Gajerla Ashok. (PTI)

Hyderabad, Dec. 29: A Maoist leader who allegedly masterminded the 2009 killing of 52 policemen in Maharashtra rebel den Gadchiroli gave up arms today, a week after 70 guerrillas surrendered amid talk of bickering in the top leadership.

Police in Telangana's Warangal, which adjoins Gadchiroli and where Gajerla Ashok, 41, alias Aithu turned himself in, claimed he was "disillusioned" with the CPI (Maoist) ideology.

Ashok is the younger brother of top rebel leader and CPI (Maoist) central committee member Ganesh.

But Ashok, who went underground at 18 and worked for 23 years in various capacities in the Maoist hotbeds of Telangana, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra, cited "personal reasons" including health problems for giving himself up. "I have surrendered because of personal reasons, including ill health ," Ashok said, speaking in the presence of Warangal police chief Ambar Kishor Jha and other officers.

Ashok parried questions on the reports of bickering in the rebel leadership and disenchantment among cadres. The surrender of 70 lower-rung cadres last week was seen as a sign of trouble brewing in the CPI (Maoist) after several of its leaders were killed by security forces this year and many surrendered.

Ashok carried a bounty of Rs 15 lakh on his head. Another of his brothers, who goes by the name of Azad, is also a central committee member in the outfit.

"It appears Ashok surrendered as he was disillusioned with the party ideology and decided to join the mainstream," said Warangal DIG B. Malla Reddy.

Other officers said Ashok had joined the Maoists in 1991 and worked for 10 years in Warangal, his home district, in various squads.

In 2001, he was sent to Bastar, the rebel stronghold in neighbouring Chhattisgarh. In 2008, he became a member of the Dandakaranya special zonal committee - a wing of the CPI (Maoist) blamed for deadly ambushes and massacres of security forces.

Ashok later rose up the rebel ranks, becoming secretary of the Maoists' South Bastar District Committee, another dreaded squad.