Palestinian refugees are not at your service

By Moe Ali Nayel

http://electronicintifada.net/content/palestinian-refugees-are-not-your-service/12464

“Are you enjoying filming our misery? Film: it’s fine, you are like the others. You show up in the camp, film, leave, and we are still here.”

I used to reply: but we want to tell the world about your story. Always, with the same sarcasm, is the reply: “how much are you getting paid to tell the world our story?”

Throughout my time working as a fixer with international journalists I never understood why people on the sidewalks of the camps’ busy streets always regarded our “humanitarian” mission with skepticism. But earlier this year I came to understand this skepticism ofPalestinian refugees in camps in Lebanon.

It was a gloomy day and clouds condensed above Sabra, a shanty town adjacent toBeirut’s Sports City stadium, overlooking the Palestinian refugee camp Shatila.

We walked through a maze of narrow alleys in Sabra, led by Abdullah, a young Palestinian from Syria, doing relief work for his fellow Palestinian refugees who fled violence in Syria and were now seeking safety all over Lebanon.

I had been hired as a translator for a human rights professor from Harvard University who was working on a project regarding the situation of Palestinian refugees from Syria who have fled to Jordan and Lebanon.

Walking through the dim damp alleyways of Sabra, Abdullah led the way. The Harvard professor and her two students were heading to meet a Palestinian refugee from Syria who had agreed to meet us.

“We are not here to talk about her son”

“We are going to meet a woman from Yarmouk,” said Abdullah, referring to the Palestinian refugee community near the Syrian capital. “She fled two weeks ago with her injured son who needs urgent medical care. I hope you’ll be able to aid the poor woman.” Abdullah grabbed my elbow, encouraging me to make sure I translated his announcement to the Harvard team.

At the end of a narrow alleyway we stopped at a pile of shoes by the steps of a small apartment; the heap of shoes indicated the many people who were inside. While we added our shoes to the pile the professor and her students murmured: “We are not here to talk about her son, we just want to ask about her experience fleeing from Syria to Beirut.”

And: “fine let’s just give her a quick five minutes to talk about her son and we’ll move on.” The professor decided on the matter and looked at me as to include me in this decision since I was the translator and would be introducing the team and mediating the interview.

Crammed into the tiny apartment of Mariam, a Palestinian refugee who was sheltering two families from Yarmouk, we all sat and sipped on Turkish coffee waiting for Um Muhammad.

Cigarettes were lit, breaking an awkward silence, but when the Harvard team coughed and complained the cigarettes were politely put out. The silence was broken by Um Muhammad who came rushing in, apologizing for being late, trying to catch her breath while thanking us extensively for the great humanitarian work she thought we were doing: “God bless you and may he give you strength for the charitable work you are doing.”

Introductions and shy small talk were made, while in the background the professor set the scene for her trainees. Questioning would go in turns and each woman carried her list of already prepared questions, the kind used in human rights classrooms. It became clear to me that the Harvard team led by the professor were here to conduct training sessions on how to document human rights violations in the Middle East. Palestinian refugees fleeing Syria as a training topic.

Um Muhammad, a woman in her late 40s, covered her head with a beige scarf and wore an ankle-length burgundy trench coat. A mother of four, she was born in Beirut’s Burj al-Barajneh camp. She fled to Yarmouk camp in Syria during the 1980s when, as she puts it, “being a Palestinian was enough to get a person in trouble.”

Human rights kit

Um Muhammad smiled politely, trying to hide her agony but her eyes betrayed the distress and lack of sleep. In mid-December while her youngest son was playing with his friends next to their school in Yarmouk, the Syrian regime’s MiG fighter jets dropped bombs a few meters away from them, she said. A piece of shrapnel hit the 14-year-old boy on his head.

Um Muhammad rushed her son to a government hospital in Damascus: “they wanted me to sign a paper stating that my son was injured by the terrorists but I refused and told them the terrorists don’t have MiGs. Instead I grabbed him and went running to a field hospital in Yarmouk but they were only able to clean his wound and couldn’t perform surgery.”

“I brought him to Lebanon and I have been running around trying to find anyone who can pay for his surgery or treat him,” she added. “But its the same response I keep getting, from UNRWA [the UN agency for Palestine refugees] and the political factions in the camps from Fatah to Hamas: ‘we don’t have funds.’ It’s been almost one month since his injury. Pieces of shrapnel are still stuck inside his skull, his health is deteriorating each day; now, he’s starting to lose his speech.”

A Harvard student in her early 20s with a stern manner, ready to take her human rights course from theory to practice, sat opposite Um Muhammad. Her human rights kit was out: a long list of questions laid out, voice recorder turned on and set on the coffee table, different color markers deployed, a bundle of papers next to us on the couch.

The student organized her tools, gave a nod to the professor and the round of human rights questioning started. Her quick-fire questions started with the basics: name, age, marital status, number of children and place of residency in Syria. Human rights documentation training was now in action. I was told that for accuracy purposes questions need to be repeated more than once to see whether people are telling the truth:

Why did you come to Lebanon?

How long did it take you from your house to the border?

Try to remember exactly how long the trip took you.

How did you get to the border? Did you take a taxi, a car, or a bus? What kind of car? How much did you pay?

Who paid your visa fees to Lebanon?

Where did you get the money from?

Um Muhammad answered and re-answered but she was trying hard to recall details as her mind was not in full focus on her experience while fleeing.

“Try to remember”

“Tell us how long it took you to get from Yarmouk to the hospital the day your son got injured,” one said.

Um Muhammad struggled to be exact as she replied, “The hospital was not far and there were Syrian army checkpoints on the way but they let us pass, so it took us between 20 to 30 minutes.”

“Tell us exactly how long it took you,” the trainee insisted, keen on the minutiae for her records. “Was it 20 or 30 minutes? Try to remember, and how long you waited at the checkpoint. Five minutes? Ten minutes? Try to remember.”

As this routine continued, Um Muhammad’s answers became more vague and troubled, the students desperate for details. I was told to translate that they were from Harvard and they are here to document her experience so it was important for her to remember.

After a two-hour marathon of questions, Um Muhammad shot me looks of astonishment throughout, as if her words were not credible enough for them. As she was made to repeat her answers over and over, she sighed and went on. At one point, answering politely, but tired of the tirade of questions, Um Muhammad lit a cigarette and told me “I cannot remember those minute details ya khalti,” addressing me as an aunt would a nephew.

Smoking ban

“Please tell her to put out her cigarette.” Um Muhammad didn’t need me to translate this one, she instantly noticed the grimaced looks.

The persistent human rights student, here only to conduct her by-the-book interview in the presence of her evaluating professor, continued with her tiring and condescending questioning.

“Tell us: when you got to the Lebanese border crossing how did you know which window you had to go to.”

“There was a window for Lebanese travelers, a window for Syrians, and a window for foreigners this was the one where Palestinians were getting entry permits,” she replied.

“But how did you know this particular window was for Palestinians?”

“It was not the first time I came to Lebanon — I already told you that I was born here and one of my daughters lives here so we visit Lebanon often.”

“When you are at the Lebanese border crossing how do you figure out which window to go to? Was there a sign you read? What did the sign say?”

Um Muhammad looked at me, confused.

“You can’t just talk to her”

The conduct of the student was neither easy nor graceful, papers were shuffled, questions fired. Um Muhammad answered and re-answered in the hope of getting to the part that she came for: to tell her story and find aid for her injured son.

Um Muhammad’s growing frustration became hard to miss: she grabbed at her pack of cigarettes then let go, smiling at us as she remembered that she couldn’t smoke. Finally, losing her polite manner, she interjected: “I want to talk about my son. I need to tell you the story I’m here for.” She was cut short as her host Mariam arrived with another round of coffee.

Here I took my chance, while the coffee was being served, to tell Um Muhammad about a doctor I know from Ein al-Hilweh refugee camp, a reputable orthopediatrician who I thought Um Muhammad should go to, who treats people for no charge.

