STATEMENT on arrest of Dr. Nisha Biswas and other civil rights activists in Lalgarh

We, the undersigned organizations and individuals, are shocked by the arrest on 14th June of Dr Nisha Biswas, Scientist - Central Glass & Ceramic Research Institute Kolkata, Manik Mandal, writer, Kanishka Choudhary, school teacher, and ten other persons by the W Bengal police from Lalgarh area, where they had gone at the request of the local people to investigate human rights violations by police and paramilitary. At the time of their arrest they were charged with violation of Sec 144 (anticipated major public nuisance or damage to public tranquility), a bailable offence. However, when produced in court on 16th June they were charged with several false cases, such as waging war against the state, criminal conspiracy, and unlawful assembly, and remanded to 14 days jail custody. On 25th June, a bail hearing requesting her transfer to police custody- on the spurious evidence of an alleged photograph in her camera- was rejected by the court and her bail hearing is due on 6th July.
We believe that this is not an isolated incident, but part of the repression and reign of terror let loose by the central and state governments over the past few years in the tribal parts of central India to crush dissent, and the accompanying attempts to delegitimize and criminalize all dissent and opposition to its policies.
On one hand, the state has launched an armed offensive in the forested tribal areas of Chhattisgarh, Orissa and West Bengal, in the name of countering the `Maoist menace’, to actually destroy the numerous resistance movements against forced acquisition of their land for mining and big industry, against displacement from their land and homes and loss of their livelihoods. This has been accompanied by the increasing use of extra-judicial killings and arbitrary arrests of villagers and leaders, and extra-legal measures that curb ordinary freedom of expression. Lalgarh area of W Bengal has been a site of intense police repression for more than a year now and under Section 144 for as much period. Civil society persons have not been allowed to visit the area and attempts to do so have been met with detentions and arrest. In Chhattisgarh there has been use of the draconian CSPSA to stifle opposition and of non-state actors like Salwa Judum that terrorises and kills villagers, destroys their homes, perpetrates sexual violence against women, and forces them into camps, or to desert their home and hearths and flee to neighbouring states.
On the other, the state has been suppressing in several ways efforts of civil liberties/democratic rights activists to expose the lawlessness and brutalities being committed in these areas by the security forces and to inquire into issues of violation of people’s rights in the process of `development’ of these areas. These tribal areas have been rendered out of bounds for people from outside the area, in violation of all Constitutional provisions regarding freedom of movement and of expression. Any person or group of persons visiting these areas, or talking about or writing about the situation there, or raising questions about the deployment of paramilitary forces in such large numbers is harassed, intimidated, or arrested and labeled as `Maoists’ or `Maoist sympathizers’, thus criminalizing all such democratic rights activities. Starting with Dr. Binayak Sen in Chhattisgarh, a large number of civil liberties activists across the country have been illegally arrested and implicated under false charges of `waging war against the state’ and accused as `Maoists’. Just over the past three months 14 people - trade unionists, forest rights activists and ordinary people - from Gujarat have been arrested under an omnibus FIR.
The recent arrest of Nisha Biswas and others, and the shrill tirade against writer Arundhati Roy, are part of this trend of targeting civil and political rights activists and urban intellectuals, and discrediting them for raising questions, for sincerely carrying out their democratic responsibility of drawing attention to violation of Constitutional and legal safeguards.
We are also deeply concerned by the extreme intolerance being displayed by the state and sections of urban society towards Arundhati Roy for her views on development, displacement, on the situation of the tribals, the violation of their Constitutional rights, and the military offensive of the state. Freedom of expression and vigorous discussion and debate are indispensable for a true democracy. Instead of carrying forward an informed debate on the issues raised by her, attempts are being made to stifle her voice by vicious abuse, public threats of arrest and much more. It is very disturbing that sections of the media too have been (ir)responsible and complicit in this matter, by false reporting of Ms Roy’s statements to suit their requirements. We also take this opportunity to condemn the statement reportedly made by a BJP leader of Chhattisgarh that Ms Roy 'should be publicly shot down'. That such public incitements to kill a person are ignored by the state machinery exposes the extent of double standards and hypocrisy that characterize our political institutions and leaders. Such intolerance to Ms Roy’s writings and speeches not only makes a mockery of the claims of this country to being a `great democracy’ that grants immense freedom of expression to its citizens, it also poses a grave threat to the spirit of critical public discussion and debate warranted on crucial issues such as development and marginalization.
We are also extremely disturbed and anguished by the reports of rape and other forms of sexual violence by the security forces and Salwa Judum against innocent village women in Chhattisgarh as `punishment’ for alleged support to `maoists’. We ask of the political leadership - in this `war against the Maoists’, for that matter in any place whether it be in Kashmir or the north-east, why are women systematically targetted for sexual violence by the security forces? As already stated above, any attempts to bring this to light and extend assistance are also prevented by intimidation of the affected women. By not taking any action ever against the perpetrators the entire state machinery is accessory to these gruesome acts.

In this situation, we demand:
1. The immediate release of Dr. Nisha Biswas and others arrested along with her.
2. The witch-hunt against Ms Roy be ended.
3. Strict measures be taken against the security forces to put an end to the sexual violence being perpetrated by them against women.
4. We once again demand immediate withdrawal of the armed offensive against the tribal population. Instead, as expected of a democratic government, the government should move towards addressing politically the long-standing grievances of the tribal population, which have been explicitly pointed out and discussed by the government’s own report.

We strongly urge all other democratic minded women’s groups and organizations to join us in this urgent appeal to the Indian government and the respective state governments.

25 June 2010

Women Against Rape and Repression (WARR)


Women Against Rape and Repression (WARR) is a network of individuals and women’s and human rights organizations from across India. It is a non-funded effort initiated by women, and is concerned with atrocities and repression against women by state and non-state actors, especially in conflict zones.
Those who would like to endorse this statement, in their organisational or individual capacity, please revert by 28/06/2010, at which point we will forward the statement to various officials in the government/s.

Endorsed by:
AIPWA (Delhi)
Anhad (Delhi),
CAVOW-India,
Chhattisgarh Mahila Adhikar Manch,
Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan (Madhya Pradesh),
Madhya Pradesh Mahila Manch,
PUCL-India,
Saheli (Delhi),
Vidyarthi Yuvjan Sabha
WinG-India,

Individuals:
Indira Chakravarthi,
Dr. Uma Chakravarthi
Uma V. Chandru
Dr. Leena Ganesh
Kamayani Bali-Mahabal
Priti Turakhia
Ranjana Padhi

Scientist arrested in Midnapore: a story somewhat different from the one you have been reading so far

By Parni Ray

Nisha Biswas, 56, a family friend and a senior scientist at the Central Glass and Ceramics Research Institute was detained by the West Midnapore police in Lalgarh on the 15th of June, 2010. She has been charged with a long list of cases, most of which fall under the larger bracket of the now ubiquitously used Section 120 of the Indian Penal Code (criminal conspiracy against the state).

Biswas, a moderately fresh face in the slowly burgeoning team of Human Rights activists working in Lalgarh, has been working with the locals of the area for almost 2 years now. This, obviously, was not her first visit to the turbulent area, where section 144 still rages on.

On the 15th of June on her way to Lalgarh on yet another field survey Biswas was accompanied by at least 5 other people, Kaniska Chowdhury (a professor in Behala college), Manik Mondal (human rights activist), two unidentified reporters from CNN-IBN and a journalist from Hindustan Times. Following their arrest, the three journos were let of immediately after a quick clarification of their identities while Biswas, Mandal and Chowdhury were placed in judicial custody.

Alarmingly none of the detailed accounts presented by CNN-IBN of the incident (and there were quite a few see http://ibnlive.in.com/news/13-maoist-sympathisers-arrested-from-lalgarh/124675-3.html?from=rhs) even care to mention that their own correspondents entered Lalgarh with this band of 'naxal sympathisers' as allies.

Biswas and her associates face the risk of a life imprisonment, or so says the ever so reliable TELEGRAPH. This on the basis of the notebook, pen, digital camera and the meagre 4,500 rupees seized from them, a seizure list of which is yet to be released. This on the basis of the 18 months of 'intelligence reports' acquired by the Kolkata Police by tapping and recording her various phone conversations. Her (and her associates) specific offense in Lalgarh, police claim has been to

a) have attended a kangaroo court held by the villagers (of which there is no proof)

b) to have corresponded with Maoists on a regular basis and have brought along funds for their operation, the 4,500 rupees, Midnapore police claim, was for this purpose alone. Police claim Biswas and the others were picked up while trying to meet Maoist leaders in Lalgarh and while in talks with members of Chhatrodhar Mahato's PCPA.

c) to have instigated the villagers with (but of course) anti-national thoughts and attempted to (but of course) wage war against the state.

