After months of calm in Saranda, Maoists have hit back threatening to derail the government's development offensive launched in the tribal region a year ago with much hope and fanfare.

More than 36 hours since a group of CPI(Maoist) ultras allegedly set fire to four dumpers and two JCBs (earthmovers used in construction) involved in constructing road under the ongoing Saranda Development Plan (SDP) in Ushariya village of Digha panchayat, there has been no arrests even as West Singhbhum police claimed to have launched a “massive manhunt”.

According to locals, more than 30 armed Maoists arrived around 11 pm on November 25 and warned workers at the site not to participate in government-sponsored "anti-people programmes”. With the workers too scared to protest, the ultras soon set fire to the equipment and fled.

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Like most news development involving Maoists, this, too, is more than a mere ‘law and order situation’ for the authorities. It could well be a concerted attempt by the ultra-Left CPI(Maoist) to stage a comeback in an area from where they were driven out by the security forces.

While a combing operation has been launched under West Singhbhum district superintendent of police, Pankaj Kamboj, paramilitary personnel were still to reach the spot till late Nov 26 evening, though the nearest CRPF camp in Chottanagra is only about 8 km along a forest road from Ushariya.

Why the attack

According to reports, the equipment set on fire belonged to a contractor engaged in building a 16-kilometre road from Chottanagra to Thalkobad in Saranda. The stretch where the incident occurred is part of the 130-km road network being built in Saranda forest, in West Singhbhum district of Jharkhand, as part of Saranda Development Plan (SDP), a Rs 260-crore package sponsored by the Centre for development of the region.

While it is significant that the Maoists have hit back more than a year since a security operation last August overthrew 11 years of Maoist hold on Saranda, the timing of the attack is equally significant. It comes days before the authorities mark the first anniversary of the SDP programme being announced in December last year.

This attack, local leaders say, is an attempt by the Maoists to stage a comeback.

While many other schemes under the SDP are being put into action, the integrated development centre at Digha panchayat village had missed at least two deadlines before the road construction work started on October 12 this year. And though payments under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS) were being made according to norms that were relaxed by the Centre, allowing direct cash payment of wages to beneficiaries, there were several delays in clearing payments. Villagers had protested this.

Work on the road network started in late October, and there is already a growing grouse over alleged irregularities in laying one of the roads at Chottanagra. What has raised the local tribals’ wrath is the slow and minimal work on implementation of the Forest Rights Act (FRA), 2006 — one of the long-standing demands of the region.

Though the some of the goals have been satisfactorily achieved and work, according to officials, is on toward achieving the others, the pace of progress has come under a lot of criticism. Despite the Centre’s best attention, there have been delays in implementation at the local level.

"The delay in FRA implementation is one of the key issues that could undermine the plan,” Sushil Barla, a local political and tribal rights activist, said. “The delay is being used by the Maoists to incite locals against the government. In fact, a lack of transparency and the lackadaisical attitude of the local administration could be used by them to stir up the locals into believing that the government is not serious.”

And if it happens, Barla reiterated, it would be a “tragic loss for the people of Saranda”, as the Maoists could revive their stranglehold over the region.

Govt plans: pace of implementation holds key

After the ultra-Left militants were driven away in the monsoon of last year, the union rural development ministry had announced the Saranda Development Plan to concentrate on governance needs of 56 villages in six panchayats of Saranda. As part of the plan, all 7,000 families in these villages were to get assistance under Indira Awaas Yojana, the Centre’s flagship rural housing grant, besides a solar lamp, bicycle and a transistor radio.

While MNREGS payment norms were relaxed, allowing direct cash payment, SDP entailed 10 integrated development centres (IDCs) for single-window delivery of several services from the state and central governments. These IDCs were to come up in the six panchayats, making governance accessible to even remotest villages in the forest.

Additionally, a one-metre thick, 130-kilometre concrete road network was to be built with funds from the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana. As per plans, the villagers are also to be covered under FRA, 2006, with recognition of individual and community pattas (land titles).

By October this year, the district administration had helped over 4,000 families open bank accounts and receive the first instalment of Indira Awaas grant. Almost all families had received solar lamps and transistors, promised under the development plan. Logistical issues, however, came in the way of distributing the bicycles.

Significance of Saranda: on throes of war and peace

Saranda is of great economic interest to both the state and Maoists. It is India's largest iron-ore reserve, and many private mining companies are waiting to get prospecting and mining licences in the region. Maoists have extracted massive 'levies' from companies that operate in the region.

At the same time, the impact of mining for local tribals has been disastrous. Besides damaging the sensitive ecology and impacting traditional livelihood, the riches of the region have not percolated down to the grassroots.

Only a handful of locals have found permanent employment in the mining and other companies, including the state-owned Steel Authority of India Limited.

It is this anger that helped Maoists in the past in Saranda, and it is likely to help them again amid a growing public opinion that the road network under SDP is being built to facilitate access to further mining by private and public sector companies, despite repeated denials by the union government. Rural development minister Jairam Ramesh had in fact announced in July 2012 that the government will roll back the Saranda Development Plan if there is evidence of any further private mining being allowed in the region.

Ramesh had also proposed a 20-year moratorium on mining in Saranda.

The latest attack should come as a reminder to the government that any delay in implementation of SDP could create conditions for a Maoist resurgence, while it also shows that the ultras see concentrated development package as a threat to their propaganda.

Meanwhile, people of Ushariya and surrounding villages are getting on with life in a growing state of panic since the Nov 25 attack, apprehensive of indiscriminate action by the police and paramilitary forces, despite the government’s repeated assurances that security forces would deal with tribal people in a "sensitive" manner.

(Sarthak Ray who spent four months in Saranda is not stationed there anymore but keeps track of developments in the region.)

Also visit our main Saranda page.