Manipur to Bastar, Child Soldiers Suffer at the Frontlines of Conflict

Case studies from war zones highlight State negligence and the importance of education at grassroots.

As conflict brews on in Manipur, tales of affected children reveal need to strengthen educational infrastructure.

(Photo: Aroop Mishra/The Quint)

Manipur has been simmering in the fire of protracted ethnic conflict since May 2023. While hundreds have been killed and nearly 60,000 displaced, children have been one of the most affected demographics. From being helpless victims of violent clashes, many are now being sucked into the cycle of violence that has become the new 'normal' in the hill state.

Multiple media reports since the start of the conflict have been highlighting the utter child rights violations amid the ongoing crisis.

During a recent press conference, Keisham Pradeepkumar, president of the Manipur Commission for Protection of Child Rights (MCPCR), said the armed groups in Manipur have been recruiting child soldiers, providing them arms training, and inducting them as frontline village defenders.

He further stated that both Meitei and Kuki armed groups have been inducting children. Even Naga armed groups in Manipur have been alleged to be recruiting child soldiers under the apprehension that soon their stronghold villages might be under attack.

The MCPCR added that even though no survey of child soldiers in the region has been carried out, there is multiple evidence to substantiate their allegations.

"We have multiple cases on record of child soldiers being used by the armed groups, arrests of minors and schools occupied by insurgents. We have taken multiple empirical data related to dropouts of high school children and related them to the increased arms and drug trades and other such instances to conclude the whopping rate of child soldiers being used. Dropouts are most vulnerable to be recruited as child soldiers."

An official under the condition of anonymity

During our last visit to the Lamka region in 2024, a civil society leader, speaking on condition of anonymity, however, asserted that the minimum age for serving as a village defender is 18 years. “Such media reports mean malice to our community and aspire to defame our frontline village defenders,” he added.  

A Kuki Students’ Organisation (KSO) leader, who did not wish to be named, added, “At the onset of this conflict in 2023, the schools were closed — and the entire system came to a standstill. There were instances of minors being inducted by the insurgent groups at the time. But after we reopened schools and brought back most of the children to school, such instances reduced drastically".

The leader further added that village defense committees are led by the village chief, and they have been ensuring that no minors are being inducted. "Even before the conflict, we have instances where parents of 15- or 16-year-old children have approached us to rescue their children who have joined the underground groups. We had talked to those groups, rescued them and admitted them to schools," he said.

In the same press conference, the MCPCR also appealed to the government to establish two residential schools in every district for the internally displaced children (IDP).

Children in Conflict Zones: Cases from Bastar, J&K

A similar situation has unfolded for years in South Bastar, in Chhattisgarh, which is also simmering in its own decades-long deadly war between the state forces and the Maoists.

In 2024 alone, at least 10 children were reported killed in South Bastar — in firings, in encounters, as casualties of accidental blasts of the left-out ammunitions by the state forces, or the improvised explosive devices (IEDs) planted by the Maoists.

At least five children were reported grievously injured in IEDs planted by the Maoists or in cross-firings.

Mangli Sori, a six-month-old infant, was killed in cross-firing at Mudvendi village of Sukma district. She has been reported to be the youngest casualty in the ongoing armed conflict in the region.

Usage of child soldiers by Maoists is also rampant in South Bastar. On 18 April 2024, ⁠a 17-year-old child, who was a hardened Left-Wing Extremist (LWE) cadre, was killed in an encounter in the Kanker district of Chhattisgarh which claimed the lives of 29 Maoist cadres.

Months later, an alternate media house reported on three more hardened child soldiers who were killed during the encounter. It has been alleged that the police forces had reported the age of these slain child cadres as "somewhat around 18".

Baijnath Padda, who was only 15 when he joined the Maoists in 2023, was one of the slain child cadres in this encounter. Padda was 16 when he was killed.

The media house has also identified three similar cases during other encounters in Bastar where the family of the slain cadres identified them as being under the age of 18.

Janilia Naruti was 14 when she joined the Maoists in January 2024, claimed her brother. Her Aadhaar card substantiates his claim. Naruti was also killed during the encounter.

Similarly, as per a report released by the Jammu and Kashmir Police in 2020, around 150 child soldiers were reportedly used by militant organisations there since 2003.

According to the European Foundation for South Asian Studies, while the militant organisations have been recruiting child soldiers, the state agencies have been reluctant to deal with apprehended child soldiers with care. The report mentions that in April 2021, a 14-year-old child was killed during a skirmish with the security forces. In 2023, a 17-year-old child was involved in a militant attack which had killed five security personnel in Kashmir.

What do the State Policies Say?