Biswas has been specifically targeted by the media especially due to her occupation as a 'Scientist', which, as a tag tends to inspire great alarm when paired in relation with 'terrorist' outfits. It is a trifle funny how the media implicitly means to suggest that the only reason a scientist may come into contact with a political association is to help them make explosives! As if all sorts of scientists, irrespective of what their specialization, what their field are equipped to soup up bombs, as if bombs ARE what scientists make!
The media doesn't however stop at introducing this rather ludicrous subtext between the lines, it continues on its path of hilarity in a direction which is particularly enraging. After the prerequisite questioning of the disapproving neighbours, the angry colleagues,the reportage swoops, vulture like, on predictably double-edged phrases. 'She was always aloof', 'she had a fight with a colleague'. Taken out of context and subjected to the tried and tested journalistic methods of 'cut' and 'paste' these damp-as- salt-in-July sentences lend a whole new hue to both, the piece being rendered and the individual being described. It's a particularly horrifying method of social profiling. I tremble with fear at the thought of what my classmates from college or my co-learners at swimming class or my neighbour who I have never met or the lady who comes to take our rubbish in the morning or even that girl I once brawled with in school might tell journalists if they came enquiring after me!

There are a number of reasons why I am writing this post. For one, I am angry. And yes there is no point in denying the urban smugness which has lent a particularly sharper edge to my anger simply because this is happening to a woman I have had dinners and shared a smoke with. But surely there are other reasons as well. One of them, the most important of them, is to further share with you the sham of a media we have already recognized as a puppet in the hands of the state, equally corrupt, equally dictated by corporate demands and in one word, blind. But most importantly I write this so that YOU know, and tell others and tell the OTHERS to tell others so that soon, when one of us decides to do something about this, this particular 'this', or some other 'this', or THIS in general we all know who to stand by and perhaps, what to do.

Spread the word.

see for more
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100617/jsp/bengal/story_12574789.jsp
http://redbarricade.blogspot.com/2010/06/three-intellectuals-and-their-arrest-in.html
http://www.myjamshedpur.com/news/scientist-prof-city-trio-arrested-lalgarh
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/13-maoist-sympathisers-arrested-from-lalgarh/124675-3.html?from=rhs

Press Notes by PUDR and Sanhati

http://sanhati.com/articles/2491/
http://sanhati.com/articles/2494/

Fact Finding Report of Narayanpatna Firing on Chasi Mulia Adivasi Sangha

http://sanhati.com/articles/1941/

As this report gets written Singanna and Andru’s bodies are being cremated at Podapadar village amidst a throng of police platoons waiting to arrest any member of Chasi Mulia Adivasi Sangha (CMAS) who exposes herself or himself to the police. Already 20 have been arrested and there is evident fear of many more hundreds being detained or arrested. The total clamp down on participation of the media, activists, leaders and any sympathizer of CMAS is not only condemnable but totally unjustified. The district has been turned into a hunting ground of tribals and there is fear written all over the faces of tribals in this remote block of Koraput district. A small team of three members made a two-day visit to Narayanpatna to ascertain the situation and understand the truth behind the firing incident which killed two tribals.

Blocked roads, long walks up and down winding hill paths and petrified tribals afraid to open their mouths to any unknown persons were the memories etched in the team members’ minds. But what left the members shocked during their visit on 21st and 22nd November 2009 was that democracy had fallen to its worst during those three days after the firing and murder of two tribals.

There is much to be asked about the firing but the question foremost on our mind is – who ordered the firing? did the police take the permission of a magistrate before setting off their guns and why was tear gas and other non-fatal measures not used to disperse a crowd which police thought might create a law and order situation? the time gap between the protest gathering and the firing is just about 30 minutes? but police say they requested and warned and then opened fire? all these things happened in 30 minutes? sounds a little preposterous and forces one to wonder whether it was cold blooded murder or a freak incident or a well-planned strategic elimination of a leader who held sway over a large number of fearless and empowered tribal cadres of CMAS.

As the days pass rising police brutalities destroy brick by brick the euphoric notions of ‘democracy’ so carefully packaged and sold to people of India by a political class sold out to corporate greed. Every night and every dawn brings shivers to the tribals as they await an assault on their hamlet, whether on the hill top or on the plains or deep in the jungles, by the marauding security forces. No one knows from which end and at what time under cover of darkness these cobras and scorpions will attack their village, break open their doors, kick them out of their homes and beat the blues out of them. The CMAS has been persistently branded a frontal organization of the CPI (Maoist) despite their vehement rebuttal and lack of any evidence to show their Maoist connections.

Facts and observations stated in this report are based on information and statements collected during interviews with Narayanpatna residents who were witness to the firing, local mediapersons and villagers of Kumbhari and Narayanpatna Panchayats.

Fact Finding Team Members -

1. K Sudhakar Patnaik – Senior Journalist
2. Manoranjan Routray – Journalist
3. Sharanya – HumAnE, Koraput

The Facts of 20th November 2009

• About 200 CMAS members including 100 women came to Narayanpatna Police Station to protest against harassment of tribals in particular women during the previous days’ combing operations by security forces. They reached the police station at around 2 pm and since the two gates of the police station were closed they called on the OIC to come out for a discussion. The police refused to let them in and began verbally abusing tribals who had assembled at the gate.

• When the police did not respond to their repeated requests to let a team of tribals into the police station for discussion on their complaints with the OIC, CMAS leader Kumudini Behera and CMAS President Kendruka Singanna broke open the lock of the small side gate of the police compound with an axe. As the gate opened 5-6 main leaders of CMAS including Singanna and Kumudini went to meet OIC Gouranga Charan Sahu. During a heated exchange between the OIC and Singanna, the OIC began to shout that he was being attacked by CMAS leaders and he ordered the IRB guards on the roof of the police station to open fire on the crowd gathered outside. The police fired three shots in air and then began to indiscriminately fire at the crowd standing outside the police compound. The firing was done by the IRB as well as CRPF and Cobra at 2.45 pm. The firing continued for half an hour and 300 bullets were fired at people.

• Hearing the sound of firing Singanna and others came out of the police station. Singanna was hit in the chest while he was walking out of the police compound. He received ten bullets in his chest and fell in front of the small police gate. Another CMAS member Andru Nachika of Bhaliaput village received bullet injuries and fell face down outside the police compound. Their bodies were left there by CMAS members who ran helter-skelter as the police began firing at them. Around 300 bullets were fired at the people. In this firing, while two have died it is being estimated that around 60 more persons have been injured and some are in a serious condition.

• Singanna is survived by his wife who is also pregnant, three sons and a daughter. Andru is survived by his wife who is also pregnant and two children.

The Reason for CMAS Protest

• During a fact finding visit on 22nd November 2009, all CMAS members and villagers interviewed stated that they had gone to the Police Station to lodge their protest against police harassment of tribals and in particular women who were being harassed by the security forces.

• One of the main reasons for CMAS members’ protest was that they wanted an answer from the OIC regarding violation of an assurance made to the tribals earlier. The CMAS members stated that about two months back they had held a protest rally regarding harassment of tribals in the name of combing and deployment of security forces in their villages. Following the rally, the OIC had given a written assurance to CMAS leaders that forces would not enter their villages and harass the tribals. They would conduct combing operations without harassing the locals. But the CMAS members stated that the police had violated this assurance and hence they came to ask the police the reason for this gross violation which was a serious breach of trust.

• Of particular importance is people’s statement that the security forces categorically told them during combing operations on 18th and 19th November that they should leave their villages immediately or else they would have to face dire consequences. They even told them that the non-tribals whose lands CMAS had ‘grabbed’ (sic!) would come back soon to claim their lands !

• Combing operations and related harassment of 18th and 29th November was reported from Odiapentha, Dandabeda, Palaput, Dubaguda and Badhraguda villages.

• Apart from warning them, they did not allow the women and men to continue their harvesting work. Some said that they even took away their harvested paddy and mandia crops. The tribals explained to us that this season is the most important time for them because they are engaged in harvesting, husking and storing of their foodgrains. Hence such combing operations and threats to people would destroy their harvesting operations and affect their food security.

• When the tribals related this to their CMAS leaders, the latter decided to go to the police station to demand an explanation for this warning and also protest the harassment. The CMAS leaders sent cadres to different villages and assembled the members and took a decision to hold a peaceful march to the police station to make their protest and put their demands before police.

• About 50 tribals whom we interviewed and most of who had attended the march to the police station, categorically stated that they did not carry any firearms and that they carried a few axes and thick bamboo sticks. None carried any bow and arrow because they explained to us that on previous occasions their bows and arrows had led the media to brand them as Maoists. So they said that they had consciously not carried any bows and arrows or local swords.

