Thirteen years after one of the deadliest Naxal attacks in Chhattisgarh wiped out the state Congress leadership, a Special NIA court is all set to deliver its verdict on Monday.The case came to be known in the annals of Chhattisgarh history as the Jhiram Ghati massacre. On May 25, 2013, just after 4 pm, CPI (Maoist) cadres killed 29 Chhattisgarh Congress leaders and security personnel after planning the attack for months and allegedly hoodwinking the entire intelligence and security apparatus of the state.Who all were killedThe killings involved Chhattisgarh Congress stalwarts, including former Union Minister Vidya Charan Shukla, then state unit chief Nand Kumar Patel and his son Dinesh, then MLA Yogendra Sharma, and former MLAs Uday Mudaliyar and Mahendra Karma, founder of the volunteer anti-Naxal force Salwa Judum.Even today, a memorial in the name of those killed stands on the national highway in Sukma’s Jhiram Ghati, where the attack took place.It is widely believed that Mahendra Karma, founder of the anti-Naxal civilian force Salwa Judum, was the prime target of the 2013 attack. He took 50 bullets and was also axed to death.Only one survivor that dayCuriously, one Congress leader, Konta MLA Kawasi Lakhma, escaped unhurt that day and contested his sixth election in 2023. He again won the seat.Conspiracy theories surfaced after Lakhma survived the attack, with locals telling this correspondent, when she visited the Jhiram Ghati memorial in Bastar during the Chhattisgarh election tour in 2023, that former Chhattisgarh Industry Minister Kawasi Lakhma’s writ ran large in Bastar’s Maoist belt, where he inspired both fear and awe.Wait for justiceThirteen years after the attack, families say they still have no answers.“It is almost as if no one killed them. The National Investigation Agency probed the matter and filed a closure report terming the ambush as a Naxal attack and naming few cadres of the outlawed CPI (Maoists). It was a political assassination. We are still awaiting an honest probe,” Jitendra Mudaliyar, son of former Congress MLA Uday Mudaliyar, who was killed in the attack, tells The Tribune.No answersRelatives of those killed say the massacre happened under the BJP government led by then Chief Minister Raman Singh. But even during the later five years of Congress rule, there were no answers.Umashankar Shukla, a local Bastar resident, tells The Tribune correspondent that the wait for justice has been long and despairing.MemorialThe Jhiram Ghati Memorial on the national highway in Bastar’s Sukma bears photographs of Chhattisgarh Congress stalwarts killed in the attack — Vidya Charan Shukla, Nand Patel, his son Dinesh, then MLA Yogendra Sharma, and former MLAs Uday Mudaliyar and Mahendra Karma. Photographs of some security personnel do not even feature their names.Major intelligence lapsesFamilies of Jhiram Ghati attack victims cite NIA findings to note that Maoist cadres had planned the attack for months, conducting dry runs at the carefully chosen spot, with local villagers even serving them food at the same location where they lay in wait for the Congress convoy, which was moving as part of the ongoing Parivartan Yatra.”The convoy security was very low despite advance intelligence on Naxal movement,” remembers Jitendra Mudaliyar, adding that the Jhiram Ghati spot was carefully chosen for the massacre because of its desolation and dense forest cover.