The instances of child soldiers’ being used in two-armed conflict-affected regions, Manipur, and the South Bastar, have come to light after India's certification for having ‘no armed conflict-affected children’ by the UN in June 2023.

The UN report highlighted that India has implemented all its recommendations for the protection of child rights during armed conflicts in J&K. No detailed report on the implementation of the UN’s recommendations by the Indian State is available in the public domain yet. Usage of child soldiers is one of the six grave child rights violations during armed conflicts, as per the UN.  

India has been a signatory to the UN’s optional protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict since 2002. As a signatory of this protocol, the Indian State is legally obliged to ensure that children below the age of 18 years don’t participate in armed conflict-related hostilities, to take proper measures to prevent the recruitment of child soldiers by non-state armed groups, and to ensure proper rehabilitation of apprehended child soldiers.

The newly amended Juvenile Justice Act 2015 also makes it mandatory for the state to ensure that children are protected during armed conflicts.

India has been reluctant to be a signatory to optional protocols of the Geneva Convention which will protect conflict-affected communities but has displayed better adherence to the optional protocol on the protection of children during armed conflicts by substantially reducing the usage of child soldiers in state and state-backed armed forces.

Despite these steps, child rights violations during armed conflicts by both state and non-state armed groups have been rampant in the country.

How Non-State Armed Groups See It

In an open letter written in 2006, the erstwhile General Secretary of Maoists, Ganapathi, had stated that the minimum age for induction in the Maoist militia is 16 years. He had justified this policy stating that a 16-year-old is no longer a child in an Adivasi village and has been enough politically conscious to be part of the militia.

Rajeev Kumar Bhattacharjee, journalist and author of ‘Lens and the Guerrilla: Insurgency in India’s Northeast’, had noted in a paper on the use of child soldiers by the insurgent groups that as per the cultural contexts of multiple rural tribes and communities of the Northeast, a 16-year-old is considered a full-fledged adult, and hence, is rampantly inducted into the armed outfits.

He recalled his meeting with the United Liberation Front of Assam chief Paresh Baruah in 2012 when he confronted the latter upon why the group inducted 16-17-year-olds into its army, Baruah had given a similar justification as the Maoists; that a 16-year-old is no longer a child. He had further added that the minimum age of induction in the American Army is also 17 years. 

Bhattacharjee believes that the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) is one of the very few insurgent groups in India whose minimum age for induction in the militia was 21 years. After a continued armed struggle against the Indian State for three decades, all the factions of NDFB disbanded themselves in March 2020.

In December 2024, three children were severely wounded during an encounter between the security forces and Maoists in Bijapur district. As per a media report, the father of one of the wounded children had alleged that security forces had fired on the children without any provocation. The police alleged that the Maoists were using children as shield, resulting in them getting wounded in the cross firing.  

A few months back, independent journalist Malini Subramaniam interviewed a mid-rung Maoist leader. She asked him how, despite a Maoist policy on the minimum age for recruitment into the militia being 16 years, were children as young as 14-15-year-old Padda or Narut (killed in Kanker) inducted, trained in the usage of arms, and involved in an encounter?

The Maoist leader had responded at the time that an internal inquiry had been initiated against the ones who had recruited them.  

But the leader was never able to provide a satisfactory answer to questions about how these two underage recruits (also as per the Maoist policy) went unnoticed by other leaders for months after their induction, nor did the Maoist spokesperson issue any press note clarifying the allegations against them. 

Who Saves Children When War is Over?

India has been witnessing decades-long armed conflicts in various regions of the country. Amidst the ongoing armed conflicts, Suspension of Orders (SoOs) have been signed between multiple non-state armed groups and the Indian State throughout the tenure.

An army officer under the condition of anonymity said, “SoOs are sometimes a half-pager or sometimes a few pages long, outlining the dos and don’ts for the parties involved in the armed conflicts. They hardly ask the insurgent groups to hand over the child soldiers to them, let alone ensure their proper rehabilitation”.  

In essence, SoOs between an insurgent group and the state forces simply ensure that both are not attacking each other.

Rehabilitation of children involved is often the last concern of the state, which is focused on avoiding attacks and counterattacks. The state has no data to date on the number of child soldiers identified or rescued after signing SoO with insurgent outfits.

Kishlay Bhattacharjee, an academician, and journalist, agrees that the state is least bothered about the identification, rescue, and rehabilitation of child soldiers. Being one of the very few journalists to have interviewed Kuki National Organisation leaders just after they had signed the SoO pact in 2008, the scribe notes, “There are no documents on child soldiers with the security forces, the government, or the insurgent outfits either".