Situation of 22nd November 2009

• As of today, it is difficult to ascertain the exact number of persons injured as CMAS members have returned to their villages and have not been able to meet or communicate with each other about the actual injuries to their members. Medical aid to these persons is not available as the injured are afraid to come to Narayanpatna Primary Health Centre (PHC) for medical treatment for fear of being arrested. They are taking treatment from their traditional tribal healers (disaris). Doctors are also reluctant to go to the villages for treating any patients for fear of abuse by the police and security forces. Local Anganwadis and ASHA workers are unable to teat the injured as they do not have the necessary medicines, spirit and cotton to clean and dress the wounds.

• Far flung villages and constant combing by the security forces is also making it difficult for the leaders to move to different villages to ascertain how many have been injured and what is their condition. Most leaders are in hiding as there is a reported shoot-at-sight order against them.

• On 22nd November early morning there was a combing operation by security forces and seven persons were arrested from their homes between 5 to 6 am. Apart from this, forces forcefully broke into homes and searched for ‘red flags’ (whatever that might signify as evidence!?). They abused people, in particular the women, kicked and beat young boys with thick bamboo sticks who did not answer questions. They seized axes, sickles, knives, bows and arrows and bamboo sticks from every house they entered and told the tribals that these are ‘dangerous weapons of murder’ and that they would be arrested if they were found in their homes next time. The tribals asked us, “these are our agricultural implements and daily household needs so how can we not keep them at home? How will we get fuelwood, cut vegetables, harvest paddy and cut branches to feed our animals? Where should we hide them and why should we do that when we never use these as weapons of murder as accused by the police?” We had no answers ….

• Four CMAS members from Narayanpatna and three persons from Palaput, 1 km away from Narayanpatna. The details of persons arrested are : 1. Raju Huika – Narayanpatna Kandha Sahi, 2. Dora Nachika – Narayanpatna Kandha Sahi, 3. Masi Sirka – Narayanpatna Kandha Sahi, 4. Ramesh Khosla – Narayanpatna Ghasi Sahi, 5. Kumudini Dora - Palaput Tala Sahi, 6. Debendra Behera - Palaput Tala Sahi 7. Satyanarayan Bangu - Palaput Tala Sahi (his commander was seized)

• These seven persons have been taken into police custody on 22nd November and will have to be produced before Judicial Magistrate at Laxmipur within 24 hours. If this is not done then the police would be violating its own laws.

• Apart from this, the fact finding team also met three persons who have received bullet injuries. A boy of 18 years received two bullet injuries in his leg and in the same village another person has a bullet injury wherein the bullet is still lodged in his hip. Yet another person of that village has a bullet wound which whisked past his left calf and has left a slit which needs immediate stitches. Another older man of another village has received a bullet injury in his left hand. This person was marketing dry fish near the police station when he was hit. He had no idea about the rally and the reasons for it. He is also partially hearing impaired. Apart from this, the people the fact finding team spoke to said that about 60 others have also received bullet injuries and are hiding in the villages. None of these persons are able to get medical help.

• As the fact finding team wanted to give some medicines to the injured patients and went into Narayanpatna town for purchasing these at around 3 pm on 22nd November they were stopped by DSP Jagannath Rao and Semiliguda IIC Sarat Sahu along with some armed constabulary. After initial questions on where the team had gone and why and checking of vehicle, they asked the team to leave the town immediately or else they would have to detain the members. This warning came despite knowing the fact that two of the fact finding members were journalists.

Impact of Firing on People

• All people whom the fact finding team met in the last two days are under tremendous fear that the police would kill every tribal they set their sight on including all members of CMAS. There is fear in their eyes as they spoke to the fact finding team members. They asked, “what should we do when the police comes to our village?” When they were told not to run upon seeing the forces, they asked, “if we do not run then how can we save ourselves? they will definitely kill us”. The women stated that they heard forces warning them in low breath that if the CMAS male members did not hand themselves over to the police then they would rape the all the women to ‘teach them a lesson’. One old woman asked us, “what wrong have we done? We only asked for lands to cultivate and live a life of dignity and freedom from hunger?”

• People are afraid to move out of villages due to fear of arrest and are constantly discussing about what will happen to them after this. Every village we went to we found women and men assembled in their village meeting place discussing the impending dangers. They are afraid to stay in the jungles as the forces are patrolling the jungles as well. They say that if they stay in the jungles they will be hunted and killed and if they live in their villages then they will be hunted out into the jungles and then also killed. “So either ways we die”, tell the women.

• The leaders of CMAs have several questions : why did the police not use tear gars to disperse the tribals if they thought there was going to be a law and order situation? Why were rubber bullets not used? The firing took place within half and hour of the protest rally so how did the police state that they gave the people adequate opportunities to break the rally and disperse?

• The CMAS leaders also asked us, “when the police comes attacking us in our villages we do not retaliate and kill them? In fact we allow them to search us, our homes and even beat us up mercilessly? So why did police kill us when we came to their home to seek answers to simple questions?” They told us, “even if we had snatched the weapons we could not have fired because we do not know how to use them? So how did we become threats to the life of the OIC or the IRB guards standing on the rooftop?”

• They asked us to reflect on why would they, the tribals, want to attack the police in their own compound? And why would 200 tribals come to the police station to loot arms when the OIC did not even have a gun on him when they confronted him? They explained to us that the IRB guards stationed on the roof, who fired at the crowd, were beyond the reach of tribals and hence it is impossible that they were trying to snatch their weapons at the roof.

• A very pertinent question was asked to us by a few tribal youths at a meeting in a village of Kumbhari Panchayat. They told us that the Government wants tribals to keep peace and help the Government and use democratic means to state their complaints. But the CMAS members asked us, “why should we help Government when it has not even given us our basic survival needs like PDS, NREGS, schools and health? Government forced us to fight for our survival but killed us because we went to ask them a question? Is that so undemocratic? And what the police did to us, is that what you call democracy?”

• The fact finding team also observed that the local mediapersons have not been reporting the truth behind several facts of the firing incident and are tracking movement of other reporters and fact finding teams visiting the area. They are conveying this information to the local police. The team felt very strongly that local mediapersons were doing this with malafide intentions.

Open Letter to Noam Chomsky: Nirmalangshu Mukherjee

http://kafila.org/2009/10/21/open-letter-to-noam-chomsky-nirmalangshu-mukherjee/

Posted by Aditya Nigam

[We publish below an open letter to Noam Chomsky, written in the wake of his endorsement of a statement against 'Operation Green Hunt', issued recently by a large number of intellectuals in India and in the US. Nirmalangshu's letter is important because it raises some very serious questions that are being brushed under the carpet by sections of the radical intelligentsia. Unlike Nirmalangshu, I would not put 'radical' within scare quotes, since it is precisely this that highlights the immense tragedy of our times. Radical intellectuals - truly radical intellectuals - once again find themselves caught in this situation where in order to oppose state violence, they will wilfully turn a blind eye to the violence of armed nihilist gangs, simply because these claim to speak on behalf of the oppressed - a claim that Nirmalangshu's letter exposes in all its falsity. He lays bare how the politics that goes by the name of 'Maoism' (i.e. CPI-Maoist) believes in violently erasing all other voices of opposition to and criticism of the state, but that of itself. This brand of politics in fact lives in symbiosis with the state - delegitimizing all forms of mass democratic politics. At this moment one deeply misses the courageous voice of the late Balagopal - recently slightingly dubbed a 'liberal humanist' by a spokesperson of the Maoists, at a meeting meant to salute his memory. I cannot help recalling here the feeling of immense sadness many of us were overcome by, watching and hearing speakers at this meeting (in Delhi) for Balagopal - speakers who were ungenerous, if not carping and outright dismissive of the courage of conviction that was Balagopal. AN]

Dear Prof. Chomsky,

I saw your support to the statement issued by Sanhati in the form of a letter to the prime minister— endorsed by some intellectuals from India and abroad. Three points are transparent: (a) the Indian government is planning a massive armed operation in the tribal-hilly areas in the eastern part of the country, (b) the poorest of the poor and the historically marginalised will suffer the most in terms of loss of lives, livelihood and habitat, and (c) for whatever it’s worth, an all-out campaign by democratic forces is needed to resist the armed invasion of people’s habitat by any party. To that extent, the statement does bring out the urgency of the matter.

What is not so transparent from the statement is the condition that has brought about this state of affairs. It is said that large-scale neo-liberal policies—including formation of SEZs and encroachment of tribal habitats for mining and other forms of exploitation—has led to mass impoverishment. So, in desperation, the poor have allegedly taken up arms to defend themselves.

This picture is wrong in (i) ascribing the so-called armed struggle to the people, and (ii) being silent about the ’specific’ source of the current aggression by the state, namely, the armed operations of CPI (Maoist). The statement is otherwise right about the ‘general’ situation: sinister neo-liberal policies, growing impoverishment and marginalisation of the poor, and the resulting anger thereof.

