PUDR strongly condemns the death sentence awarded to the ten accused, including two women, by the NIA Court Jagdalpur on September 16 in the Jhiram Ghati Maoist attack case and demands their release. Twenty-seven persons, including prominent leader Mahendra Karma and senior Congress leaders Nand Kumar Patel and Dinesh Patel, were killed and at least thirty-five injured in the attack on their convoy on May 25, 2013. The CPI (Maoist) claimed responsibility stating that the primary purpose of the attack was to punish Mahendra Karma who had headed the Salwa Judum, a state-sponsored anti-Naxalite movement emerging in 2004 declared illegal by the Supreme Court in 2011, in which hundreds of Adivasis were killed and displaced by militias of ex-Naxals/Special Police Officers (SPOs).
Nine people were named in the first chargesheet (May 2014) and thirty-two were declared absconding in the NIA’s supplementary chargesheet (September 2015), of whom two were arrested in 2017 and 2019. Of the eleven who faced trial, one died in judicial custody. Pramila Modiyam, Chaitu Lekam, Sumitra Punem Modiyam, Mukka Mandavi, Kosa Kavasi, Aayata Markam, Madkami Deva, Joga Madkami, Banjami Sanna and Mahadev Nag were sentenced to death, convicted under the various sections of the Indian Penal Code including murder, criminal conspiracy, and waging war against the Government of India, sections of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act relating to commission of a terrorist act and membership of a terrorist organisation, and under the Arms Act and Explosive Substances Act. All those convicted are Adivasis.
The judgement names twenty-seven persons as absconding, of whom senior leader Paka Hanumanthu/Ganesh Uike was killed in an encounter in December 2025 under Operation Kagaar. Several other Maoist leaders continue to be listed among the absconders, though known to have surrendered under the government’s Surrender and Rehabilitation Policy. These include Chaitu alias Shyam Dada, Soma Sodhi alias Surinder who surrendered in November and December 2025 respectively, and Barse Deva alias Devji and Thippiri Tirupathi alias Devuji who surrendered in January and February 2026.
PUDR condemns the sentence unequivocally as part of its in-principle opposition to the death penalty as a barbaric and retributive form of justice, which allows no possibility for reform and wherein a miscarriage of justice has irrevocable consequences. Experience has shown that the supposed safeguard of “rarest of rare” under Indian law is no guarantee against arbitrariness, shaped as it is by political considerations, social prejudices and subjective interpretations.
The Jhiram Ghati sentencing order too uses the argument of “rarest of rare” to award the death penalty, with special emphasis on the number of dead and injured and the brutality of the killings, especially that of Mahendra Karma, Nandlal and Dinesh Patel who were killed after surrender and capture. An examination of the judgement shows the weak bases on which the conviction and sentencing took place. More than forty people were charged, of which judgement was passed only on ten Adivasi accused. Of the thirty-three survivors, only thirteen were examined. Some of the statements were taken almost two years after the incident and Test Identification Parades (TIPs) to identify the accused were not conducted. Disclosure memos and “pointing out” have been cited as evidence, even where no recoveries were made. Two of the convictions were based on confessions. The first charge sheet records that they provided logistical support primarily in the form of collecting, transporting and storing rice. In one of the accepted confessions, the accused describes his role as having collected Rs. 20 from village households and handing these over, carrying grain and cooking for the Maoists who carried out the attack. In two instances the judge rejected confessions as grounds for conviction, but retained references to co-accused as evidence against them. Several of the protected witnesses were surrendered Maoists employed with government agencies and the police at the time, or those who had surrendered after the attack.
None of the witnesses identified the accused as present at the scene. The judge nevertheless used unlawful assembly, criminal conspiracy and common intent to rule that they merited the death sentence irrespective of there being no evidence of their participation in direct acts of killing. In the sentencing, no meaningful mitigating circumstances are taken into account. From Bachan Singh v. State of Punjab, several Supreme Court judgements have emphasised that a host of factors must be taken into account to pass the death sentence, including socio-economic status, family dependents, community ties, and most importantly, “extreme culpability”. In other words, a judge must look at circumstantial factors that led to the crime, and the culpability of the individual for the crime itself. In contrast, the judge in the present case summarily dismissed the arguments offered by the defence that they were village people who had no prior cases against them, that none of the witnesses had identified the accused as present at the scene (directly impacting culpability) and that India had been declared Naxal-free, towards lowering and grading the quantum of punishment awarded.
Awarding the maximum penalty to all ten undertrials in a highly politicised case stretching over more than 12 years, immediately in the wake of the Government declaring a “Naxal-mukt Bharat” suggests that political considerations have played a role in the sentencing. Hailing the verdict as “a victory of justice”, CM Vishnu Deo Sai lauded the “strong leadership” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Home Minister Amit Shah for liberating the state from the “clutches of armed Maoism”, a shorthand for the killings and surrenders under Operation Kagaar. The Jhiram Ghati attack case carries both real and symbolic value for the ruling party, functioning as a public reminder of the strength of the Maoist movement in the 2000s, and the present Government’s success in self-proclaimedly defeating it.
It must be remembered that eight of the ten convicted have already spent around twelve years in jail, and two others ten and seven years respectively, in what is a blatant miscarriage of justice. To keep them incarcerated, that too under the shadow of death, until their judgement is considered at the appellate level, is to further aggravate the injustice. Moreover, the apparent immunity given to the surrendered/ absconders, demands that on grounds of parity the same immunity be extended to the ten sentenced to death in the same case.
It needs to be emphasized that the ten convicted in the name of justice are all poor Adivasis. Like them, innumerable others continue to languish in jails for so-called ‘Naxal crimes’. PUDR in its report Reddening the Green: Costs, Contexts, and Consequences of the War in Bastar (2024-2026), has asked for amnesty for all those accused of ‘Naxal crimes’, towards bringing true peace and justice in post-war Bastar. Previous peace accords in India such as the Shillong Accord of 1975 and Mizoram Accord of 1986 can offer useful guidance. Any accountability for violent crimes can happen only with an independent and comprehensive framework that is extended to all participants in the conflict. In the absence of such a framework and a democratic political will to implement it, incarcerated Adivasi villagers such as the ten sentenced to death in the Jhiram Ghati case, will continue to serve as scapegoats for the state’s arbitrariness.
In principle and in the context of the politics of crime and punishment in contemporary Bastar, PUDR unequivocally demands the immediate release of Pramila Modiyam, Chaitu Lekam, Sumitra Punem Modiyam, Mukka Mandavi, Kosa Kavasi, Aayata Markam, Madkami Deva, Joga Madkami, Banjami Sanna and Mahadev Nag, not least as a concrete step towards realizing the lives beyond armed conflict promised by the Government of India.
Deepika Tandon & Shahana Bhattacharya
(Secretaries)