As per a report by the Asian Human Rights Commission, multiple instances of child soldiers being used by the Salwa Judum forces were reported from Chhattisgarh during the early 2000s. The outfit was banned by the Supreme Court in 2011. Even as multiple studies and reports prove it to be a state-backed force, Chhattisgarh, and the Central Ministry of Home Affairs have been in denial.

Schools as a Tool for Rehabilitation

It is true that the Indian State has displayed much improvement in terms of dealing with the issue of child soldiers in state-backed forces during the last decade. But perhaps more effective interventions in reducing the vulnerabilities of conflict-affected children have been coming from the grassroots.

The public educational infrastructure in the South Bastar region, for example, was demolished by Maoists during the Salwa Judum era as a counter-offensive action against the state forces who were occupying the school buildings. In 2018, the villagers came forward and convinced both the Maoists and the state authorities to reopen the demolished schools in the region so that the schooling of children could continue.

The state government acted promptly and ensured thatched-hut schools and teachers for smooth re-operation of those schools. Nearly 105 such schools have been re-opened in Sukma, 296 in Bijapur, and one in Narayanpur districts.

This initiative has substantially reduced the vulnerabilities of children in South Bastar for getting induced as child soldiers in the Maoist forces. During the fourth periodic review of the human rights situation in India held in 2024, the United UN Human Rights Committee (UNHRC) acknowledged the Indian State’s ratification of the UN’s optional protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflicts.

In Manipur, another KSO leader under the condition of anonymity said that in the wake of the ongoing conflict, the rich and government employees either sent their wards to schools outside the state or admitted them in private schools. But IDP were left out.

Government schools were recording four times of their enrollment before the conflict. Multiple schools were being used as relief camps. By the months of October and November 2023, KSO had launched the ‘Zero Drop Out Project’ which ensured that dropout children are brought back to schools.

"KSO had initiated community schools in Bingpi Kanggui, K Molnom Chandel, Phaikoh Kamjong, Sangaikot Chrurachandpur and Tuibong Churachandpur, which has reintegrated 2110 IDP dropouts to schools. These schools have substantially reduced the vulnerability of children from being inducted as child soldiers. We further realised that IDP teenagers after passing out of the high schools were sitting idle at the relief camps and hence, we have initiated livelihood trainings for them in collaboration to NGOs.”

KSO leader

But even then, the issue of child soldiers being used by the non-state armed groups remained rampant throughout the armed conflict-affected regions of the country with a sense of apathy being displayed towards the issue by the Indian State.  

Bhattacharjee said that India’s adherence to the UN’s Optional Protocol has improved spontaneously without many efforts from the state, provided the modern and digital times we are in.

For example, today "security forces will not be able to openly conduct air strikes in any conflict-affected region likewise the 1966 Mizoram air strikes owing to the global and moder times we are living in today. It is almost similar in the case of child rights’ protection during armed conflicts.”

Rescuing Children From Arms

Vijay Podiyam (name changed) is a 17-year-old child who was inducted as a child soldier in 2019 and was arrested in 2020. After spending two years in a juvenile correctional facility, he was released, upon which, he was admitted to a school in Dantewada district of Bastar. But he had to leave the school as his classmates teased him as ‘Naxali’.

There are multiple such instances in South Bastar alone where child soldiers arrested rather than killed during an encounter and trying to reintegrate into society must face repeated discrimination and stigma of Maoism.

After the IED blast in Dantewada in April 2023 in which 10 DRG personnel and one civilian driver were killed, Dantewada Police arrested three children who were used by the Maoists to execute the blast and sent them to a juvenile correction center.

“Child soldiers after being rescued display utter mental health issues. Effirts at reintegration of such children by merely sending them to school doesn’t serve the purpose. They need mental health support to be proper counseling and rehabilitation.”

KSO leader (on condition of anonymity)

A UNICEF report states that between 2005-2022, globally more than 105,000 child soldiers were verified as used by parties to conflict, the actual number of cases is speculated to be much higher.

The Indian State is obliged to ensure that child soldiers are rescued and rehabilitated properly. Also, it is immensely important to ensure that no more child soldiers are recruited. Specific talks concerning child rights with the non-state armed groups in consultation with civil society organisations and regional peacemakers can help in this regard.

Moreover, specific policies concerning the protection of child rights during armed conflicts need to be formulated and the existing ones implemented.

Sensitising armed force personnel while treating child soldiers and developing a public repository of the child soldiers (both rescued and abducted) to date along with their present rehabilitation status are also essential steps to recovery.

Only then can a Vijay Podiyam, Baijnath Padda, or Janilia Naruti have a real chance at living a life with dignity.

(Prasun Goswami and Raunak Shivhare are actively involved in restoration of public education infrastructure in South Bastar and advocacy for child rights protection during armed conflicts at both national and international platforms. This is an opinion piece. The views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)