In Karreguttalu’s lanes, every step can kill

On a mellow March morning, the rustle of dry leaves under Kunja Pandey’s feet would have been the only sound breaking the stillness of the Utla Palli forest in Chhattisgarh’s Bijapur district until, all of a sudden, the ground beneath her erupted in a violent ball of fire.The 15-year-old was collecting firewood when she stepped on an unseen object — a pressure mine planted in the undergrowth. The explosion tore through Kunja’s leg. For two days, she barely held on to life as her family relied on traditional remedies to treat her. But with her condition worsening, she had to be moved to a govt hospital in Bhadrachalam, several hundred kilometres away. Kunja survived, but her life may not be the same again.Rampuram village, hidden in the Maoist heartland of Bijapur, isn’t the only one where the spectre of landmines and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) placed by Naxalites haunts daily life.On March 30, weeks after Kunja’s brush with death, a blast near Bottamarka Hills in Bijapur’s Usoor killed 40-year-old Sushila Sodi. She was returning home with a basket of mahua fruit when her foot landed on an IED. Ten days before that, Boggula Krishnamurthy, one of a group of tribal men from Ippagudem village in Telangana who were cutting bamboo shoots in a forest near Muthyandhara waterfall in Venkatapuram mandal, stepped on a mine. His legs bore the brunt of the blast.Collateral scars of a decades-long conflict are all too common in villages across Karreguttalu, a hilly belt straddling Telangana and Chhattisgarh. Venkatapuram and Wajedu mandals in Telangana’s Mulugu district, and the Cherla area of Bhadradri Kothagudem — bordering Sukma and Bijapur in Chhattisgarh — are all strewn with minefields waiting to explode. medium nocaption121157895Danger Runs DeepKarreguttalu’s importance as a defensive stronghold of the Maoists was reinforced after Operation Kagar smoked them out of Abujhmarh in Chhattisgarh. Remote and rugged, its upper reaches have booby traps laced with iron spikes, reminiscent of those used in Vietnam War. Pressure-triggered IEDs are a key component of the guerrillas’ defence in this forested zone. Police suspect around 500 Maoists are hiding within a 288 sq km span of Karreguttalu’s forested terrain.In a recent note addressed to the local population, the regional Maoist command fired an ominous warning: Stay away from Karreguttalu. It also cautioned the villagers against succumbing to the lure of rewards and becoming police informers, reminding them that lives had already been lost for trying to do so.Security forces started cordoning off Karreguttalu towards the end of April as part of what they hope will be Operation Kagar’s final breach of the Maoist citadel. More than 10,000 personnel from the CRPF, Telangana Greyhounds, and special police units of Telangana, Odisha, Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh are part of the operation.Till April 30, the team had identified and defused around 150 IEDs, most of them pressure mines. Some of the IEDs were found stuffed inside empty beer bottles.medium nocaption121158266Line Of PerilA report by the Geneva-based Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor pegged casualties from landmines and other explosive remnants of war in 2023 at 5,757 globally. “Civilians made up 84% (4,335) of all recorded casualties,” the report states, adding that “children accounted for 37% (1,498) of civilian casualties where the age group was recorded.”The report mentions India, Cambodia, Myanmar, Pakistan and Gaza as territories with “nonstate armed groups using landmines”.Mulugu SP Dr P Shabarish suspects the situation in Telangana’s Maoist stronghold could be worse than documented, with many instances of cattle and wildlife being killed in landmine explosions going unreported.“Four such cases were reported in the past year in Mulugu alone, including one death,” the officer said. The May 8 blast that killed three Telangana Greyhound commandos also occurred in Mulugu district.Around 20 pressure mines were detected and defused during a recent exercise in Mulugu, where a People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army (PLGA) battalion is believed to be holed up along a 10-15km corridor. “The upper reaches of the Karreguttalu hillock have no human habitation. There are villages about 3km from the Venkatapuram main road. Maoists discourage civilian movement in this area. The peak, which straddles either side of the interstate border, is heavily mined,” Shabarish said.SP Rohit Raju of Bhadradri Kothagudem offers a similar account. “We find mines every other day. The most vulnerable areas are the Cherla and Dummugudem mandals. Villages like Chennapuram and Pusuguppa in Cherla mandal have reported several explosions and the maximum Maoist activity,” he told TOI . medium nocaption121157916Shrinking Red ZoneA senior police officer said the PLGA’s Dandakaranya Special Zonal Committee once occupied vast stretches of forested and hilly terrain across Bijapur, Sukma and beyond.“They had separate divisions and area committees. Their space has shrunk with CRPF camps coming up deep inside the forests of Chhattisgarh. The terrain around Karreguttalu is one of the few remaining Maoist hiding places,” he said. “But with our forces advancing, even basic movement and moving supplies has become difficult for them.”Those who have fought Maoists talk about how they are the most ruthless when cornered. Their defensive methods have evolved, and their reluctance to target civilians has disappeared.Security agencies believe Maoists rely on local spotters to monitor the movement of forces. These informants also help determine where mines should be planted — on roads, footpaths, forest trails and even riverbanks.Security forces fear that even after the last of the Maoists are killed or captured, it will be years before the region is free of landmines.In a landscape scarred by explosives and embittered memories, harrowing individual accounts — of Kunja, Sushila and Boggula — reveal warfare’s irreparable toll.