The human rights trainee, who couldn’t understand our Arabic and seemed to feel as if she was being excluded, suddenly snapped: “What’s going on? You can’t just talk to her without telling me. What are you talking to her about? I need to know everything that is being said,” interrupting my conversation with Um Muhammad. Further awkwardness filled the air in the room.

Not what they came for

By now, Um Muhammad had lost any remaining patience after three hours of questioning.

“Can I talk about about my son now?” The question hung in the air, followed by silence and uncertainty from the Harvard team. It was decided that to bypass her story they would give her “five minutes to tell her son’s story quickly and move on to questions.”

As Um Muhammad told a story of humiliation and anguish, we listened and nodded. My precise translation here seemed unnecessary: I was told to sum it up. This was not what we came for.

No one came to help any one here, it seemed, this was just a professor training her students, the picture now clear for all. Once Um Muhammad’s story was done and she had noticed that the team were not interested, she leaned forward and asked how we could help. The students kept silent, looking at their professor to rescue the awkwardness left by their disconcerted silence.

The professor spoke: “We will include your son’s story in part of the study we are doing, and it will be published by Harvard.” Then, the professor asked me to tell anxious Um Muhammad that Harvard is an important university and when the report was published many people would read it.

Um Muhammad politely smiled, grabbed her bag, looked at me and said: “That’s it?” Her disappointed face was hard to ignore, although she kept smiling and asked: do they still want to ask anything? Yes, there were more questions now that her son’s story was told, came their reply.

The refugee dilemma

After two more questions, a weary Um Muhammad began fidgeting in her seat shaking her legs nervously; she answered with a defeated tone while grabbing her handbag, positioning herself to get up and leave. But the rookie eyes of the Harvard students didn’t notice her signals of departure. I asked Um Muhammad to get going and she asked me if there is “anything at all that these girls can do to help my son.” I apologized and told her not to waste her time with them.

This has been the Palestinian refugees’ dilemma since 1948: watching groups of people from across the globe stroll through the misery of their camps and and then leave. Making their personal plight and stories available to writers and advocates is for them a way to induce change and action and to advance their moral cause around the world.

But humanity is the key here. To tell stories and conduct research, one would do well to remember that refugees deserve our sensitivity when dealing with their hardships. It’s been 65 years and Palestinians in the camps are still clutching onto whatever crumbs of hope or aid they can. But ultimately they are left awaiting the day they can return to the place where their dignity and humanity can be restored: Palestine.

Moe Ali Nayel is a freelance journalist based in Beirut, Lebanon. Follow him on Twitter:@MoeAliN.

‘We are happy with the way things are in Singur’

http://www.tehelka.com/story_main27.asp?filename=Ne030307We_are_CS.asp

Having travelled on the ground, Shoma Chaudhury asked Ravi Kant, MD, Tata Motors, some hard questions on the company’s role in Singur. He fielded them all

AP Photo

We follow a Tata Code of Conduct. This translates into being fair and civic minded in all our projects

1) How do you read the situation in Singur? Has the government made mistakes? Have you made mistakes? Would you do some things differently if you had the chance now?

Ans: It is rather unfortunate that the entire project has been dragged into a political controversy. West Bengal was one of the states, which were keen to locate the plant. As you would be aware there has been de-industrialisation in the state for the last several decades, and the present government is keen for rapid re-industrialisation. The state government showed keenness to host the plant, rightly concluding that it will have a ripple effect of attracting greater investment for rapid industrialisation. Incidentally, we had the option of setting up the plant in some other states as well, where major encouragements are being offered by the Central Government.

We believe due process of law has been followed in acquiring the land. This has been confirmed by the High Court of Calcutta in its judgment of February 14. We also learn that the state government has announced compensation, and a huge majority of the affected people have already taken the compensation. Importantly, at Singur, dwelling units of the affected people are outside the acquired land and therefore they are not being displaced. The government had shown us several plots, including some in and around Kolkata, from which we chose the one which is most amenable to setting up the project based on several considerations. You would be aware that we have chalked out and have begun to implement a plan to integrate the community with the project. The plan includes providing training to enhance employability of people, supporting women in forming self-help groups to provide items and services relevant for the plants, and general community development. Panchayat leaders from Singur have visited our Jamshedpur plant have seen for themselves what can be achieved. Since the beginning of construction of the plant on January 21, hundreds from the local community are working on the site every day. We are confident that as the project progresses, people will begin to see even greater benefit. We are satisfied with our decision to locate the project in Singur – it will help in the revitalisation of the automotive industry in West Bengal.

Tata Motors has not used state force, or caused it to be used. We believe the local community is with us

2) Is there a Tata code of conduct in business? Are there any general practices, situations, unfair advantages other companies may be comfortable with, but you would like to remain disassociated from?

Ans: True to the tradition of the Tata Group, Tata Motors strictly adheres to the corporate governance principles practised by the Tata Group.

It translates into being fair and civic-minded, fulfilling its duties to the entire spectrum of stakeholders, and, most importantly, making integrity an article of faith across all its operations. These norms have been articulated in the 'Tata Code of Conduct', which guides the actions and decisions of the group's companies and employees. The ethics code in the Tata Group covers much more than financial dealings – it sets out the terms of transaction with customers, suppliers, vendors, shareholders, and above all the community. It has been the tradition of the Tata Group to ensure that its manufacturing centres and operations are beneficial to communities, among which they exist. A project plan, from the very beginning, is so conceived that it forges a bond with the community. This has been our principle for Singur too.

This can be amply demonstrated by visiting any of our plants, like Jamshedpur, Pune, or Lucknow.

3) There are many questions being raised about your project in Singur. Some seem very valid. Could you comment on them?

1) Given that the Tata Motors small car project is a private, profit making enterprise, why has the government been used as an intermediary?

Ans: We wish to point out that the land does not belong to the Tatas. The Government of West Bengal has acquired the land for the West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation (WBIDC), which will lease it. The state government decided to follow this process, which we had no objection to. Every state we were talking to had committed to give us land either acquired or to be acquired by them. We do not see the acquisition by the West Bengal government as an exception or something special done for us.

2) Apparently the government is spending close to Rs 140 crore of public funds to acquire that land for your project. However, Tata will pay only Rs 20 crore back after 5 years of receiving the land, and at minimal interest. How is this justified? Is the government a shareholder in the project?

Ans: The commercial terms are not in the public domain, and therefore I will not comment on whether your facts are correct or incorrect. The land is being leased to us. It is part of the benefit, the state government is providing to match incentives being offered by other competing states. As I have said earlier, it is not an exception but in line with what other states are willing to do in view of the long-term benefits being accrued to the state.

3) Tata Motors was apparently shown 4 other sites for the factory. What were they? On what grounds were they rejected?

Ans: The Government showed us several plots. Our expert team, considering the unique requirements of the plant site, including physical characteristics, logistics, cost etc, selected the plot in Singur.

4) People have been demanding that the MOU between you and the government be made public. Why is this not being done?

Ans: The Government of West Bengal has stated its position on this issue.

5) Land is being acquired for your factory under the clause that it is for “public purpose”? What is the “public purpose” of a car factory, set up with the aim of earning private profit?

Ans: It is for the government to explain. This is not the first time a government – state or central – has acquired land for industrialisation and has given it to private or public parties.

In Singur, besides Tata Motors plant, several ancillaries are coming up on the land that is being leased. Tata Motors itself is investing about Rs.1500 crores, and the ancillaries will make additional investment.

The project, in its totality, in Singur will restore to West Bengal, once one of the three centres of auto manufacturing, a place in the industry’s expanding map, gaining for the state a share of direct and indirect benefits in employment creation and overall economic development supplementing the advances in agriculture. The project includes some of the best-known names from the auto component industry, who will set up facilities, in the adjacent vendor park. It is not inconceivable how this first initiative can induce a whole host of other organisations, cutting across industries, to recognise the attractiveness of the state. This actually has been noticed in recent times in Uttaranchal, where the entry of one company has induced several others to follow suit.

These investments lead to ancillarisation, support industries and services, thereby leading to a multiplier effect, through small scale units, a variety of services on overall economic development, much beyond the project area.

In the next 10 years, the automobile industry will generate an additional 25 million jobs across the country. The investments we are talking about will help the state get a share of this job creation.

