New Delhi: A combination of security pressure and rehabilitation efforts has given a deadly blow to Naxalism, with more than 10,000 Maoists laying down arms in the last decade and top leadership eliminated, officials said.
The Union Home Ministry had set the deadline to eliminate Naxalism from the country as March 31.
In 2025, 2,300 Maoists laid down arms, and more than 630 cadres chose mainstream life over armed rebellion in the first three months of 2026, official data on LWE surrenders from 2014 to early 2026 show.
According to an official, the government has adopted a unified, multi-dimensional and decisive strategy against Naxalism.
An example is the road entrenchment in the “Red Corridor”, an arc that once stretched from “Pashupati to Tirupati” across Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Maharashtra, and parts of Andhra Pradesh, where contractors refused to work.
The Centre tasked the Border Roads Organisation with building roads in People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army (PLGA) core areas, involving the construction of five key roads and six crucial bridges in these hotbeds of the insurgency.
More than 15,000 kilometres of roads have been constructed in Communist Party of India (Maoist) affected areas, of which 12,250 kilometres have been completed in the last 10 years alone, the
officials said.
Fortified police stations increased from 66 in 2014 to 586 constructed in the last 10 years. Additionally, 361 new security camps have been established in the last 6 years, and 68 night-landing helipads have been built to strengthen operational reach.
This has resulted in the number of police stations recording Naxal incidents dropping sharply from 330 across 76 districts in 2013 to merely 52 in 22 districts by June 2025. The government’s strategy of focusing on a combination of security pressure and rehabilitation efforts has chipped away at the movement’s core, leaving it headless in Chhattisgarh, a first since it started, they said.