Raipur
Libaru Korram alias Diwakar alias Kishan was in Class 5 when tragedy struck his family and turned his life upside down.
First he lost his mother, and then his father and younger brother too. In between, relatives helped his elder sisters get married. That left Diwakar all alone.
He had no choice but to drop out of school. And in no time, even before he could resume his studies somehow, local Naxalite leaders took him and inducted him as a teenager into the banned Maoist outfit in 2002.
“As there was nobody in my family, I joined the Maoist outfit when I was a teenager. Senior Maoist leaders brainwashed the villagers of Markampal while taking me in the name of fighting for Jal, Jungle and Zameen,” Libaru shares with The Indian Tribal.
Since then, the Gond tribal from Markampal village in Kondagaon district spent 17 long years in the Naxal organisation rising through the ranks wielding a AK-47.
Libaru was active as the Bhoramdeo Area Committee Head as well as a Divisional Committee Member (DVCM). He carried a bounty of Rs 8 lakh on his head in Chhattisgarh and Rs 5 lakh in Madhya Pradesh.
“I spent around 17 years in the Maoist organisation in various ranks and then decided to shun violence. I was disappointed with the exploitation of senior Maoist cadres as well as inhuman and hollow Naxalite ideology,” he says.
He was not alone during his surrender though. A woman Naxal Devi alias Laxmi also surrendered along with him before the security forces in Kabirdham district in 2021.
Laxmi was the Bhoramdev Area Committee member. She was carrying a bounty of Rs 2 lakh in Chhattisgarh and Rs 5 lakh in Madhya Pradesh. They were mainly associated with Vistaar Platoon Number 2 under the Kanha-Bhoramdev Division Committee of Maoists.
Maoists’ ‘Vistaar Platoons’ seek to expand their activities in their newly formed MMC (Madhya Pradesh-Maharashtra-Chhattisgarh) zone.
After surrender, they joined the mainstream of the society through the State government’s surrender and rehabilitation policy in Kabirdham district. Later, the two got married in 2022.
Under the district police drive to educate Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs), who dropped out of school in severely affected Maoist villages of Chilphi, Taregaon, Rengakhar, Jhalmala and Bodla in Kabirdham district, the surrendered Maoist couple could resume studies “for a better life”.
Libaru, his wife and two other surrendered Maoist couples as well as 200 other school dropouts of PVTG groups filled their forms for Class 10 and Class 12 open exams for the academic session 2023-24 conducted by the Chhattisgarh State Open School. Of them, 105 students including Libaru passed the exams. Libaru achieved the milestone in his third attempt, with 35 percent marks.
The police department had provided them free coaching in their villages and also made arrangements of free of charge transportation facility for these students from their villages to the examination centres.
Earlier, around 100 students of these villages passed the class 10 and 12 open school exams. Some of them are pursuing their studies further while some are self-employed and in jobs.
Notably, among the surrendered Maoists, only Libaru could pass the Class 10 exam while his wife got supplementary in two subjects. She will now appear for the supplementary exam.
Chhattisgarh Deputy Chief Minister Vijay Sharma also congratulated Libaru via video call for his success. He motivated his wife to work hard for her supplementary exams and pass it. Sharma appealed to the Maoists to get inspiration from Libaru to shun the path of violence and join the mainstream of society to shape up their life better.
“Libaru, who passed the Class 10 exam is an example of victory of pen over the gun. He set an example for those students who get more facilities but fail in exams and take extreme steps,” Kabirdham Superintendent of Police Abhishek Pallava maintained even as he appealed to the students to get inspiration fromLibaru to fight against all odds in life without negative thoughts.