6) Comparable car factories take up only 300 acres or less. Why are you acquiring 997 acres? What use is that land gong to be put to? Why is all of it being subsidized by the government?

Ans: Out of the about 997 acres of land that is being acquired by the West Bengal government, the Tata Motors small car factory will be set up on around 650 acres. The remaining about 300 acres would be used for setting up the vendor park, where ancillaries will set up their plants. These are the auto component manufacturers who would be supplying the critical parts for the small car. They are free to supply to other organisations as well.

7) The other clause in the Land Acquisition Act being used in your favour is the “socio-economic development” of the region. Singur is already a rich, self-sufficient, agrarian economy. Your project will evict thousands of farmers and landless labours. The compensation will turn their rich, perennial capital of land to pretty meager temporary monetary wealth. Turn a rooted agrarian economy to floating migrant urban population. How can this be deemed socio economic development?

Ans: The acquired plot excludes homesteads. So no resident of Singur is getting displaced. Secondly, farming there mostly employed seasonal labour. In contrast, the project will generate in the initial few years, over 10,000 jobs which are not seasonal.*

8) If you claim governmental subsidies on the grounds of “public purpose and socio-economic development”, are you not morally bound to set up factories in backward regions? Why take up prime land close to a metropolis and existing infrastructure? Why do you need to be subsidized to do his?

Ans: Tata Motors and Tata Group have historically invested in setting up facilities when none existed. Jamshedpur, Pune, Babrala, Mithapur and recently Uttranchal are examples of manufacturing facilities set up by Group companies which have had a very positive impact on the local economy and the well-being of people living in the area.

9) How many jobs do you envisage your factory will create? What kind of people will it employ? What is the break-up of this? How many local people will it be able to absorb?

Ans: The Tata Motors’ plant operation is expected to create employment in excess of 10,000 direct and indirect jobs within the plant, amongst vendors and service providers in the vicinity. Essential to generating employment for the Singur community is enhancing employability.*

Tata Motors is initiating various steps to train people of the Singur villages, who had earlier registered with the WBIDC, to improve their employability. It has already selected a batch of individuals, on the basis of a test and interview, for extensive 6-month training. Another group of residents of Singur, selected by the WBIDC, is at present being trained by the Ramakrishna Shilpa Mandir (Belur). The company is in the process of organising more extensive training for them based on a selection process. Arrangements will also be made to impart relevant training to other individuals, in the WBIDC list, appropriate to their educational background and skills and based on a selection process.

As part of the project, Tata Motors will also organise groups of women from Singur families and enable them to produce various items, which will be required during the construction phase and when the Tata Motors and vendor plants are operational. Last week, the first self-help group of women from Singur villages started a canteen to supply food for the Tata Motors Small Car project site. This is part of the company’s plan to increase income-generation for the families. Other such group activities could include tailoring to manufacture personal gear, cable harnessing, electronic items etc.

The Tata Group has also decided to support community development in the area. Plans are to establish a community centre, offer support in primary health, education.

10) Your factory will only be able to create 1000 jobs, if that. Not all of these jobs will be awarded to local people. The project will displace at least 11,000 families, i.e., an average of 44,000 people, conservatively speaking. The government has no rehabilitation plan for them. Are you comfortable with this?

Ans: There is no displacement of families or houses in the acquisition of the land. The project will generate over 10,000 direct and indirect jobs. Our focus is on enhancing employability as well as creating opportunities for self-employment.

11) There has been violence and police action, and section 144 in Singur. Are you comfortable associating with this? Why have you not taken the initiative to speak to villagers and build consensus rather than use State force to wall off the land.

Ans: Tata Motors has not used state force, or caused it to be used. In fact, for some time now, Tata Motors has been directly engaging with the Singur community, and we find overwhelming support for the project. The participation of people from the villages in the construction of the plant, the participation of women in starting the self-help group for food supply indicates that.

12) There are 56,000 factories in Bengal lying defunct. People want to know why new industries cannot be started in those places. What is your response to that?

Ans: I think it would be best for the West Bengal Government to answer it.

13) People in Singur say they would have welcomed agro-industries in the region, something related to the local economy rather than a car factory that displaces their economy to set up something else. Would you concede some fairness in this?

Ans: As I have stated and what we see on the ground is that people of Singur have welcomed our project – they are actively participating in it.

14) There have been reports that Tata feels the opposition in Singur has been engineered by rival companies and political parties. Even if that were really the case, the questions posed here still remain valid to a neutral party like me. Would you concede that?

Ans: We would not like to say anything beyond what our Chairman, Mr. Ratan Tata, has already stated on the aspect.

15) While continuing with economic reforms, would you agree the time has come to rethink some of the directions the new economy is moving in?

Ans: There has to be continuous thinking on how we can learn and improve. It is important to look at issues and developments on a continuous basis.

16) The resistance to SEZs and industrial plants and projects across the country is being projected as a factory vs. farm, industry vs agriculture divide. How do you see it? Would you agree people’s resistance is against the arbitrary processes involved rather than to industry itself? Amongst reformers and capitalists, there is often very easy talk about “collateral damage”, the “pain” of growth. What is your view on this?

Ans: Any kind of change will evoke concerns. It is important to engage with the community and give them the confidence that the change will impact their lives positively.

17) Tatas’ projects have run into violent resistance at Kalinganagar and Chattisgarh. What are your learnings from all this?

Ans: The violence in the protest has always been beyond our understanding. However, what is important is the change management that has helped people to appreciate the genuine efforts put by the Group in enhancing the quality of life of the local community.

See Also:

* http://development-dialogues.blogspot.com/2008/05/singur-employment-bluff-called.html

Mar 03 , 2007

On India's Growing Violence: 'It's Outright War and Both Sides are Choosing Their Weapons'

http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/1743

March 26, 2007

The following is an interview with Arundhati Roy, conducted by Shoma Chaudhury of Tehelka.

There is an atmosphere of growing violence across the country. How do you read the signs? In what context should it be read?

You don't have to be a genius to read the signs. We have a growing middle class, reared on a diet of radical consumerism and aggressive greed. Unlike industrializing Western countries, which had colonies from which to plunder resources and generate slave labor to feed this process, we have to colonize ourselves, our own nether parts. We've begun to eat our own limbs. The greed that is being generated (and marketed as a value interchangeable with nationalism) can only be sated by grabbing land, water and resources from the vulnerable. What we're witnessing is the most successful secessionist struggle ever waged in independent India : the secession of the middle and upper classes from the rest of the country. It's a vertical secession, not a lateral one. They're fighting for the right to merge with the world's elite somewhere up there in the stratosphere. They've managed to commandeer the resources, the coal, the minerals, the bauxite, the water and electricity. Now they want the land to make more cars, more bombs, more mines : supertoys for the new supercitizens of the new superpower. So it's outright war, and people on both sides are choosing their weapons. The government and the corporations reach for structural adjustment, the World Bank, the ADB, FDI, friendly court orders, friendly policy makers, help from the 'friendly' corporate media and a police force that will ram all this down people's throats. Those who want to resist this process have, until now, reached for dharnas, hunger strikes, satyagraha, the courts and what they thought was friendly media. But now more and more are reaching for guns. Will the violence grow? If the 'growth rate' and the Sensex are going to be the only barometers the government uses to measure progress and the well-being of people, then of course it will. How do I read the signs? It isn't hard to read sky-writing. What it says up there, in big letters, is this: the shit has hit the fan, folks.

You once remarked that though you may not resort to violence yourself, you think it has become immoral to condemn it, given the circumstances in the country. Can you elaborate on this view?