Hundreds of organisations working at the grass roots level across the country are engaged in a variety of struggles against state repression and the insidious economic policies of the government. This includes many Gandhian, liberal and leftist organisations and individuals. Importantly, some of these—such as the organisations led by veteran activists Kanu Sanyal and Asim Chatterjee, among many others in Bengal, Andhra, Bihar, Orissa and elsewhere—also subscribe to maoism and are known initiators of the original naxalbari movement. Thus, the labels ‘maoist’ and ‘naxalite’ apply to a much wider category of organisations and individuals than the CPI (Maoist). Needless to say, even the wider category of maoists, not to mention just the CPI (Maoist), forms a tiny fraction of the broad democratic resistance to the policies of the state. The current armed operations of the state are directed ostensibly against the CPI (Maoist) in the areas under its control.

The state of course makes no such distinction in public; by identifying the wider category with the narrower one, it is constructing the opportunity to target the entire left-democratic fraternity in due course. To put the point differently, although the undeclared target of the state covers the entirety of left-democratic forces—as evidenced, for example, in the growing attacks on industrial workers especially in the private sector—the declared target currently consists of CPI (Maoist) and its area of control. The significance of this specificity is wholly missing from the statement you endorsed.

The identification of CPI (Maoist) with the entire resistance movement suits CPI (Maoist) as well. Its Supreme Commander recently declared from his hideout from a guerrilla-controlled area: ‘People, who are the makers of history, will rise up like a tornado under “our party’s leadership” to wipe out the reactionary blood-sucking vampires ruling our country … our party’s influence has grown stronger and “it” has now come to be recognised as the only genuine alternative before the people.’ (Open magazine). We will evaluate the factual content of this declaration below.

For now, it is interesting to note the character of the propaganda: somehow the propagandist interests of CPI (Maoist), the state, and the corporate media suitably converge. The Supreme Commander’s claim is grimly endorsed by the prime and the home ministers of India; according to them, the ‘naxalite menace’ is the greatest threat to internal security. It is also endorsed by the corporate media: the ‘menace’ is said to have spread in 15 of about 25 states, and in 180 of about 500 districts of the country—the numbers accelerating each month to encourage the prospect of a ‘civil war’ soon across the country. The Central government frequently convenes high-profile meetings of chief ministers, secretaries, and police chiefs of the country to meet the challenges posed by the menace. Cutting-edge special forces, carved out of the paramilitary forces, are being constructed and deployed in ‘naxal-infested’ areas. In recent months, even the army and the air force are beginning to enter into the picture. Naxalite actions—widespread arson, mass killings, and the ability to take on the security forces—are prominently reported in the corporate media with ill-concealed awe. This strand of the naxalite movement never had it so big in its close to 40 years of existence in hideouts in remote jungles.

As for the factual content of this dramatic story, I will briefly record some facts that do not find a place in the three-pronged propaganda.

- CPI (Maoist) is a comparatively new organisation formed in 2004 when two naxalite factions Maoist Coordination Committee (MCC) and People’s War Group (PWG)—located primarily in some tribal-inhabited jungle areas in Bihar and Andhra Pradesh respectively—decided to join hands after fighting a bloody war for area-control among themselves for close to two decades. By 2006, CPI (Maoist) was almost completely wiped out from Andhra after their presence there for close to forty years. They also lost major areas in Bihar. The organisation has basically shifted to two of the most backward, tiny, and newly-formed states of Jharkhand and Chatthisgarh. As noted, even there, their presence is basically centered in the areas of dense forest and adjacent tribal-dominated villages, especially in the Bastar district. Ostensibly, as the jungles extend from their headquarters, they have also developed some hideouts and some armed squads to create enough violence to mark their ‘presence’ in West Bengal, Orissa, and elsewhere. To sum, they have essentially failed to emerge out of portions of jungles of eastern India after over four decades of campaign for this particular strand of ‘Marxism-Leninism-Maoism’.

- The organisation has no presence whatsoever in the vast agrarian and industrial terrains of the rest of the country. It has no trade union, no peasant organisation worth its name, no penetration in the dalit, youth, and women’s movements. But it seems to have captured the imagination of sections of elite, urban, and ‘radical’ intelligentsia in Calcutta and Delhi who have impressive connections with some Indian intellectuals settled in universities abroad, as the statement you endorsed highlights (earlier, this intellectual support used to come from Bombay and Hyderabad). The phenomenon is historically familiar.

- ‘The only genuine alternative before the people’ is viewed as a terrorist organisation by none other than Kanu Sanyal and many other active maoists, not to speak of broad spectrums of left parties and organisations most of whom do not find a representation in the statement. The basic reason why Sanyal calls CPI (Maoist) ‘terrorists’ is as follows.

Ever since its inception in 1969, this brand of maoism rejected all classical forms of mass struggle and adopted the sinister doctrine of individual annihilation of ‘class enemies’. ‘Class enemies’ typically consisted of hapless, poorly armed police constables, petty landlords and traders, and an assorted category of ‘informers and traitors’. Most notably, the category of ‘class enemies’ also included grass-root cadres—not their leaders—of the parliamentary left. In the states of West Bengal and Andhra, where this campaign originated, the parliamentary left was typically the only organisation present at the grass root. The annihilation of these ‘class enemies’—typically, middle peasants, school teachers, party wholetimers, etc—effectively meant capturing of areas, by means of guns and knives, already under the left. To that end, the squads first targetted their own maoist fraternity who refused to subscribe to their murderous politics. After the ‘renegades’ were silenced, the next target was cadres of CPI(M), CPI, etc.

This ‘red terror’ basically led to the dismantling of democratic movements in the erstwhile red bastions. In West Bengal, a neo-fascist regime of the Congress Party won the elections handsomely and watched the mutual killings of the left with glee. Once the task was accomplished, the government turned on the maoists and the remaining left and white terror ruled West Bengal for five years. During the nightmare, all forms of democratic movements virtually disappeared from the state as lumpen youth accompanied by paramilitary forces roamed the streets.

In time, almost all of the initiators of this campaign realised their grave mistakes and those who survived encounters, long imprisonment, and psychological collapse, returned to classical mass lines in a variety of forms, including participation in the elections. However, a fragment continued the murderous politics in the jungles of Andhra and Bihar in the form of two organisations MCC and PWG, later unifying into CPI (Maoist), as noted.

Two recent—and contrasting—events in the neighbourhood throw significant light on the consequences of this brand of politics. In Sri Lanka, a vast freedom movement of Tamil nationalism arose about three decades ago. As the movement became progressively militant, it gave rise to a formidable militarist organisation: Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam (LTTE). LTTE declared armed struggle, systematically eliminated all other groups advocating Tamil liberation, took to the jungles, and launched a civil war.

There were several rounds of ‘negotiations’ between the government and the LTTE, often with international effort. LTTE refused to give up arms and join the democratic process; thus, it used each pause in the hostilities to consolidate its forces. After over twenty years of bloody war with Sri Lankan security forces, resulting in incalculable suffering of Tamil people, the LTTE was recently wiped out from Sri Lanka. The calamity facilitated the emergence of a neo-fascist regime in Colombo; it also left behind nearly a million hapless Tamil refugees at the mercy of this government. With all moderate forces from both the sides eliminated from the scene, the Tamil freedom movement is now faced with a historical setback after over hundred thousand deaths.

The Supreme Commander (cited above), whose organisation was trained in guerrilla warfare by former commandos of LTTE, agrees with the consequences: ‘There is no doubt that the movement for a separate sovereign Tamil Eelam has suffered a severe setback with the defeat and considerable decimation of the LTTE. The Tamil people and the national liberation forces are now leaderless.’ But he puts the blame elsewhere: ‘The jingoistic rallies and celebrations organised by the government and Sinhala chauvinist parties all over Sri Lanka in the wake of Prabhakaran’s death and the defeat of the LTTE show the national hatred for Tamils nurtured by Sinhala organisations and the extent to which the minds of ordinary Sinhalese are poisoned with such chauvinist frenzy.’ Nonetheless, he hopes that ‘the ground remains fertile for the resurgence of the Tamil liberation struggle. Even if it takes time, the war for a separate Tamil Eelam is certain to revive, taking lessons from the defeat of the LTTE.’ Although he is prepared to learn—perhaps, tactical—‘lessons’, he does not seem to have any problems with the militarist, sectarian, and exclusivist politics of the LTTE.

