Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday accused the Opposition INDIA bloc’s vice-presidential candidate B Sudarshan Reddy of “aiding” Maoists by delivering the Salwa Judum judgement in 2011.

“If that judgement had not been passed, Naxal terrorism would have ended by 2020,” Shah said while speaking in Kerala’s Kochi after inaugurating the Manorama News conclave organised by the Malayala Manorama group.

In 2005, the Salwa Judum, a state-supported civil vigilante campaign, was launched with an aim of targeting villages seen as harbouring Maoists. Armed vigilantes allegedly torched homes and forced villagers to flee to government-run camps.

Translated as “purification hunt” in Gondi language, Salwa Judum was presented by the state government as a spontaneous movement by the region’s tribal community against the Maoists. However, human rights activists accused the Salwa Judum of coercing people into leaving their villages and supporting the group. With the tribal community split between both sides, there were several deaths for months.

In 2011, Reddy, a former Supreme Court judge, was part of the bench that struck down the practice of Salwa Judum, saying that the state actions amounted to “an abdication of constitutional responsibilities” and that it represents “an extreme form of transgression of constitutional boundaries”.

The court also said that Salwa Judum was unconstitutional and ordered the group to be disbanded.

On Friday, Shah said that the residents of Kerala will “certainly see that the Congress party, under the pressure of Left parties, is fielding a candidate who supported Naxalism and used a pious forum like the Supreme Court”.

The Opposition INDIA bloc announced Reddy as its vice-presidential candidate on Tuesday.

Reddy was a judge in the Andhra Pradesh High Court in 1995 before becoming the chief justice of the Gauhati High Court in 2005. He was a judge of the Supreme Court from 2007 to 2011, when he retired.

Reddy also served as Goa’s first Lokayukta, or the anti-corruption ombudsman, in 2013.

The INDIA bloc’s announcement came two days after the Bharatiya Janata Party said that Maharashtra Governor CP Radhakrishnan will be the ruling National Democratic Alliance’s candidate for the vice presidential election.

Radhakrishnan has been the Maharashtra governor since July 2024. He previously served as the governor of Jharkhand and Telangana, and the lieutenant governor of Puducherry.

Radhakrishnan was associated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the parent organisation of the BJP. He was the BJP’s Tamil Nadu unit chief between 2004 and 2007.

He was a BJP Lok Sabha MP from Tamil Nadu’s Coimbatore between 1998 and 2004.

The vice president is also the Rajya Sabha chairperson.

The polls to elect the vice president are scheduled for September 9. The election result will be announced on the polling day itself.

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