I'd be a liability as a guerrilla! I doubt I used the word 'immoral' : morality is an elusive business, as changeable as the weather. What I feel is this: non-violent movements have knocked at the door of every democratic institution in this country for decades, and have been spurned and humiliated. Look at the Bhopal gas victims, the Narmada Bachao Andolan. The nba had a lot going for it : high-profile leadership, media coverage, more resources than any other mass movement. What went wrong? People are bound to want to rethink strategy. When Sonia Gandhi begins to promote satyagraha at the World Economic Forum in Davos, it's time for us to sit up and think. For example, is mass civil disobedience possible within the structure of a democratic nation state? Is it possible in the age of disinformation and corporate-controlled mass media? Are hunger strikes umbilically linked to celebrity politics? Would anybody care if the people of Nangla Machhi or Bhatti mines went on a hunger strike? Irom Sharmila has been on a hunger strike for six years. That should be a lesson to many of us. I've always felt that it's ironic that hunger strikes are used as a political weapon in a land where most people go hungry anyway. We are in a different time and place now. Up against a different, more complex adversary. We've entered the era of NGOs : or should I say the era of paltu shers : in which mass action can be a treacherous business. We have demonstrations which are funded, we have sponsored dharnas and social forums which make militant postures but never follow up on what they preach. We have all kinds of 'virtual' resistance. Meetings against SEZs sponsored by the biggest promoters of SEZs. Awards and grants for environmental activism and community action given by corporations responsible for devastating whole ecosystems. Vedanta, a company mining bauxite in the forests of Orissa, wants to start a university. The Tatas have two charitable trusts that directly and indirectly fund activists and mass movements across the country. Could that be why Singur has drawn so much less flak than Nandigram? Of course the Tatas and Birlas funded Gandhi too : maybe he was our first NGO. But now we have NGOs who make a lot of noise, write a lot of reports, but whom the sarkar is more than comfortable with. How do we make sense of all this? The place is crawling with professional diffusers of real political action. 'Virtual' resistance has become something of a liability.

There was a time when mass movements looked to the courts for justice. The courts have rained down a series of judgments that are so unjust, so insulting to the poor in the language they use, they take your breath away. A recent Supreme Court judgment, allowing the Vasant Kunj Mall to resume construction though it didn't have the requisite clearances, said in so many words that the questions of corporations indulging in malpractice does not arise! In the ERA of corporate globalization, corporate land-grab, in the ERA of Enron and Monsanto, Halliburton and Bechtel, that's a loaded thing to say. It exposes the ideological heart of the most powerful institution in this country. The judiciary, along with the corporate press, is now seen as the lynchpin of the neo-liberal project.

In a climate like this, when people feel that they are being worn down, exhausted by these interminable 'democratic' processes, only to be eventually humiliated, what are they supposed to do? Of course it isn't as though the only options are binary : violence versus non-violence. There are political parties that believe in armed struggle but only as one part of their overall political strategy. Political workers in these struggles have been dealt with brutally, killed, beaten, imprisoned under false charges. People are fully aware that to take to arms is to call down upon yourself the myriad forms of the violence of the Indian State. The minute armed struggle becomes a strategy, your whole world shrinks and the colors fade to black and white. But when people decide to take that step because every other option has ended in despair, should we condemn them? Does anyone believe that if the people of Nandigram had held a dharna and sung songs, the West Bengal government would have backed down? We are living in times when to be ineffective is to support the status quo (which no doubt suits some of us). And being effective comes at a terrible price. I find it hard to condemn people who are prepared to pay that price.

You have been traveling a lot on the ground : can you give us a sense of the trouble spots you have been to? Can you outline a few of the combat lines in these places?

Huge question : what can I say? The military occupation of Kashmir, neo-fascism in Gujarat, civil war in Chhattisgarh, MNCs raping Orissa, the submergence of hundreds of villages in the Narmada Valley, people living on the edge of absolute starvation, the devastation of forest land, the Bhopal victims living to see the West Bengal government re-wooing Union Carbide : now calling itself Dow Chemicals : in Nandigram. I haven't been recently to Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Maharashtra, but we know about the almost hundred thousand farmers who have killed themselves. We know about the fake encounters and the terrible repression in Andhra Pradesh. Each of these places has its own particular history, economy, ecology. None is amenable to easy analysis. And yet there is connecting tissue, there are huge international cultural and economic pressures being brought to bear on them. How can I not mention the Hindutva project, spreading its poison sub-cutaneously, waiting to erupt once again? I'd say the biggest indictment of all is that we are still a country, a culture, a society which continues to nurture and practice the notion of untouchability. While our economists number-crunch and boast about the growth rate, a million people : human scavengers : earn their living carrying several kilos of other people's shit on their heads every day. And if they didn't carry shit on their heads they would starve to death. Some fucking superpower this.

How does one view the recent State and police violence in Bengal?

No different from police and State violence anywhere else : including the issue of hypocrisy and doublespeak so perfected by all political parties including the mainstream Left. Are Communist bullets different from capitalist ones? Odd things are happening. It snowed in Saudi Arabia. Owls are out in broad daylight. The Chinese government tabled a bill sanctioning the right to private property. I don't know if all of this has to do with climate change. The Chinese Communists are turning out to be the biggest capitalists of the 21st century. Why should we expect our own parliamentary Left to be any different? Nandigram and Singur are clear signals. It makes you wonder : is the last stop of every revolution advanced capitalism? Think about it : the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution, the Chinese Revolution, the Vietnam War, the anti-apartheid struggle, the supposedly Gandhian freedom struggle in India... what's the last station they all pull in at? Is this the end of imagination?

The Maoist attack in Bijapur : the death of 55 policemen. Are the rebels only the flip side of the State?

How can the rebels be the flip side of the State? Would anybody say that those who fought against apartheid : however brutal their methods : were the flip side of the State? What about those who fought the French in Algeria? Or those who fought the Nazis? Or those who fought colonial regimes? Or those who are fighting the US occupation of Iraq? Are they the flip side of the State? This facile new report-driven 'human rights' discourse, this meaningless condemnation game that we are all forced to play, makes politicians of us all and leaches the real politics out of everything. However pristine we would like to be, however hard we polish our halos, the tragedy is that we have run out of pristine choices. There is a civil war in Chhattisgarh sponsored, created by the Chhattisgarh government, which is publicly pursing the Bush doctrine: if you're not with us, you are with the terrorists. The lynchpin of this war, apart from the formal security forces, is the Salva Judum : a government-backed militia of ordinary people forced to take up arms, forced to become SPOs (special police officers). The Indian State has tried this in Kashmir, in Manipur, in Nagaland. Tens of thousands have been killed, hundreds of thousands tortured, thousands have disappeared. Any banana republic would be proud of this record. Now the government wants to import these failed strategies into the heartland. Thousands of adivasis have been forcibly moved off their mineral-rich lands into police camps. Hundreds of villages have been forcibly evacuated. Those lands, rich in iron-ore, are being eyed by corporations like the Tatas and Essar. Mous have been signed, but no one knows what they say. Land acquisition has begun. This kind of thing happened in countries like Colombia : one of the most devastated countries in the world. While everybody's eyes are fixed on the spiraling violence between government-backed militias and guerrilla squads, multinational corporations quietly make off with the mineral wealth. That's the little piece of theater being scripted for us in Chhattisgarh.

Of course it's horrible that 55 policemen were killed. But they're as much the victims of government policy as anybody else. For the government and the corporations they're just cannon fodder : there's plenty more where they came from. Crocodile tears will be shed, prim TV anchors will hector us for a while and then more supplies of fodder will be arranged. For the Maoist guerrillas, the police and SPOs they killed were the armed personnel of the Indian State, the main, hands-on perpetrators of repression, torture, custodial killings, false encounters. They're not innocent civilians : if such a thing exists : by any stretch of imagination.

I have no doubt that the Maoists can be agents of terror and coercion too. I have no doubt they have committed unspeakable atrocities. I have no doubt they cannot lay claim to undisputed support from local people : but who can? Still, no guerrilla army can survive without local support. That's a logistical impossibility. And the support for Maoists is growing, not diminishing. That says something. People have no choice but to align themselves on the side of whoever they think is less worse.

But to equate a resistance movement fighting against enormous injustice with the government which enforces that injustice is absurd. The government has slammed the door in the face of every attempt at non-violent resistance. When people take to arms, there is going to be all kinds of violence : revolutionary, lumpen and outright criminal. The government is responsible for the monstrous situations it creates.

'Naxals', 'Maoists', 'outsiders': these are terms being very loosely used these days.