In sharp contrast, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) (CPN(M)) also launched a civil war against a ruthless feudal monarchy protected by the Royal Nepalese Army after all democratic methods failed. The war lasted nearly a decade with the CPN(M)-directed People’s Liberation Army dominating vast terrains of the country with massive popular support. The basic point to note is that what CPN(M) strove for during the armed struggle—republic, constituent assembly, supremacy of the parliament created by universal franchise, etc.—India already has. Once that was achieved in Nepal, a genuine armed struggle—far far superior than anything Indian ‘maoists’ have ever envisaged—was immediately brought to a halt. CPN (M) proved its point by winning over 40% of the seats in the interim parliament after the republic was established. With this mandate in hand, innovative, peaceful but militant processes were then adopted to broaden the democratic base even in a context in which the possibility of a counter-revolution orchestrated by the ousted monarch, the army and the ruling elites of India loomed large.

The current impasse in Nepal is about the supremacy of the parliament over the army. As the leader of CPN(M) Prachanda points out, the democratic movement is at a crossroads due to this seminal conflict. Indian republicanism addressed and solved that problem 60 years ago.

During the war, PWG—followed by CPI (Maoist)—maintained close contact with CPN(M). But after the CPN(M) joined—in fact, established—the democratic process in Nepal, the CPI (Maoist) does not find any lessons to be learned. This time the blame is on CPN(M). As the Supreme Commander puts it: ‘It is indeed a great tragedy that the CPN(M) has chosen to abandon the path of protracted people’s war and pursue a parliamentary path in spite of having de facto power in most of the countryside.’ In a letter to CPN(M), CPI (Maoist) ‘advised’ the former not to give up armed struggle until the ‘old order’ is smashed and the CPN (M) is able to seize power all by itself to usher in ‘new democratic revolution’. However, the Supreme Commander remains optimistic since ‘given the great revolutionary traditions of the CPN(M), we hope that the inner-party struggle will repudiate the right opportunist line pursued by its leadership, give up revisionist stands and practices, and apply minds creatively to the concrete conditions of Nepal.’ So, the statesman-like leadership of Prachanda is ‘revisionist’.

Beyond the bluster, it is not difficult to discern that, no matter what, the CPI (Maoist) is not prepared to give up its fatal policies. They are not open to any debates, no one can enter their ‘liberated zones’ without unconditional support to their line. Like Prabhakaran and his LTTE, having meticulously secured hideouts for themselves in ‘impregnable’ dense forests protected by squads armed with sophisticated weapons, they are prepared to carry on ‘protracted war’ for many years before their inevitable decimation. In the process, not only will the tribals under their control suffer immensely, it will give the growingly authoritarian state a golden opportunity to smash whatever avenues of hard-won democratic resistance still remain in place.

As noted, the CPI (Maoist) has exactly two channels of ‘popular’ support: the tribals they control and a section of ‘radical’, urban intelligentsia. It is the support of the latter that gives the CPI (Maoist) significant propaganda mileage and a false impression of invincibility and popular support. By posing the current military preparations of the state only as a state vs. people conflict, the statement you endorsed effectively exonerates the CPI (Maoist) and plays into their hands.

Sincerely

Nirmalangshu Mukherji
Department of Philosopy
University of Delhi

See Also:

http://development-dialogues.blogspot.com/2009/11/operation-green-hunt-who-is-state.html

The Pleasures of Release

http://www.hindustantimes.com/editorial-views-on/opeds/The-pleasures-of-release/Article1-470640.aspx

By Aman Sethi

While there is always the thrill of holding people hostage against their desire, the Maoists, of late, seem to have discovered the pleasure of release.

Having spanked the State into submission by beheading Francis Induwar; by freeing policeman Atindranath Datta and ‘peacefully’ vandalising the Bhubaneswar-New Delhi Rajdhani Express, the Maoists appear to be signaling a new phase in their troubled relationship with the State.

Now that the State and the media know that the Maoists are capable of taking the pleasure equals pain principle to its logical climax, freeing hostages and good-naturedly scribbling slogans on trains appears like a far more civilised way of fomenting revolution.

Just recently, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress President Sonia Gandhi expressed their willingness to break free from the handcuffs of current discourse and engage with those who abstain (from violence).

Maoist leader Kishenji has insisted that while the rebels shall not lay down their arms, talks with the West Bengal and central governments must be preceded by the unconditional release of all prisoners taken captive since military operations began in Lalgarh in June, a withdrawal central forces from the area and a declaration of ceasefire by both sides.

In the meantime, Home Minister P Chidambaram has warned that he can keep his velvet gloves on for only so long; thereafter it’s steel fisting all the way. The victims of military operation shall inevitably be the poor tribals who have love for neither State nor rebel. Now if only the Maoists would take themselves in hand.

Maoism’s other side

http://www.hindustantimes.com/editorial-views-on/editorials/Maoism-s-other-side/Article1-474600.aspx

Dilip Simeon

There are crimes of passion and crimes of logic – Albert Camus

Spokesmen of Maoist extremism have recently expressed regret for beheading a police officer and explained their actions as a defence of the oppressed. Their comrades’ brutality they say, is an aberration. They cite instances of state violence to justify actions they claim are undertaken in self-defence. There is more to this than meets the eye. Maoist theory holds that India is a semi-colonial polity with a bogus constitution that must be overthrown by armed force. The comrades view all their actions as part of a revolutionary war. Their foundational documents declare armed struggle to be “the highest and main form of struggle” and the “people’s army” its main organisation. In war, morality is suspended and limits cast aside. War also results in something the Pentagon calls “collateral damage.” Is it true that Naxalite brutality is only an aberration?

On August 15, 2004, the Maoists killed nine persons in Andhra Pradesh, including a legislator, a driver and a municipal worker. On August 14, 2005, Saleema 52, a cook in a mid-day kitchen in Karimnagar was beaten to death by Maoists for being a “police informer.” This was the second woman killed by them in a fortnight. A former Naxalite, Bhukya Padma 18, was hacked to death in Marimadla village on July 30. On September 12, 2005 it slit the throats of 17 villagers in Belwadari village in Giridih. Landmine blasts in February 2006 killed 26 tribals and injured 50 in Dantewada, Chhattisgarh. The victims were returning from religious festivals, and some from anti-Naxalite rallys. Another blast on March 25 killed 13 persons.

Some of these killings may be incorrectly reported, some carried out by local cadre on their own. But the comrades clearly believe in political assassination. Moreover, the decisions to kill are taken in a shadowy realm wherein the fault of the victim is decided by whim. Truth and falsehood are dispensed with because the Party is Always Right. Their targets have no chance of appealing for mercy, and no one will be punished for collateral damage. And all this is justified because the Maoists are at war - a circular argument, because whether or not we are at war is another whim.

But there is an elephant in India’s drawing room. Maoists openly defy the Constitution, which they say is a mask for a brutal order. Are not our mainstream parties equally contemptuous of the law? Why did the NDA regime try and do away with Schedule 5 of the Constitution, that protects tribal lands from encroachment? Why is it still being violated? Is there not prima-facie evidence of politicians’ involvement in massacres in Delhi and Gujarat in 1984 and 2002? Why haven’t they been brought to justice? In 1987, 40 Muslims of Meerut were killed in custody. Why did the case take eighteen years to come to court? The BJP and the Congress both supported the private army named Salwa Judum with disastrous consequences for Chhatisgarh’s population. Even the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court criticised the States’ recklessness. In 2007 the West Bengal government despatched an illegal armed force to crush its opponents in Nandigram. India’s rulers regularly protect criminals, and part of the public is complicit in this. Policemen in dereliction of duty get promoted. Mass murderers are hailed as heroes. Why are we addicted to the double-standard?

Those who believe in virtuous murder are today calling upon the democratic conscience. Does democracy include the right to kill? Our left-extremists have changed the world for the worse. Along with right-wing radicals, they ground their arguments on passionate rhetoric and a claim to superior knowledge. Fighters for justice have become judge and executioner rolled into one – in a word, pure tyrants. Every killing launches yet another cycle of trauma and revenge. Will Francis Induvar’s son ever dream of becoming a socialist? Should not socialists hold themselves to a higher standard than the system they oppose?

Symbolism counts for a lot in Indian politics. If the Maoist party is interested in negotiations, I suggest a demand that will expose the hypocritical nature of our polity: ask the government to remove the portrait of V.D. Savarkar from the Central Hall of Parliament, placed there in 2003. If it cannot do that, ask it to place Charu Mazumdar’s portrait alongside. Why not? Both were extreme patriots. Both believed in political assassination, both hated Gandhi and both insisted that the end justifies the means.

My suggestion will meet with indignation. But the deep link between these two currents of extremism is the unutterable truth of Indian history. Hindutva is the Maoism of the elite. In 1969, an ultra-leftist Hindi writer penned a diatribe titled Gandhi Benakaab that praised Godse as a true son of India. In 42 years of activity, Naxalites hardly ever confronted the communalists; although to be fair, one ultra-left group in Punjab did combat the Khalistanis. The assassination of a VHP Swami in Kandhamal in August 2008 is the only example. The Maoists owned the crime, but the Sangh Parivar vented its wrath upon Christian villagers. Thousands were displaced and over 30 were killed. The comrades were unwilling or unable to prevent the carnage.

