AP to hold talks with Naxalites on Oct 15

The Andhra Pradesh government will hold peace talks with People's War and Janashakti groups of Naxalites on October 15.

Announcing this in Hyderabad on Sunday, state Home Minister K Jana Reddy said the agenda for the talks will be finalised on October 5.

The nine-member official team, constituted by the state government, will hold direct talks with the three-member People's War team and the representatives yet to be named by Janashakti group.

The home minister said the decision to hold the talks on October 15 was taken at a high-level meeting convened by Chief Minister Dr Y S Rajasekhar Reddy in Hyderabad on Sunday.

Earlier, the government had invited the Naxalite leaders for talks on October 2 but the latter expressed inability to do so in view of the public meeting organised by them in Hyderabad on September 30.

Subsequently, the two Naxalite outfits had suggested October 13 as the date for the first round of direct talks.

Jana Reddy said that the government preferred October 15 as the date for the talks in view of the assembly by-elections in Asifnagar and Siddipet on October 13 and the counting of votes to be taken up on October 16. The venue for the talks was yet to be finalised, he said.

He said that the policy framework and modalities for the talks as well as detailed agenda of the issues to be discussed will be finalized at a meeting with Naxalite emissaries on October 5.

Welcoming the announcement of the names of three top People's War leaders for participation in the direct talks, Jana Reddy said that the government will provide safe passage and make elaborate security arrangements for them. "They will not face any problem at all. We will provide them security from which ever place they want," he said.

Three top underground People's War leaders -- AP State committee secretary Ramakrishna, AP-Orissa Border Special Zonal Committee Secretary Sudhakar and North Telangana Special Zonal Committee Secretary Ganesh -- will represent the militant outfit in the peace talks.

The People's War leaders will participate in the unveiling of a memorial of the founder of Naxalbari movement Charu Mazumdar and Srikakulam martyrs at Guttikondabilam village in Guntur district on October 11 and then proceed to Hyderabad.

Incidentally, Guttikondabilam is the place where Charu Mazumdar attended the first-ever meeting of Marxist-Leninist cadres in 1969. The first AP State Committee of CPI-ML was formed at that meeting with Panchadi Krishnamurthy as secretary.