'Outsiders' is a generic accusation used in the early stages of repression by governments who have begun to believe their own publicity and can't imagine that their own people have risen up against them. That's the stage the CPM is at now in Bengal, though some would say repression in Bengal is not new, it has only moved into higher gear. In any case, what's an outsider? Who decides the borders? Are they village boundaries? Tehsil? Block? District? State? Is narrow regional and ethnic politics the new Communist mantra? About Naxals and Maoists : well... India is about to become a police state in which everybody who disagrees with what's going on risks being called a terrorist. Islamic terrorists have to be Islamic : so that's not good enough to cover most of us. They need a bigger catchment area. So leaving the definition loose, undefined, is effective strategy, because the time is not far off when we'll all be called Maoists or Naxalites, terrorists or terrorist sympathizers, and shut down by people who don't really know or care who Maoists or Naxalites are. In villages, of course, that has begun : thousands of people are being held in jails across the country, loosely charged with being terrorists trying to overthrow the state. Who are the real Naxalites and Maoists? I'm not an authority on the subject, but here's a very rudimentary potted history.

The Communist Party of India, the CPI, was formed in 1925. The CPI (M), or what we now call the CPM : the Communist Party Marxist : split from the CPI in 1964 and formed a separate party. Both, of course, were parliamentary political parties. In 1967, the CPM, along with a splinter group of the Congress, came to power in West Bengal. At the time there was massive unrest among the peasantry starving in the countryside. Local CPM leaders : Kanu Sanyal and Charu Mazumdar : led a peasant uprising in the district of Naxalbari which is where the term Naxalites comes from. In 1969, the government fell and the Congress came back to power under Siddhartha Shankar Ray. The Naxalite uprising was mercilessly crushed : Mahasweta Devi has written powerfully about this time. In 1969, the CPI (ML) : Marxist Leninist : split from the CPM. A few years later, around 1971, the CPI (ML) devolved into several parties: the CPM-ML (Liberation), largely centered in Bihar; the CPM-ML (New Democracy), functioning for the most part out of Andhra Pradesh and Bihar; the CPM-ML (Class Struggle) mainly in Bengal. These parties have been generically baptised 'Naxalites'. They see themselves as Marxist Leninist, not strictly speaking Maoist. They believe in elections, mass action and : when absolutely pushed to the wall or attacked : armed struggle. The MCC : the Maoist Communist Centre, at the time mostly operating in Bihar : was formed in 1968. The PW, People's War, operational for the most part in Andhra Pradesh, was formed in 1980. Recently, in 2004, the MCC and the pw merged to form the CPI (Maoist) They believe in outright armed struggle and the overthrowing of the State. They don't participate in elections. This is the party that is fighting the guerrilla war in Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand.

The Indian State and media largely view the Maoists as an "internal security" threat. Is this the way to look at them?

I'm sure the Maoists would be flattered to be viewed in this way.

The Maoists want to bring down the State. Given the autocratic ideology they take their inspiration from, what alternative would they set up? Wouldn't their regime be an exploitative, autocratic, violent one as well? Isn't their action already exploitative of ordinary people? Do they really have the support of ordinary people?

I think it's important for us to acknowledge that both Mao and Stalin are dubious heroes with murderous pasts. Tens of millions of people were killed under their regimes. Apart from what happened in China and the Soviet Union, Pol Pot, with the support of the Chinese Communist Party (while the West looked discreetly away), wiped out two million people in Cambodia and brought millions of people to the brink of extinction from disease and starvation. Can we pretend that China's cultural revolution didn't happen? Or that millions of people in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe were not victims of labor camps, torture chambers, the network of spies and informers, the secret police. The history of these regimes is just as dark as the history of Western imperialism, except for the fact that they had a shorter life-span. We cannot condemn the occupation of Iraq, Palestine and Kashmir while we remain silent about Tibet and Chechnya. I would imagine that for the Maoists, the Naxalites, as well as the mainstream Left, being honest about the past is important to strengthen people's faith in the future. One hopes the past will not be repeated, but denying that it ever happened doesn't help inspire confidence... Nevertheless, the Maoists in Nepal have waged a brave and successful struggle against the monarchy. Right now, in India, the Maoists and the various Marxist-Leninist groups are leading the fight against immense injustice here. They are fighting not just the State, but feudal landlords and their armed militias. They are the only people who are making a dent. And I admire that. It may well be that when they come to power, they will, as you say, be brutal, unjust and autocratic, or even worse than the present government. Maybe, but I'm not prepared to assume that in advance. If they are, we'll have to fight them too. And most likely someone like myself will be the first person they'll string up from the nearest tree : but right now, it is important to acknowledge that they are bearing the brunt of being at the forefront of resistance. Many of us are in a position where we are beginning to align ourselves on the side of those who we know have no place for us in their religious or ideological imagination. It's true that everybody changes radically when they come to power : look at Mandela's ANC. Corrupt, capitalist, bowing to the IMF driving the poor out of their homes : honoring Suharto, the killer of hundreds of thousands of Indonesian Communists, with South Africa's highest civilian award. Who would have thought it could happen? But does this mean South Africans should have backed away from the struggle against apartheid? Or that they should regret it now? Does it mean Algeria should have remained a French colony, that Kashmiris, Iraqis and Palestinians should accept military occupation? That people whose dignity is being assaulted should give up the fight because they can't find saints to lead them into battle?

Is there a communication breakdown in our society?

Yes.

Nandigram can stop big corporations' muscle power'

Hardnews

http://www.hardnewsmedia.com/portal/2007/12/1859

Eminent economist and Professor Emeritus in JNU, Delhi, Amit Bhaduri has just returned from Kolkata and Mumbai where both Nandigram and the struggle against SEZs was part of his academic and political involvement. He participated in the massive rally of intellectuals and artists in Kolkata against the siege of Nandigram. A veteran teacher and academic, his essays on globalisation, among other subjects, are marked by meticulous insight and rigour. In conversation with Amit Sengupta.

What is your take on the joint letter by Noam Chomsky, Tariq Ali and intellectuals on Left unity in the wake of the Nandigram recapture?

Ideally, Left unity is desirable, provided your objective is clear. When a party gets sold completely to the industrial corporates, it grabs land from the peasants at any cost for private capital and continues to make big mistakes, Left unity is not possible. How can there be Left unity when the Left is totally hooked by the pro-corporate and pro-capitalist logic?

Why is the CPM pushing this current economic policy?

The fact is that the CPM has failed completely after 30 years of dominating rule in West Bengal. After Operation Barga as land reforms, it has failed to do anything for the productive sector. For instance, take NREGA: the CPM's performance is miserable — worse than the worst states. I will give you one example. In Purulia district, till the end of October 2007, 16 per cent of the money allocated for the NREGA was not used. Buddhadeb Bhattacharya has no idea or intention to increase productivity in agriculture or augment the livelihood of the people. He is driven by narrow middle-class notions of industrialisation. There is an abject lack of imagination.

So what is the difference between the Manmohan Singh-Montek Singh economic paradigm of growth and the Buddhadeb-Biman Bose model?

Why not add Prakash Karat also? The CPM's official line on growth and the Congress's line on growth have no difference except in terms of rhetoric. For instance when it comes to trade unionism, the CPM will raise the provident fund issue. These are marginal issues. As for things which are basic, the CPM is totally toeing the Manmohan Singh line on industrialisation, pandering to corporates, acquiring land of farmers and tribals which belongs to them for centuries — basically colonising. It seems very strange. They talk of American colonialism and imperialism but choose to ignore internal colonialism as integral to this global process. They seem completely confused and then they adopt a two-faced approach on the question of colonisation.

So are they communists or are they like the Christian Democrats in Germany?

In Europe I have seen the Christian Democrats closely: they have completely degenerated. The CPM is communist in the most negative sense. They completely follow the compulsory notion of a Leninist party in terms of structure such as having politburo, cadre etc, but in reality they function like a non-communist party. Their content therefore is that of a bourgeois party while the technology of the party is Leninist. A communist party stands for revolutionary principles, for revolution, not free market democracy and corporations.