Savarkar’s acolyte Nathuram Godse murdered Mahatma Gandhi. In 1969, the Justice Kapur Commission concluded that the conspiracy was hatched by Savarkar and his group. Sardar Patel said as much to Nehru in February 1948. If Savarkar deserves to be honoured by the Nation, so does Charu. Since the government is unlikely to accept either option, we may finally come to a debate about why one kind of political murder is anti-national, while the other is patriotic virtue.

Operation Green Hunt: Who is the state hunting?

Press Release

30^th October 2009

Findings of fact-finding team into 17^th September and 1^st October murders by security forces in Dantewada

The government claims that Operation Green Hunt is a necessary measure to bring ‘civilian administration to 2.5 million people’ in areas which the Maoists control The Home Ministry has admitted that it will take at least 18 months to show the results. Begun in September, Operation Green Hunt has been accompanied with a huge publicity campaign against the Maoists and news ranging from beheading of a police officer to the most recent ‘train jacking’. What have been suppressed in this vehement campaign are violent actions carried out by the security forces in the name of ‘flushing out Maoists’. For instance, no substantive information has been given in the media regarding the Gachanpalli killings of 17^th September 2009 and 1^st October killings at Gompad and Chintagufa villages in Chhattisgarh by security forces. Nor have any reports appeared regarding detentions and arrests of several young men on 1^st October. Information regarding looting, burning and torture which accompanied these operations have remained unknown. Also, that people have fled their villages and are living in make shift sheds in the forest, has gone unnoticed. The fact that on both these days, security forces (Cobra, local police and SPOs and Salwa Judum leaders such as Boddu Raja) went on a rampage—stabbing and killing people, looting, burning houses and forcibly picking up young men—is the other side of Operation Green Hunt which has been carefully kept away from public scrutiny.

In order to ascertain these facts, a 15 member fact-finding team visited Dantewada area between 10^th and 12^th October 2009. The team comprised members from PUCL (Chhattisgarh), PUDR (Delhi) Vanvasi Chetna Ashram (Dantewada), Human Rights Law Network (Chhattisgarh), ActionAid (Orissa), Manna Adhikar (Malkangiri) and Zilla Adivasi Ekta Sangh (Malkangiri). The team was initially denied permission and was repeatedly questioned and interrogated at Dornapal and Errabore police camps on the way. The team stayed at Nendra village and met witnesses and victims from several villages and gathered testimonies from them. Subsequently, the team spoke to District Collector and Superintendent of Police, Dantewada. Given below are some of the observations made by the team.

17^th September 2009: 7 villagers brutally killed by security forces.

1. Gachanpalli murders: In the early hours of 17^th September, 6 villagers were murdered by security forces in this village. Dudhi Muye (70 yrs) who could hardly walk was murdered after her breasts were cut off. Family members who had fled the scene on seeing the security forces, found her lying dead in a pool of blood. Similarly, Kawasi Ganga (70 yrs) who could barely see was stabbed and murdered in his bed. He too was found by his family members who had fled from the house and had taken shelter in the forest. Madvi Deva (25 yrs) was tied to a tree and shot at three times and then beheaded. His grandfather who was accompanying him back to the village was a witness to this. The family hasn’t found his body. Three other villagers, Madvi Joga (60 yrs), Madvi Hadma (35 yrs) and Madkam Sulla were stabbed and murdered. The last two were killed in front of one witness, the wife of Madkam Sulla. Madvi Joga was killed after being stripped naked while ploughing his little plot of land. All the houses were ransacked, broken and burnt down. Family members are either living in sheds in the forests or have taken shelter with relatives. Many others have also taken similar shelter as their houses were burnt down by the security forces.

The case of Madvi Deva: This young man was a resident of Singanpalli village and had gone out in the morning of 17^th for some family work. When he did not return his family searched for him. Two days later, a Patel from another village informed the family that he had been shot and killed by the security forces and his body was buried in the compound of Chintagufa PS. The Patel was asked to supervise the burial in the PS.

2. Torture: Burnt in hot oil: Muchaki Deva (60 yrs) of Onderpara was grazing cattle on the morning of 17^th September. He was caught, beaten and dragged into the village by security forces. He was hung on a branch of a tree and pushed into a pot of hot oil which was kept ready under the tree. He was then pulled out and poured over with water. As a result, the upper part of his body is severely burnt and he has developed maggots in his wounds. He gravely ill and although he has no access to medical aid he has been taken to Bhadrachalam by members of the fact-finding team.

Tied and paraded: 6 villagers, including 3 women were tied and paraded through Gachanpalli and other villages where the security forces went. Fortunately, they escaped as timely rains made it possible for them to flee.

3. Forced displacement and terror: families of those who were murdered by security forces and those whose houses have been burnt down vengefully, have fled the village and are living in make shift sheds in the forest. The condition of the others is no better as the entire village has been terrorized by security forces.

1^st October 2009: 10 villagers brutally killed by security forces

1. Gompad ‘encounter’: SP Dantewada described the operations in Gompad village on 1^st October as an ‘encounter’. An encounter with a difference: while 9 villagers were killed by security forces in the village and their bodies were left there, no casualties were inflicted on security forces. This too the SP confirmed. 4 members of one family, Madvi Bajar, his wife, Madvi Subbi, their married daughter, Kartam Kanni and their young daughter, Madvi Mutti were stabbed and killed inside house. So too were two other villagers from Bhandarpadar, Muchaki Handa and Madkam Deva, who were staying the night over at Madvi Bajar’s house on their way home from Andhra Pradesh where they had been working. Another couple, Soyam Subba and Soyam Jogi were stabbed and killed inside their house. Yet another villager, Madvi Enka was stabbed inside the house and then dragged all over the village. Before leaving the village, the security forces shot him and left his body. All 9 deaths, like the ones on 17^th September, were preceded by stabbing and the bodies were left in the village. When the team asked the SP about recovery of bodies from the encounter site, the SP stated that Naxalites had ‘taken them away’.

More killings: In Chintagufa, a 45yr old man, Tomra Mutta was stabbed and shot inside his house. On seeing the sudden arrival of the security forces, Tomra Mutta ran to protect his family. He was shot in the process. The team confirmed 10 murders that had taken place that day but there is apprehension that the total number of killings may be much higher as many villages could not be contacted or accessed. The SP confirmed that two sets of raid parties set off that day comprising of Cobras and local police. Hence, the details with the team do not give the entire and exact picture of how many villages were attacked and targeted.

2. Torture: Travails of a 2yr old: Madvi Bajar’s grandson was not spared. He is all of two and yet the security forces beat him, cut four of his fingers, broke his teeth and cut off part of his tongue. He has been taken to Bhadrachalam by members of the fact-finding team.

Witnesses reported several instances of harassment at the hands of the security forces. In Gompad, one villager was caught and interrogated and then shot at in his leg. He managed to run away but still has the bullet injury and has had no medical treatment. In Chintagufa, security forces tied another man and made him walk to Injaram PS. They severely beat him and also attacked him on his toe with a knife. He was finally let off in the evening. In Gompad, one young mother was shot at under her knee by security forces inside her house. Her four children fell on her and she was thus, saved. Without any medical treatment for over two weeks, she was first brought to Dantewada, and now to Delhi where she has been operated upon and is undergoing treatment.

3. Arrests: 8 arrested and 2 missing: Ten young men between 18-32 years were beaten and picked up by security forces from Mukudtong and Jinitong villages on 1^st October. Eight have been shown as arrested in a case that was registered on 3/10 at Konta PS under various sections of IPC, Arms Act and Explosives Act. They are currently lodged in Dantewada jail. However, two still remain missing. Female relatives who went in search of those missing at the Konta PS were harassed, made to affix their thumb impression on blank documents and driven away. When they returned two days later, they were abused, told not to return and informed that the men had been taken to an unknown place.
4. Looting and Burning of property and houses: As many as 9 instances of looting and burning by security forces were reported to the team. Unlike the 17^th September killings which were followed by arson and burning of the houses of those murdered, security forces on 1^st October looted homes. They took away paddy, pusles, brass pots and poultry from many homes. Money, ranging from 300/- to 10,000/- was stolen from these houses. Destruction of property, particularly burning down of houses was carried out in as many as seven instances.
5. Presence of SPOs and Salwa Judum leader with security forces: Residents of Mukudtong village confirmed that the ‘raid’ party was accompanied by known Salwa Judum leader, Boddu Raja of Injaram camp and they recognised SPOs Pande Soma of Phandeguda village and Ganga of Asarguda village. Residents of Gompad village were able to recognize SPO Madvi Buchcha who belongs to their own village.
6. Forced displacement and terror: Several families are living in makeshift sheds in the forest area as their houses have been burnt down. Those who are unable to run and flee are living in terror in the villages and residents and relatives have helped them to repair their houses and have given them other support.

