Indian Maoists have copied LTTE in child conscription

Walter JAYAWARDHANA

The Hindustan Times newspaper said the Communist Party of India, (Maoist) popularly known as the Maoists of India have borrowed the idea of child conscription to their army from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

According to an item published by the Hindustan Times they have imitated the Tamil Tigers by recruiting children as small as nine years. The Hindustan Times said, Ajay Kumar, son of a labourer in Jharkhand Lohardagga district (in India), was only nine in 2004 when security forces nabbed him from a Communist Party of India (Maoist) hideout.

Like the Tamil parents in Sri Lanka they violently opposed the taking of their children, the Indian report said. Telling that Maoists are studying the setbacks suffered by the LTTE to take lessons the report said, A Maoist document, Post-Election Situation, Our Tasks, said: The setback suffered by the LTTE has a negative effect on the revolutionary movement. The experience of the LTTE setback in Sri Lanka is very important to study and take lessons.