Do you think Nandigram will mark a rupture in this new era of relentless globalisation?

If we are successful in Nandigram, it will help in stopping the big corporations' muscle power which is propelling globalisation. Then we can defeat this process. And that will be great for the social, economic and political future of the ordinary people.

‘No Left content left in CPI-M’

http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=4&theme=&usrsess=1&id=176715

Dipankar Bhattacharya succeeded Vinod Mishra as the general secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation in 1998.
Son of a railway employee, Mr Bhattacharya was born in Guwahati in December 1961. He talks excitedly about his early schooling at Alipurduar ~ “that is when everything was happening, it made me curious and my father with his Marxist inclination helped my understanding”. All the walls in the railway township were painted red with maps of India and the slogan,
“Turn the decade of seventies into the decade of liberation”. It triggered his curiosity and the question, “was not the country already liberated”, haunted him.
Mr Bhattacharya feels there was nothing “abrupt” in his switch to politics from his studies at the Indian Statistical Institute which he joined in 1979. His specialisation covered Indian agriculture, and in his own words: “This education also in a way helped me to understand the society and my formal and political education evolved together. Politics is a transition of knowledge put into practice.” He was given the degree only in 1985.
In 1986, he went underground in an working class area; a year later, he was with the Indian People’s Front (IPF) that was an over-ground affiliate of the party.
In an interview to Hemendra Narayan in the backdrop of the happenings at Nandigram in West Bengal and Naxalite killings in Jharkhand, Mr Bhattacharya discussed a wide spectrum of the Left and ultra-Left politics.

Excerpts:

How do you react to the killings in Jharkhand by the Communist Party (Maoists) cadres? Your party has a strong base in the area. Babulal Marandi is said to be campaigning against Maoists there. Are you losing out to the Maoists in Jharkhand?
I do not see any political logic in these killings. They (Maoists) are killing innocent people. The person they were targeting, Marandi’s brother, escaped. These killings are mindless and completely indefensible. We do not see much in Marandi’s activities. As chief minister, he had indulged in fake surrender of Maoists. There is not much evidence of Marandi countering Maoists and other leaders of the BJP were using Maoists against us.
No, we are certainly not losing out to the Maoists. By terror tactics, they have tried to prevent our supporters from voting our candidates in elections.
Maoist squads have targeted our workers and campaigners in the elections. This had no impact and people have seen through their game. In Chatra and Palamu, their supporters have been joining us.

But does the violence by them have an impact on your over-ground party participating in elections?
Maoist activity does give the state a handle (against us). It does become a handicap in the area where our identity is not well known. But in the area where we are known, it does not matter. We are not losing political space to the Maoists. There are cases where our offices have been targeted and the state aggression has been directed gainst us. We have been singled out for state suppression. This is not a case of mistaken identity, this is because of our identity ~ for we have been at the forefront of the militant assertion by the people. Action against Maoists has been a ploy to justify suppression of our activities.

How do look at the tactics of Naxalites ~ at times, your party has been their target?
After their military strategy in Andhra Pradesh, the pendulum shifted to talks. The government trapped them into talks. They are trying to make up for it by their action in Chhattisgrah and Jharkhand. The people have seen the futility of their activity and loss of initiative. The people are appreciating our point.
However, in spite of the fact that they have indulged in killing our comrades, we have avoided retaliation, and also we have never supported state repression against Maoists.

The two extreme Left groups ~ the Maoist Communist Centre (MCC) and the CPI (ML) People’s War ~ have merged to form the Communist Party (Maoists). What are the chances of merger of other extreme Left groups?
The two groups have yet to sort out all issues. They have no immediate political agenda. We are trying to unite people who do not subscribe to their anarchist policy. Also, in the Left spectrum there are people who are perturbed over the Right-wing shift of the CPI-M. We are trying to give this a shape. People from the CPI-M in Punjab were split on the ideological point.
Such shift has also taken place in Orissa. In West Bengal, serious Left forces, activists are looking up to us and joining us. The feeling is that sections of the CPI-M have become power seekers and power brokers without any Left content being left in them. People with roots in the ideology are turning towards CPI-(ML) Liberation.

What do you think of Nandigram and the CPI-M’s moves there?
The CPI-M’s calculation appears to be that a friendly Central government would help them assert themselves in Nandigram and recover respectability. The party has never been so discredited and isolated in West Bengal as it is now.
All democratic norms have been flouted with impunity.
After 30 years in power, the CPI-M just cannot accept the fact that the rural poor have the guts to challenge it. This intolerance is at the heart of the whole episode. Another reprehensible aspect is that there appears to be a link now between the CPI-M’s Nandigram strategy and their softening of opposition to the nuclear deal.

In West Bengal, the incidents of ration riots recently took place across the state, particularly in Bankura. The ruling party has blamed the extreme Left, as in Nandigram, by pointing to arson as a tool to cause these riots. What have you to say?
Well, the public distribution system is in a shambles in many parts of the country. In West Bengal, the nexus between corrupt PDS dealers and panchayat officials is presided over by the CPI-M. They have consolidated this nexus for the last thirty years and rural people have been exploited. Now they are blaming the extreme Left for everything.
The ruling Left Front has forgotten the language of protest. Such a language of protest could be traced right through the 1857 Uprising, Chauri Chaura episode of Gandhi days; Jayaprakash Narayan was leading the freedom movement in 1942 when rail lines were uprooted. This is the language of the people when they are angry. They (Left Front) are deceiving themselves and do not recognise the reality.

How about the situation in Siwan now that Shahabuddin is in jail. It is an area where your party has a strong base?
People in Siwan are yearning for the end of Shahbuddin’s terror. CPI-ML’s protracted struggle has been a factor in cornering Shahabuddin. Our comrades, our party have played a role. He is down but not out yet. Among the Muslim community, there was a contrived sense of polarisation, but now within that community also we find our role being taken in the right perspective and we strike a stronger chord with the Muslims now.

What is the situation in Bhojpur? It gave your party’s first MP? For many, it has been Naxalbari manifesting itself in the sprawling Ikwari village in the district.
We have managed to consolidate our strength. It is clear to everybody. It has taken many years. Jawala Singh (a feudal lord of yesteryears in the area) and Ranbir Sena are not in the scene now.
Our party enjoys a lot of respect. The attrition and confrontation with the Ranbir Sena has taken a lot of our energy. We have to expand, for there are areas where we have a slim presence. We have overcome the challenge and are now reaching out to all sections.
A significant activity was the celebrations of the 1857 event in Bhojpur. We organised a programme in the name of Kuer Singh (an Uprising hero). We freed Kuer from getting a caste tag as there was an attempt to bind his legacy to a caste. We projected Kuer’s revolt in a different light. This has been an eye opener. There are positive signs and the party has been able to broaden its base.

Alipurduar is not far from Naxalbari. Did you visit Naxalbari?
With the advent of the Naxalbari movement, all the walls of Alipurduar had been painted red with maps of India bearing slogans like “Turn the seventies into the decade of liberation”. It had triggered my curiosity as to why liberate the country again. The first dead body I saw in my life was that of a young comrade, a martyr.

The All India Students Association, CPI(ML) Liberation’s students wing, has emerged on top in the recent JNU elections. How do you see it?
Basically the revival was on account of AISA’s activities on the campus. AISA took up the cause of workers of the university.
The CPI-M’s activities in West Bengal have angered the students. It is for the first time that the SFI, the students wing of the CPI-M, has not won a single seat in the JNU since 1989 when Army tanks rolled down Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. Nandigram has proved to be the CPI-M’s Tiananmen Square.

How do you view the developments in Nepal with Maoists getting power in the government?
We do not formally have any party-to-party relationship with the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist). They have certainly shown better political maturity than the self-styled Indian Maoists and Marxists. They have combined people’s war and the mass upsurge well. Now, the difficult part of the journey has begun. Sitting in India, we can wish them well.
The establishment of Nepal as a Republic and the restoration of democracy without any foreign intervention would be an achievement there.

(The interviewer is a Special Representative, The Statesman, New Delhi.)