Conclusion:

While the team could only meet residents of some of the villages, there is apprehension that a much larger number of people were killed on both days in other villages. The same is true for instances of torture, loot and detentions. The clamp down on information makes it impossible to know what exactly is happening in distant and far flung villages. However, what is clear is that the operations conducted by security forces have compelled villagers to leave their villages, flee into the forests and/or take shelter with relatives in other villages.

The condition of those who are residing in their villages is precarious and vulnerable. Given that the government has not complied with the Supreme Court order on rehabilitation of displaced families (families which were displaced in the earlier phase of Salwa Judum violence), the new and current phase of violence by security forces has added to the crisis in these remote and inaccessible villages. Instead of rehabilitating people, the government, in the name of combating Maoism, is bent upon unleashing its lethal paramilitary forces and evicting people from their villages. It is imperative to immediately end to this policy of eviction and terror and enable people to settle in their villages.

Unanswered Questions:

1. If each of the deceased were ‘maoists’, then why did the security forces leave the bodies in the villages? What was the point of the brutality that preceded killing?
2. Equally, if those injured were also Maoists, then why didn’t the police arrest them? Why were they not given medial aid?
3. Why was an old man tortured brutally in hot oil? Why was a two year old subjected to such torture?
4. Why were houses looted and burnt?
5. Why is justice denied in these cases? Why haven’t the families of the deceased, those injured and tortured and those whose houses were looted given compensation?

Demands

1. That the government must accept responsibility for murders committed on 17^th September and 1^st October by security forces and file FIRs against those responsible. Further, the government must acknowledge all instances of torture, illegal detention and destruction of property. FIRs must be lodged in each case and compensation given in each instance.
2. That an impartial inquiry (comprising civil society representatives and representatives of organizations working in the area) be conducted into the incidents of murder and acts of arson, loot and torture on 17^th September and 1^st October by security forces. The focus should be to bring out the truth behind these killings an also investigate the extent of the operations carried out on both days.
3. That the government must immediately take steps and show its conviction in the Supreme Court order on rehabilitation of villages and implement it immediately. The above described incidents of 17^th September and 1^st October have created fear and panic and compelled villagers to flee. Unless the government implements the SC order, villagers will not be able to live in their villages.
4. That along with the implementation of the above mentioned order, there be an immediate end to cordon and search operation carried out by security forces in these areas. Lack of rehabilitation coupled with an ever increasing size of the paramilitary forces in such backward areas with low population density raises fears of repeated incidents, such as the ones described above.

Signed by

Sharmila Purkayastha, PUDR

Asish Gupta, PUDR

Himanshu Kumar, VCA

On behalf of fact-finding team

[received via an email]

See also:

http://development-dialogues.blogspot.com/2009/11/open-letter-to-noam-chomsky.html

Maoist Martyrdom Vs State Barbarism

http://www.countercurrents.org/sagar051109.htm

By Satya Sagar

Is Maoism in India really the only response to poverty and lack of development? Is an armed rebellion the only way to change the way the Indian State operates? Will such a movement lead to a better future for underprivileged people in this country? Are other forms of mass democratic struggles an alternative option at all?

These are the questions that haunted me as I sat through a public hearing on drought at Daltonganj in Jharkhand’s Palamu district late October this year. Questions that are not new and have been debated repeatedly within the various strands of the Indian left movement for several decades now, with no clear answers as yet.

While I mused, there was this young woman standing on the stage, slowly edging towards the mike, patiently waiting for her turn to speak. She need not have said anything at all. Her emaciated, frail frame, the harassed look on her face and the tears silently welling up in her sunken eyes had already conveyed to us this was another tale of unmitigated tragedy.

Barely in her early twenties, she had been diagnosed with tuberculosis a few months ago. Her husband was already on his deathbed due to the same affliction as there was no public health center near her village. Treatment in town was obviously unaffordable. The drought raging in the district, reported to be the worst in over half a century, would end up wiping out her entire family she explained in a quiet, matter of fact tone.

As we sat there, the small ‘jury’ of three or four of us who had come from Delhi and Ranchi to listen to the woes of Palamu’s villagers felt much, much smaller. For her horror story was only one out of some 3000 similar ones of neglect, deprivation and outright desperation that tensely waited to be recalled that early winter afternoon.

The old man who never got his old age pension, the abandoned widow on the verge of starvation, the landless worker who slogged for wages that never arrived, the child born with a deformed hip a decade ago and still hobbling his way through childhood. This contrasted with the fact that thousands of crores of rupees had been allocated for employment guarantee schemes, subsidised rations, public health and infrastructure schemes – all siphoned off somewhere between the Indian capital New Delhi and the state capital Ranchi. Stolen by a kleptocracy that dares to call itself the ‘elected’ representatives of the Indian people.

And yet, poverty and lack of development are not the only reasons why the Naxals or Maoists, the MCC or whatever you want to call them thrive in Palamu. It is also the lack of respect and dignity that the dalits and adivasis of these parts have suffered for centuries, their abject humiliation by the ‘upper castes’ continuing without redress in Independent India.

Many, many moons ago when the first movements for justice started in this district they were led by the Communist Party of India, the Socialists, the Gandhians. Struggles against feudal practices like the ‘right to the first night’, which forced the brides of Dalit men to spend the first fortnight after marriage as concubines of upper-caste landlords- a ‘custom’ enforced at gun-point. Or against the practice of bonded labour whereby generations of families slaved for their ‘creditors’, the interest on their loans accumulating faster than the rivers of sweat they were able to shed.

In the seventies, when these popular struggles died down due to changing priorities or exhaustion or corruption or whatever of these organisations the Naxals had moved into this vaccum- with their guns. So somehow it is not just the failure of the Indian state to deliver the basic needs of the people we are talking about here but the inability of our mass, democratic movements to maintain a consistent long-term presence too.

Do the Maoists have popular support? Among the landless, the poor, the ‘lower castes’, the adivasis the answer obviously would be yes as in the initial years their interventions did help wipe out the worst of feudal excesses. Most of their cadres come from these oppressed sections of society though the occasional ‘upper caste’ youth too have joined.

Have their actions led to an overall improvement in the lives of the people? Well, yes and no. Yes, because as mentioned their activities have boosted the morale of the poor and the oppressed. No, because a high morale is all very well but a highly nutritious meal or a functioning high school would be still better and these are still elusive.

The Maoists with simple Newtonian logic had achieved the first step of doing away with the fear of feudal oppression. Greater the inertia of an object, greater the force required to move it. Shoot a few really bad, ‘upper-caste’ warlords in the area and this has the force-multiplier effect of, at least for a short while, moving mountains of unaccounted power.

The next several steps of organising people, winning all the basic things they crave for- food, water, healthcare, escape from poverty and so on has proved far more difficult for the Maoists. In other words, the details of day-to-day life are missing from their strategy. There is only so much martyrdom and bloodshed any population can take.

It is also true though, once the gun has been taken up by the oppressed, the State weighs in heavily on the side of the local oppressors. The latter themselves escalate the levels of violence and it becomes impossible to do anything in the open. No more public meetings, no rallies, no discussions and debates among the people, no mass organisations. In other words none of those basic ingredients required to build a future, participative people’s democracy.

At the same time, the underground- that dark and dangerous space so tantalising from a safe distance to angst-ridden, urban radicals- is fraught with enough problems of its own. The constant hiding, the secrecy and suspicion bordering on paranoia, the inability to communicate with comrades or carry out political education of cadre, the costly lapses and subsequent losses- all leading to the near negation of the movement’s original objectives.

Every now and then a creative Maoist cadre somewhere will try to do something different at the local level like run schools, crackdown on social evils, mobilise people for militant struggles that don’t involve the use of arms These struggles, wherever they have occurred, have always been hugely popular with the people. Those in power, who had complained about the violence of the Maoists, would now worry about their non-violent methods and at some point of time step in with their jackboots to crush the experiment.

Unfortunately, I suspect, the Maoist leadership too sees these experiments as ideologically soft, reformist or even worse as too ‘Gandhian’ and doesn’t really believe in them in any way. It occasionally allows them to happen with the idea that ‘deviants’ within their fold can always be brought back to the ‘correct path’ one way or the other. The lives of the people, after all, can really change for the better only when the ‘New Democratic Revolution’ happens.

In the worldview of the Maoist ideologues the physics of the armed struggle will some day square the grand mathematical equation of social injustice on one side with the predations of capitalism and imperialism on the other. Their solutions are alarmingly final ones, all derived from the dead abstractions of physics and mathematics, whether they correspond with the living biological needs of the faceless ‘people’ and ‘masses’ or not.

