in Hyderabad, Telangana in the last week of March to call on the Modi state to engage in peace talks with the CPI (Maoist). A few days later, the CPI (Maoist) responded and expressed readiness to enter into talks.

Through party spokesperson Comrade Abhay, the CPI (Maoist) laid out four conditions for negotiations. The party also offered a ceasefire if the Modi regime responds positively to the call for peace talks.

First, it demands stopping Operation Kagaar, which is killing civilians. Second, it demands a halt to the construction of new military camps and for soldiers to remain in existing camps. Third, the state must stop issuing new Memoranda of Understanding or permits to corporations to plunder the environment. And fourth, release all political prisoners arrested for resisting corporatization and militarization.

Various democratic organizations supported the CPI (Maoist)’s readiness to enter into peace talks for the welfare of the Indian people. But as expected, the reactionary state openly opposed this. It said it will only talk to the party if it declares surrender.

In this context, the CPI (Maoist) and PLGA are determined to continue their armed struggle until the basic problems of the Indian people are addressed.