RAIPUR: A school teacher was beaten and strangled to death by Maoists in Jagargunda area of Sukma district Sunday, just three days after Naxals hanged two villagers in Bijapur.
The victim, 25-year-old Dudhi Arjun, worked as a 'sikshadoot' - a contractual teacher who volunteered to teach students in extremely remote areas of Maoist-hit Bastar division.
Arjun is the second 'sikshadoot' to be murdered in Bastar in a year. Last June, teacher Kawasi Sukka was brutally murdered by the insurgents in Sukma, ignoring the pleas of hundreds of villagers.
Maoists target teachers because they take education to children, making it difficult for the banned outfit to recruit them. Dozens of schools, shut due to Maoist violence for over two decades, are being reopened and teachers like Arjun are key in this initiative.
Arjun, a native of Dantewada's Gondpalli, was kidnapped and taken before a so-called 'jan adalat' where he was ordered to be killed, just like the two villagers in Bijapur. He was savagely beaten in front of villagers and then strangled.
Maoists have murdered nearly a dozen villagers in just over a month, including two brothers, aged 16 and 19. Under pressure from security forces, Maoists are lashing out at civilians in Bastar.
Meanwhile, three Naxalites were arrested in Jharkhand's Latehar district on Monday. All three were associated with People's Liberation Front of India, police stated.
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