Andhra Pradesh ADGP-Intelligence Mahesh Chandra Laddha, Eluru Range Inspector General GVG Ashok Kumar and other police officers in Vijayawada inspect weapons seized from arrested Maoists. | Photo credit: The Hindu
Six Maoists were killed in an encounter in Maredumilli Agency in Andhra Pradesh’s Alluri Sitarama Raju district on Tuesday (November 18, 2025). Among those killed were top Maoist commander Madvi Hidma, who was a central committee member and commander of the South Bastar battalion of the banned CPI (Maoist), and his wife Madakam Raje, a member of the Chhattisgarh state zonal committee.
Seven more CPI (Maoist) Maoists were killed on Wednesday (November 19, 2025) in a gunfight with the police in Maredumilli forests. Among those killed was Metturi Joga Rao alias Tech Shankar, a prominent Maoist leader who was a member of the CPI (Maoist) Central Committee and was in charge of the Andhra Odisha Border (AOB).
Left-wing extremism in Andhra Pradesh
Alluri Sitarama Raju is the only district in Andhra Pradesh currently affected by Left Wing Extremism (LWE), according to a reply given in the Lok Sabha (10 December 2024) by Home Minister Nityanand Rai.
LWE violence on the wane?
Since 2004, the CPI (Maoist) party has been responsible for most of the violence and killings among those perpetrated by left-wing extremists, according to the Ministry of Home Affairs. However, the movement seems to be waning. Incidents of LWE violence have been on the decline since 2010, when the insurgency peaked in the Red Corridor and the UPA-led government launched a massive counter-insurgency offensive.
This decline has continued under the NDA-led government, whose multi-pronged approach – outlined in the 2015 “National Policy and Action Plan to Address LWE” – has now reached a stage where the Union government aims to make all affected districts ‘Naxal-free’ by March 2026.
However, there was an increase in violent incidents in 2022 and 2023, as shown in the figure above. Mr Rai’s reply in the Rajya Sabha in March 2025 attributed this to an increase in “operations against the LWE as security forces started entering key CPI (Maoist) areas”.
According to Mr. Rai’s answer in the Lok Sabha in December 2024, about 38 districts have been identified as being affected by LWE. Fifteen of them are in Chhattisgarh. Mr Rai’s March 2025 reply quoted above also states: “LWE affected districts have been reduced from 126 to 90 by April 2018, then to 70 by July 2021 and then to 38 by April 2024.”
In 2024, as many as 267 (or about 70%) of the 374 incidents of violence were committed by extremists in Chhattisgarh alone.
Deaths from LWE-related incidents have also decreased since 2010, as shown in the figure below.
Published – 22 Nov 2025 10:29 IST