Interview with Arundhati Roy (26March, 2007)

http://sanhati.com/articles/159/

There is an atmosphere of growing violence across the country. How do you read the signs? Do you think it will grow more in the days to come? What are its causes? In what context should all this be read?

You don’t have to be a genius to read the signs. We have a growing middle class, being reared on a diet of radical consumerism and aggressive greed. Unlike industrializing western countries which had colonies from which to plunder resources and generate slave labour to feed this process, we have to colonize ourselves, our own nether parts. We’ve begun to eat our own limbs. The greed that is being generated (and marketed as a value interchangeable with nationalism) can only be sated by grabbing land, water and resources from the vulnerable. What we’re witnessing is the most successful secessionist struggle ever waged in Independent India. The secession of the middle and upper classes from the rest of the country. It’s a vertical secession, not a lateral one. They’re fighting for the right to merge with the world’s elite somewhere up there in the stratosphere. They’ve managed to commandeer the resources , the coal, the minerals, the bauxite, the water and electricity. Now they want the land to make more cars, more bombs, more mines – super toys for the new super citizens of the new superpower. So it’s outright war, and people on both sides are choosing their weapons. The government and the corporations reach for Structural Adjustment, the World Bank, the ADB, FDI, friendly court orders, friendly policy makers, help from the ‘friendly’ corporate media and a police force that will ram all this down peoples’ throats. Those who want to resist this process have, until now, reached for dharnas, hunger-strikes, satyagraha, the courts, and what they thought was friendly media. But now, more and more are reaching for guns. Will the violence grow? If the ‘growth rate’ and the sensex are going to be the only barometres the government uses to measure progress and the well-being of people, then of course it will. How do I read the signs? It isn’t hard to read sky-writing. What it says up there, in big letters is this: The shit has hit the fan, folks.

You once remarked that though you may not resort to violence yourself, you think it has become immoral to condemn it, given the circumstances in the country. Can you elaborate on this view?

I’d be a liability as a guerilla! I doubt I used the word ‘immoral’-morality is an elusive business, as changeable as the weather. What I feel is this: Non-violent movements have, for decades knocked on the door of every democratic institution in this country and have been spurned and humiliated. Look at the Bhopal Gas victims, the Narmada Bachao Andolan. The NBA for example, had a lot going for it, high profile leadership, media coverage, more resources than any other mass movement. What went wrong? People are bound to want to re-think strategy. When Sonia Gandhi begins to promote Satyagraha at the World Economic Forum in Davos it’s time for us to sit up and think. For example, is mass civil disobedience possible within the structure of a democratic nation-state? Is it possible in the age of disinformation and corporate-controlled mass media? Are hunger-strikes umblically linked to celebrity politics? Would anybody care if the people of Nangla Machhi or Bhatti mines went on a hunger-strike? Sharmila Irom has been on a hunger strike for six years. That should be a salutary lesson to many of us. I’ve always felt that it’s ironic that hunger-strikes are used as a political weapon in a land where most people go hungry anyway. We are in a different time and place now. Up against a different, more complex adversary. We’ve entered the era of NGOs – or should I say the era of palthu shers - in which mass action can be a treacherous business. We have demonstrations which are funded, we have sponsored dharnas and social forums which posture militantly but never follow up on what they preach. We have all kinds of ‘virtual’ resistance. Meetings against SEZs sponsored by the biggest promoters of SEZs. Awards and grants for environmental activism and community action given by corporations responsible for devastating whole ecosystems. Vedanta, a company mining bauxite in the forests of Orissa wants to start a university. The Tatas have two charitable trusts that directly and indirectly, fund activists and mass movements across the country. Could that be why Singur has drawn so much less flak than Nandigram, and why they have not targeted, boycotted, gheraoed? Of course the Tatas and Birlas funded Gandhi too – maybe he was our first NGO. But now we have NGOs who make a lot of noise, write a lot of reports,but who the sarkar is more than comfortable with. How do we make sense of all this? The place is crawling with professional diffusers of real political action. ‘Virtual resistance’ has become something of a liability.

There was a time when mass movements looked to the courts for justice. The courts have rained down a series of judgments that are so unjust, so insulting to the poor in the language they use, they take your breath away. A recent Supreme Court judgment allowing the Vasant Kunj Mall to resume construction though it didn’t have the requisite clearances said in so many words, that the question of Corporations indulging in malpractice does not arise! In the era of corporate globalization, corporate land-grab, in the era of Enron and Monsanto, Halliburton and Bechtel, that’s a loaded thing to say. It exposes the ideological heart of the most powerful institution in this country. The judiciary along with the corporate press, is now seen as the lynchpin of the neo-liberal project.

In a climate like this when people feel that they are being worn down, exhausted by these interminable ‘democratic’ processes, only to be humiliated eventually, what are they supposed to do? Of course it isn’t as though the only options are binary – violence versus non-violence. There are political parties that believe in armed struggle, but only as one part of their overall political strategy. Political workers in these struggles have been dealt with brutally, killed, beaten, imprisoned under false charges. People are fully aware that to take to arms is to call down upon yourself the myriad forms of violence of the Indian State. The minute armed struggle becomes a strategy, your whole world shrinks and the colors fade to black and white. But when people decide to take that step because every other option has ended in despair–should we condemn them? Does anyone believe that if the people of Nandigram had held a Dharna and sung songs the West Bengal Government would have backed down? We are living in times, when to be ineffective is to support the status quo (which no doubt suits some of us). And being effective comes at a terrible price. I find it hard to condemn people who are prepared to pay that price.

You have been traveling a lot on the ground — can you give us a sense of the fissures you are seeing on the ground. What are the trouble spots you have been to? Can you outline a few of the combat lines in these places?

Huge question – what can I say? The military occupation of Kashmir, neo-facism in Gujarat, civil war in Chhattisgarh, MNCs raping Orissa, the submergence of hundreds of villages in the Narmada Valley, people living on the edge of absolute starvation, the devastation of forest land, the Bhopal victims living to see the West Bengal government re-wooing Union Carbide – now calling itself Dow Chemicals - in Nandigram. I haven’t been recently to Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Maharshtra, but we know about the almost hundred thousand farmers who have killed themselves. We know about the fake encounters and the terrible repression in Andhra Pradesh. Each of these places is has its own particular history, economy, ecology. None is amenable to easy analysis. And yet there is connecting tissue, there are huge international cultural and economic pressures being brought to bear on them. How can I not mention the Hindutva project, spreading its poison sub-cutaneously, waiting to errupt once again. I’d say the biggest indictment of all is that we are still a country, a culture a society which continues to nurture and practice the notion of untouchability. While our economists number-crunch and boast about the growth rate, a million people, human scavengers - earn their living carrying several kilos of other peoples’ shit on their heads every day. And if they didn’t carry shit on their heads they would starve to death. Some fucking superpower this.

How does one view the recent State and police violence in Bengal?

No different from police and State violence anywhere else – including the issue of hypocrisy and doublespeak so perfected by all political parties including the mainstream Left. Are communist bullets different from capitalist ones? Odd things are happening. It snowed in Saudi Arabia. Owls are out in broad daylight The Chinese Government tabled a bill sanctioning the right to private property. I don’t know if all of this has to do with climate change. The Chinese Communists are turning out to be the biggest capitalists of the 21st century. Why should we expect our own Parliamentary Left to be any different? Nandigram and Singur are clear signals. It makes you wonder – is the last stop of every revolution advanced capitalism? Think about it - the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution, the Chinese Revolution, the Vietnam War, the Anti- Apartheid struggle, the supposedly Gandhian Freedom struggle in India…what’s the last station they all pull in at? Is this the end of imagination?

The Maoist attack in Bijapur — the death of 55 policemen. Are the rebels only a flip face of the State?

