Vijayawada: Two senior Maoist leaders — J Nagaraju alias Kamalesh, a State Zonal Committee member and in-charge of the East Bastar Divisional Committee, and his wife M Jyoteeswari alias Aruna, a Divisional Committee member and head of the Mobile Academic Political Organisation School, East Bastar — surrendered before director general of police (DGP) Harish Kumar Gupta here on Saturday.

Nagaraju, a native of Poranki village near Vijayawada, carried a reward of Rs 20 lakh on his head, while his wife Aruna, hailing from Kappaladoddi in Krishna district, had a reward of Rs 5 lakh. The DGP handed over cheques of Rs 20,000 each to the couple as immediate relief.

Addressing the media, DGP Harish Kumar Gupta said the couple surrendered due to growing disillusionment with the Maoist ideology and the internal failures of the CPI (Maoist) party. He stated that the movement is steadily losing support and strength.

The DGP also revealed that security forces had recently unearthed a significant weapons dump belonging to the Andhra-Odisha Border (AOB) Maoist cadre, who fled during encounters over the past three months. The recovered cache included one AK-47, two grenade launchers, five SLRs, two INSAS rifles, 606 live rounds of ammunition, and 37 kg of cordex wire.

In addition, the DGP distributed cheques totaling Rs21 lakh to 13 underground Maoist cadre who had recently surrendered.

In the past year alone, police engaged in five exchanges of fire, resulting in the neutralisation of six Maoists. A total of 40 underground cadre have surrendered, including two divisional committee secretaries and 15 area committee members.

Gupta stated that around 20 Maoist cadre from Andhra Pradesh — including five zonal committee members — are still active. He appealed to them to surrender and rejoin mainstream society within seven months, warning that police will take firm action if they do not.

The DGP also mentioned ongoing efforts to train tribal youth to enhance employment opportunities, noting that several tainees have already secured jobs.

Senior police officials including IGP Operations Ch Srikanth, commissioner of police S V Rajasekhar Babu (Vijayawada), IGP Intelligence P H D Ramakrishna, and DIG Visakhapatnam Range Gopinath Jatti were present during the press meet.