Come Maharashtra Day, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis will honour the Special Operations Group (C-60 commandos) with medals for their valiant efforts to make the state Naxal-free. Five hundred personnel serving with the elite units in the Gadchiroli and Gondia districts of the state will be honoured by Fadnavis, reports said.
Currently, 29 C-60 teams are deployed in Gadchiroli, while nine are active in the Gondia district. Each team in Gadchiroli reportedly consists of 28 personnel, while there are 20 in each of the Gondia teams. The state government also awards special service medals and commendation certificates to Force One commandos and officers who have served two consecutive years, as well as personnel serving four years in the Quick Response Team, Loksatta said in a report.
The C-60 Special Operations Group is best known for being the first district-level commando force in the country formed from the indigenous tribal population. The Greyhounds of Telangana and AP, the Special Operations Group (SOG) of Odisha, and the Thunderbolts in Kerala are all state-level units, while the entire 60 members of the maiden C-60 team hailed from Gadchiroli.
The brainchild of former Gadchiroli Superintendent of Police K.P. Raghuvanshi (who retired in 2015 as Director General of the Maharashtra Security Force), the C-60s were formed in 1990 and were formerly known as 'Crack Commandos' and 'Naxalite Kardankal'.
"Veerbhogya Vasundhara" (The Brave Rule the World) is the motto of the unit, which recruits and trains tribal youth in modern policing and warfare. Equipped with modern gadgets, weapons, and technology, their familiarity with the terrain, communities, and language was the best counter-measure against the Naxal cadres, who were largely led by Telugu-speaking senior members, Raghuvanshi and his team found.
A success model worth replicating
The strategy was a success, and more C-60 teams were recruited and activated in the region. As per a 2018 report, 24 teams were divided between the Gadchiroli headquarters (14) and Aheri’s Pranhita headquarters (10) in the southern part of the district which, in terms of size, is bigger than many North-eastern states and Delhi.
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As per information on the Gadchiroli Police website, C-60 commandos undergo training at Greyhound Training Centre in Hyderabad, NSG Manesar in Haryana, Hazaribagh, Kanker, and the Unconventional Operations Training Centre (UOTC) in Nagpur. "They are also informed about Naxal tactics from time to time to carry out anti-Naxal campaigns. They are also given motivational lectures and shown commando movies to boost their morale," it said.
They are known for several success stories over the decades, including the elimination of 33 Maoists at the Rale-Kasnasur-Boriya forest on the Gadchiroli-Chhattisgarh border in a single encounter in 2018, The Times of India said in a report. In 2025, 200 C-60 commandos stormed the Maoist headquarters of Abujmarh, dismantling a critical rebel camp after a gunbattle that lasted over two hours, another report added.
According to Marathi media reports, the medals are part of an initiative that aims to provide government-level recognition for high-quality service. These medals will be announced every year on the eve of Maharashtra Day. For the first two years, 500 medals will be announced annually. From the third year onwards, the medals will be awarded to all eligible officers and personnel.