How can the rebels be the flip side of the state? Would anybody say that those who fought against Apartheid – however brutal their methods - were the flip side of the state? What about those who fought the French in Algeria? Or those who fought the Nazis? Or those who fought Colonial Regimes? Or those who are fighting the US occupation of Iraq? Are they the flip side of the State? This facile new report-driven ‘human rights’ discourse, this meaningless condemnation game that we all are forced to play, makes politicians of us all and leaches the real politics out of everything. However pristine we would like to be, however hard we polish our halos, the tragedy is that we have run out of pristine choices. There is a civil war in Chattisgarh sponsored, created by the Chattisgarh Government which is publicly pursing the Bush doctrine – if you’re not with us, you are with the terrorists. The lynch pin of this war, apart from the formal security forces, is the Salwa Judum – a government backed militia of ordinary people forced to take up arms, forced to become SPOs (Special Police Officers). The Indian State has tried this in Kashmir, in Manipur, in Nagaland. Tens of thousands have been killed, hundreds of thousands tortured, thousands have disappeared. Any Banana Republic would be proud of this record.. Now the government wants to import these failed strategies into the heartland. Thousands of Adivasis have been forcibly moved off their mineral –rich lands into police camps. Hundreds of villages have been forcibly evacuated. Those lands, rich in iron-ore are being eyed by corporations like the Tatas and Essar. MOUs have been signed, but no one knows what they say. Land Acquisition has begun. This kind of thing happened in countries like Colombia – one of the most devastated countries in the world. While everybody’s eyes are fixed on the spiraling violence between government backed militias and guerilla squads, multinational corporations quietly make off with the mineral wealth. That’s the little piece of theatre being scripted for us in Chattisgarh.

Of course it’s horrible that 55 policemen were killed. But they’re as much the victims of Government policy as anybody else. For the Government and the Corporations they’re just cannon fodder – there’s plenty more where they came from. Crocodile tears will be shed, prim TV anchors will hector us for a while and then more supplies of fodder will be arranged. For the Maoist guerillas the police and SPOs they killed were the armed personnel of the Indian State, the main, perpetrators of repression, torture, custodial killings, false encounters. The ones whose professional duties involve burning villages and raping women. They’re not innocent civilians – if such a thing exists - by any stretch of imagination.

I have no doubt that the Maoists can be agents of terror and coercion too. I have no doubt they have committed unspeakable atrocities. I have no doubt they cannot lay claim to undisputed support from local people – but who can? Still, no guerrilla army can survive without local support. That’s a logistical impossibility. And the support for Maoists is growing, not diminishing. That says something. People have no choice but to align themselves on the side of whoever they think is less worse.

But to equate a resistance movement fighting against enormous injustice, with the Government which enforces that injustice is absurd. The government has slammed the door in the face of every attempt at non-violent resistance. When people take to arms, there is going to be all kinds of violence – revolutionary, lumpen and outright criminal. The government is responsible for the monstrous situations it creates.

The term Naxals and Maoists and outsiders is being used very loosely these days. Can you declutter it.

‘Outsiders’ is a generic accusation used in the early stages of repression by governments who have begun to believe their own publicity and can’t imagine that people have risen up against them. That’s the stage the CPI (M) is at now in Bengal, though some would say repression in Bengal is not new, it has only moved into higher gear.. In any case what’s an outsider? Who decides the borders? Are they village boundaries? Tehsil? Block? District? State? Is narrow regional and ethnic politics the new communist mantra? About Naxals and Maoists – well… India is about to become a police state in which everybody who disagrees with what’s going on risks being called a terrorist. Islamic terrorists have to be Islamic – so that’s not good enough to cover most of us. They need a bigger catchment area. So leaving the definition loose, undefined, is effective strategy, because the time is not far off when we’ll all be called Maoists or Naxalites, terrorists or terrorist sympathisers and shut down, by people who don’t really know – or care -who Maoists or Naxalites are. In villages of course that has begun – thousands of people are being held in jails across the country, loosely charged with being terrorists trying to overthrow the state. Who are the real Naxalites and Maoists? I’m not an authority on the subject, but here’s a very rudimentary potted history.

The Communist Party of India the CPI was formed in 1925. The CPI (M) Communist Party Marxist- split from the CPI in 1964 and formed a separate party. Both of course were parliamentary political parties. In 1967 the CPI (M) along with a splinter group of the Congress, came to power in West Bengal. At the time there was massive unrest among starving peasantry in the countryside. Local leaders of the CPI(M) – Kanu Sanyal and Charu Mazumdar led a peasant uprising in the district of Naxalbari which is where the term Naxalites comes from. In 1969 the government fell and the Congress came back to power under Siddharta Shankar Ray. The naxalite uprising was mercilessly crushed - Mahashweta Devi has written powerfully about this time. In 1969 the CPI (ML) – Marxist Leninist split from the CPI (M). A few years later around 1971, the CPI (ML) devolved into several parties: the CPI -ML (Liberation) largely centred in Bihar, CPI –ML (New Democracy) functioning for the most part out of Andhra Pradesh and Bihar, the CPI-ML (Class Struggle) mainly in Bengal. These parties have been generically baptized ‘Naxalites.’ They see themselves as Marxist Leninist, not strictly speaking Maoist. They believe in elections, mass action and, when, absolutely pushed to the wall or attacked- armed struggle. The MCC – the Maoist Communist Centre at the time mostly operating in Bihar was formed in 1968. The PW Peoples War, operational for the most part in Andhra Pradesh was formed in 1980. Recently, in 2004 the MCC and the PW merged to form the CPI (Maoist) They believe in outright armed struggle and the overthrowing of the state. They don’t participate in elections. This is the party that is fighting the guerilla war in Bihar, Andhra Pradesh, Chattisgarh and Jharkhand.

The Indian state and media largely view the Maoists as “internal security” threat. Is this the way to look at them?

I’m sure the Maoists would be flattered to be viewed in this way.

The Maoists want to bring down the State. Given the autocratic ideology they take their inspiration from, what alternative would they set up? Wouldn’t their regime be an exploitative autocratic violent one as well? Isn’t their action already exploitative of ordinary people? Do they really have the support of ordinary people?

I think it’s important for us to acknowledge that both Mao and Stalin are dubious heroes with murderous pasts. Tens of millions of people were killed under their regimes. Apart from what happened in China and the Soviet Union, Pol Pot, with the support of the Chinese communist party (while the West looked away discreetly) wiped out two million people in Cambodia and brought millions of people to the brink of extinction from disease and starvation. Can we pretend that China’s cultural revolution didn’t happen? Or that that millions of people in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe were not victims of labour camps, torture chambers, the network of spies and informers, the secret police. The history of these regimes is just as dark as the history of Western Imperialism, except for the fact that they had a shorter life-span. We cannot condemn the occupation of Iraq, Palestine and Kashmir while we remain silent about Tibet and Chechnya. I would imagine that for the Maoists, the Naxalites as well as the mainstream Left, being honest about the past is important to strengthen peoples’ faith in the future. One hopes the past will not be repeated, but denying that it ever happened doesn’t help inspire confidence….Nevertheless, in this part of the world, the Maoists in Nepal have waged a brave and successful struggle against the monarchy in Nepal. Right now in India the Maoists and the various Marxist Leninist Groups are leading the fight against immense injustice in India. They are fighting not just the State, but feudal landlords and their armed militias. They are the only people who are making a dent. And I admire that. It may well be that when they come to power they will as you say, be brutal, unjust and autocratic, even worse than the present government. Maybe, but I’m not prepared to assume that in advance. If they are, we’ll have to fight them too. And most likely someone like myself will be the first person they’ll string up from the nearest tree – but right now, it is important to acknowledge that they are bearing the brunt of being at the forefront of resistance. Many of us are in a position where we have are beginning to align ourselves on the side of those who we know have no place for us in their religious or ideological imagination. It’s true that everybody changes radically when they come to power – look at Mandela’s ANC. Corrupt, capitalist, bowing to the IMF, driving the poor out of their homes – honouring Suharto the killer of hundreds of thousands of Indonesian communists with South Africa’s highest civilian award. Who would have thought it could happen? But does this mean South Africans should have backed away from the struggle against apartheid? Or that they should regret it now? Does it mean Algeria should have remained a French Colony, that Kashmiris, Iraqis and Palestinians should accept military occupation? That people whose dignity is being assaulted should give up the fight because they can’t find saints to lead them into battle?

Is there a communication breakdown in our society?

Yes.