On August 29, 2025, Kallu Tati (25), working as a Shikshadoot (temporary visiting teacher in government schools in remote villages, where permanent staff hesitate to work due to security risks), was abducted and killed by Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) cadres in the Lendra area under the Gangaloor Police Station limits in the Bijapur District of Chhattisgarh. “He was abducted and strangled to death by Naxal cadres. He was the only educated individual from these villages, located deep within the forest. The body was recovered in the morning…” a Police officer disclosed. A resident of Todka village who was posted in Lendra, a highly Naxal-affected area in the Gangaloor region, Tati was returning home after teaching children in Lendra school when Maoists abducted him on the way, killed him and threw away his body. Police said Maoists have recently killed a number of ‘Shikshadoots’, accusing them of working as ‘police informers’ and contributing to development-related work. While no Maoist pamphlets were recovered from the spot, Police officials were sure of Maoist involvement, given the recurring pattern of targeting teachers in the Bastar Division.
On August 27, 2025, Laxman Barse (30), working as a Shikshadoot, was killed by CPI-Maoist cadres in Silger village under Jagargunda Police Station limits in the Sukma District of Chhattisgarh. A motive was not immediately clear, but Maoists often target civilians and villagers whom they suspect of acting as ‘informers’ for the Police. The Maoists also thrashed Barse’s family members when they tried to intervene, a Police statement added.
On July 14, 2025, two Shikshadoots were killed by CPI-Maoist cadres, in the forests of Pillur village under the Farsegarh Police Station limits of Bijapur District. One of the deceased Shikshadoots, Vinod Madde (32), a resident of Pillur, was posted at the Kondapadgu Primary School. The other Shikshadoot, Suresh Meta (28), was working at the Primary School, Tekmeta. Both the bodies were found thrown in the forests near their villages. “Initial reports suggest that the two education volunteers were suspected by Maoists of acting as police informants, which is a common accusation used by insurgents to justify such killings,” Inspector General of Police (IGP), Bastar Range, Sundarraj P. stated. The Maoists had not taken responsibility for the killing at the time of writing, and no pamphlets or messages were recovered from the site.
These incidents are only the most recent in the civilian category in which the Naxalites (Left Wing Extremists) have accused/branded/suspected Shikshadoots of being ‘police informers’ and have killed them to restrict the leakage of information about their movements and whereabouts.
According to partial data compiled by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), the Naxalites have killed at least six Shikshadoots under the pretext of being ‘police informers’ in Left Wing Extremism (LWE)-related incidents across the country in 2025 (all data till September 7). In the corresponding period of 2024, no such killing was recorded; however, one schoolteacher was killed in the remaining period of 2024. A maximum of eight Shikshadoots/teacherskilled was recorded in 2010, while a low of one fatality was recorded twice, in 2002 and 2007. Since March 6, 2000, when SATP started documenting LWE-linked violence in the country, at least 48 Shikshadoots/teachers have been killed across the country. These numbers are, however, a gross underestimate of the ground situation, as some of the cases go unreported due to fear of further retribution from the rebels, especially in the peak years of their violence, and particularly due to the remoteness of some of the conflict areas.
Shikshadoots are locally engaged at a modest monthly remuneration of INR 10,000 – INR 15,000, to teach in around 250 schools that were earlier shut down in remote villages of the districts of Sukma, Bijapur, Dantewada and Narayanpur. The Police suspected that Shikshadoots were killed without warning, merely on the suspicion of being ‘informers’, in a malevolent attempt to spread terror. Owing to the Chhattisgarh Government’s push for digital infrastructure development, the Bastar region has witnessed a significant growth in the installation of mobile towers in recent years. Every Shikshadoot carries a mobile phone as a basic need for their professional engagement, and there is a strong perception that cellphones are now turning out to be a threat to the life for Shikshadoots, as Maoists suspect they are used to communicate information to the security forces (SFs).
On August 31, 2025, the Shikshadoot association, expressing frustration over the killings of shikshadoots in remote insurgency-hit regions in the Bijapur and Sukma Districts of the Bastar division, convened a meeting, and asked the Maoists to furnish proof that Shikshadoots were working for the Police; a claim for which they are being killed.
This is the first time that these teachers have raised an objection openly, and it happened after the killing of their colleague Laxman Barse in the Silger region, who was brutally killed in front of his family members. The Shikshadoot association in Sukma District has issued a video statement, observing,
It was due to Maoist violence that hundreds of schools across Bastar region were shut between 2005-2013. But we took initiative with the help of local administration to start re-opening the schools even if we had to run classes at a make-shift hut. It’s a simple initiative to impart education to tribal children who deserve to study… We would like to ask Maoists why were they targeting and killing shikshadoots, do they have any proof that we work for police as informers? If yes, then they should furnish it before killing another one. Maoists and administration, both should tell us, who is making us informers. It’s the families that get worst affected when a shikshadoot is killed.
It is interesting to note that the Maoists, perhaps for the first time, on March 20, 2019, issued a letter seeking forgiveness for killing a schoolteacher in Maharashtra. On March 10, 2019, CPI-Maoist cadres shot dead a schoolteacher, identified as Yogendra Meshram, in Dholdongri village in Kurkheda Tehsil (revenue unit) in Gadchiroli District of Maharashtra. The incident came to light when hundreds of students from Jawaharlal Nehru Municipal School and Rampur Primary School in Gadchiroli took out a silent march on March 18 to protest the killing of their teacher Yogendra by the Maoists. Yogendra was a teacher at the Jawaharlal Nehru Municipal School in Gadchiroli and would visit Dholdongri every Saturday to meet his wife, Kasturba Devgade, a contractual nurse at the primary health centre in Botejhari. Meshram had gone to meet his wife when he was captured by the Maoists and was killed.
In a letter issued by Pavan, then ‘divisional commander’ of North CPI-Maoist for the North Gadchiroli area, dated March 20, 2019, and sent to Meshram’s family, the Maoists said it was a case of ‘intelligence failure’. The letter describes Meshram as an innocent man and said the Maoist cadres shot him as they suspected that he was a Policeman. The Maoists added that they suspected that he was gathering information about Maoist cadres active in Korchi tehsil. The letter read,
We bow down to you and seek forgiveness for the murder. We are also grieving with the family in these tough times. This has shown our weakness. We seek forgiveness from journalists, teachers, health department employees, and shopkeepers they don’t have to live in fear. This incident is our fault and in future it will never be repeated… We will keep fighting against the corrupt system which has been targeting and harassing the poor. This system, which is only for the capitalists and those in power, will be thrown off. Lal salaam.
Appallingly, since March 20, 2019, at least 10 Shikshadoots/teachers (data till September 7, 2025) have been killed despite the letter of apology issued by the Maoists.
Police officials say such killings are part of the Maoists’ strategy to intimidate villagers, disrupt education in conflict-affected areas, and prevent locals from cooperating with government schemes. “Education means poor villagers will get educated; this is something that the Naxals fear,” a source in the security establishment, requesting anonymity, asserted. Stating that the Maoists “don’t want the children of Bastar to be educated”, IGP, Sundarraj P. noted,
The clear motive behind these killings is to deprive the native population, particularly children, of the opportunity for education. Maoists fear that an educated and aware society would no longer support their outdated, inhumane, anti-development, and cruel ideology.
Issuing a stern warning to the Maoists and their leadership, and strongly condemning the brutal killing of young volunteers engaged in educating children in the region, IGP Sundarraj P further noted,
The killing of innocent civilians and volunteers dedicated to education is an unforgivable crime. Bastar police will ensure that the perpetrators of these heinous acts are identified, pursued, and brought to justice with the strictest possible action. Those who continue to indulge in such violence will face decisive and relentless action from the security forces.
The incidents of killing of the Shikshadoots/teachers are broadly included under the civilian category. The Maoists carry out the civilian killings on the argument that they are ‘moles’, ‘secret agents’ and ‘informers’ passing on information about the movement of cadres to the SFs. The Maoists have suffered huge losses in their rank and file, as well as senior leadership, in the last year in anti-Maoist operations carried out by SFs and also ceded territories under their control following the establishment of new security camps in their core areas. In a frustrated and desperate attempt to regain lost ground in their erstwhile strongholds, Maoists are venting their exasperation on the innocent civilian population, including women and children, accusing them of being “traitors”, “police moles” and “police informers”. Officials claim that the Maoists are on the back foot, and as they are failing to inflict significant damage on the SFs, and are suffering major losses instead, they target innocent civilians.
On September 1, 2025, CPI-Maoist cadres allegedly killed two villagers, Padam Pojha (20) and Padam Devendra (27), and assaulted another two, in the Sirseti village under Kerlapal Police Station limits in the Sukma District of Chhattisgarh. Maoists allegedly assaulted the four men with sticks and murdered Pojha and Devendra by strangulation. They allegedly suspected the victims were mukhbirs (Police informers). Ostensibly, around seven kilometres from the village, the SFs had gunned down 17 Maoists in an encounter in a forest under the Kerlapal Police Station area in Sukma District on March 29. Police said Maoists suspected that the deceased villagers passed on information about their movements to the Police.
The Naxalites have killed at least 21 civilians (19 in Chhattisgarh, and one each in Jharkhand and Maharashtra) under the pretext of their being ‘police informers’, out of the 41 civilians killed in Left Wing Extremism (LWE)-related incidents across the country in 2025 (all data till September 7), according to the SATP database. In the corresponding period of 2024, at least 27 civilians were killed (18 in Chhattisgarh, five in Jharkhand, three in Maharashtra and one in Odisha) on the same pretext of being ‘police informers.’ In the remaining period of 2024, another 21 civilians were executed (19 in Chhattisgarh and two in Telangana). A total of 48 civilians were killed and labelled ‘police informers’, out of the 80 civilians killed in LWE-related incidents across the country through 2024. The civilian fatality includes Shikshadoots/teachers.
Noting that the Maoists were retaliating by turning on soft targets to register their presence, Brigadier (Retired) B.K. Ponwar, Guerrilla Warfare Expert, thus noted,
Maoist cadres surrendering, getting caught or killed frustrate them, so they look for soft options. The Naxals targeting civilians is indicative of the fact that the rebels are upset with the forces dominating the region.
According to the SATP database, 291 Maoists have been killed, 343 arrested by SFs, and 1,126 have surrendered in LWE-related incidents across the country, so far this year (all data till September 7, 2025). Since March 6, 2000, 4,901 Maoists have been killed, 17,054 arrested by SFs, and 18,353 have surrendered across the country.
In the interim, Union Home Minister (UHM) and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah has declared that the threat of LWE terrorism in India is on the verge of extinction and the country will be Naxal-Mukt (free of Maoists) by March 31, 2026. Further, he noted that, limited to a mere few districts, with dozens of their cadre either being eliminated or surrendering, the Maoists are engaging in acts of desperation.
Following critical losses, including at the top leadership levels, due to the consolidation of SFs in their areas of erstwhile control, the Maoists have increased punitive attacks to eliminate supposed ‘infiltrators’ or ‘informers’, to minimize the flow of information about their location, movement and operations, to the SFs. In turn, the SFs continue their aggressive campaign against the rebels to meet the deadline set by the Union Government to end Naxalism in the country.