Nobody knows what this ‘New Democratic Revolution’ really means, how many hands and feet it has or whether it prefers sugar and milk with its coffee or not. Or for that matter, why the Dalits and Adivasis of India should fight for this particular model of the future and not something else. The indigenous people of the Indian subcontinent for example may be better off fighting for complete autonomy from the rest of India instead of taking on the burden of carrying out the entire ‘Indian revolution’. And if the Dalits and Adivasis should take up the gun why not poor Muslims, many of whose social and economic indicators are even worse? Also if this Revolution does happen some day, why should it be confined to the borders of India – why not South Asia as a whole or even beyond?

Again, nobody even knows when this Revolution is supposed to happen or be finally declared ‘successful’ but it is believed passionately that nothing but the gun can lead the people of India to this utopia. As one of the Maoist ideologues caught by the police recently in Jharkhand reportedly told the media with frightening clarity, ‘the bloodshed will stop only when the Revolution is over”. He did not bother to set a timeframe- they could be fighting for the next 200 years for all we know- all their martyrs looking nice on wall posters in the meanwhile. Will there be anyone out there left to recognise the ‘victory’ when it finally comes?

I personally do believe in the right of the masses to wield the gun if need be. When faced with a violent ruling class, it is an ugly but understandable premise. Mao was right when he said ‘power flows from the barrel of a gun’. The problem is about all the things he did not mention and that do not flow from guns – like water, food, medicines, peace or ultimately for that matter, even guarantees of justice and democracy. Making a fetish of armed struggle to the neglect of every other way of operating is not serious politics at all and rather indicative of the nihilist mindset behind such strategies- ‘jalaa do, mitaa do, yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaaye tho kya hei’.

The Indian State too on its part is appropriately barbaric in everything it does, making each wild accusation and conspiracy theory of the Maoists seem like a profound, well-studied thesis. Rs. 470 crores is the sum given by the Central Government for Jharkhand’s anti-Naxalite operations- to be spent on more arms for the police and more uniforms for the unemployed youth who go on to become the Indian police. If that sum were spent sincerely on the kind of people queuing up to complain at the Daltonganj public hearing there may have been no need for either the Naxal or the noxious cop.

Instead the State builds schools in the Naxal dominated areas and fills them with policemen- there are 3000 schools right now in Jharkhand full of Cobras and Scorpions or similar species lower down the evolutionary order. It is clueless about who is really a Maoist and who is not so it ends up blindly lashing out at some innocent folk within the reach of its very short and clumsy arms.

Again, the State, for all its prattle about ‘rule of law’, also does nothing to encourage any form of peaceful resistance either. Mahendra Singh of the CPI(ML) Liberation, the brave and only MLA in the Jharkhand Assembly exposing corruption in high places, was gunned down in broad daylight in early 2005. An investigation by an official committee has implicated a senior police officer, who continues to rise up the hierarchy instead of being booked for murder!

Just a year and half ago Lalit Mehta, a bright young engineer and certainly no Maoist, was shot dead in Palamu district as he exposed corruption and organised social audits of the NREGA or employment guarantee scheme. His killers, local politically connected mafia, have not yet been apprehended and may never be. All this obviously sends out a chilling message to anyone who wants to follow Lalit’s path of ‘unarmed’ activism.

The truth is that those who run the Indian State and sections of the Indian population who benefit from its policies really don’t give a damn for the people the Naxals or other left forces are trying to mobilise. The Dalits, Adivasis and the poor in general can all shrivel up and die for all they care. Whether these folks want it or not they will be subjected to a perverse development process that involves driving nails through their flesh and laying rail lines across their bones so that a small minority of Indians can have their ‘infrastructure’ and feel like a ‘superpower’. If they choose to fight back they will be crushed like flies- the endless legions of unemployed Indian youth from around the country marshalled in uniforms for this genocide.

That is precisely why when the masked Maoist leader Kishenji openly mocks the Indian State on prime time television and invites it to battle he should be careful, for he may get exactly what he wishes. The State would like nothing better than a war against its own citizens, as it becomes another opportunity to make lots of money, replenish its arsenal, demolish whatever little democratic space is left in the country and rollback all resistance to its skewed policies for decades to come. A war, for which the Maoists too, despite all their bravado, are simply not prepared well enough.

Both the Maoist leadership and the Indian State it seems are keen on playing with each other only one game called ’revolution and counter-revolution’, which ends only when either of the two players ceases to exist forever.

One thing is very clear though. If a new game is to emerge forcefully on the Indian stage soon, far greater number of Indian citizens need to get down to the task of solving the problems of poverty, oppression and injustice than involved currently. The situation today, more than ever before, calls for the building of many, many more creative mass movements to establish the rights of the people than out there right now.

As the late K.Balagopal pointed out so insightfully in a piece on violence versus non-violence in the Economic and Political Weekly a few years ago, neither method has really made much difference to the course of Indian state policies since Independence. In other words, there is simply not enough happening to bring about change given the scale of the country’s various problems.

There is no point though in blaming either the Indian State or the Maoists, both of whom will continue to do only what they know best. While Indian democracy is too important to be left to ‘elected’ politicians Maoist martyrdom by itself will also never be enough to change the Indian State.

It is for the rest of India to decide whether they are going to be mere spectators, pliant players or makers of a different destiny for themselves and their society.

Satya Sagar is a writer, journalist and videomaker based in New Delhi. He can be contacted at sagarnama@gmail.com

Will the mindset from the past change?

http://www.hindu.com/2009/11/09/stories/2009110955350800.htm

Amit Bhaduri & Romila Thapar

Those that have governed in tribal areas must share the responsibility for the negligence of the adivasis. The proposals for a multi-lateral dialogue should be set in that context.

There has been a flurry of concern as also vituperation over the activities of the Maoists in the forests that are mostly home to tribal society. There is a confrontation between the state and this society through the intervention of the Maoists. One pauses while reading the speeches of those in authority and thinks back to the past. The texts of the past represent the people of the forest, the forest-dwellers, largely as “the Other” – the rakshasas, and those who moved like an ink-black cloud through the forest with their bloodshot eyes, who ate and drank all the wrong things, had the wrong rules of sexuality and, as strange creatures, were far removed from ‘us.’

Kautilya in the Arthashastra condemns them as troublemakers and Ashoka threatens the atavikas, the forest-dwellers, without telling us why. The interest of various kingdoms in extending control over forests has an obvious explanation. The forests supplied elephants for the army, mineral wealth including iron, timber for building, and by clearing forests the acreage of cultivable land increased and the consequent agriculture brought in revenue. In later times, even when there were situations of dependence on forest people, the conventional attitude towards them was that they were outside the social pale and had to be kept at a distance.

So is this pattern essentially different from the present?

Naxal activity started in the 1960s and gained some support in the rural and later urban areas of West Bengal and subsequently Bihar and Andhra. It raised the ire of the state but did it make the state more sensitive to problems of the adivasis? It was treated as a law and order problem and put down although sporadic incidents kept occurring to remind ‘us’ that ‘their’ problems have remained. So this activity is not new but there is an increase in anger and with attacks from both sides. This makes it far more palpable even in our big cities, as yet far away from the ‘jungle areas.’

The government’s anxiety over Maoist activity has at this point increased and needs explanation. Violence on both sides has been stepped up. The Communist Party of India (Maoist) was banned. Now the Maoists are being threatened with Operation Green Hunt but at the same time are also being invited to cease their violence and negotiate. The Maoists have slowly cut a swathe through the sub-continent and the fear is that this may expand. Would this be sufficient reason for a “hunt” or could there be other factors changing the equations from 40 years ago?

The current violence on both sides is fierce enough but what happens if the state launches a semi-military offensive trying to snuff out the Maoists and the Maoists retaliate, as they are likely to? It would displace and kill many hundreds of our people, villagers and tribals living in areas of Maoist activity, including those who are not sympathetic to the Maoist ideology or objective. Any “hunt” would have to be on an enormous scale since groups claiming to be Maoists are now widespread in over 200 districts in the country in contiguous areas. Has this kind of hunt helped solve our problems elsewhere? Manipur, Assam, and Kashmir continue to remain areas of on-going civil strife.

Perhaps we should look at it less as an ‘us’ and ‘them’ situation and more as an ‘us’ and ‘us’ situation. At the end of the day, we are all involved as people who live in this country and what is more, as people who have to go on living in this country. Even those whose lives have not been remotely touched by what goes on in ‘tribal societies’ will find themselves ill at ease with expanding civil strife.

If we see it as an ‘us’ and ‘us’ situation, then the need for a dialogue with all the groups involved becomes the most immediate concern. The question is who should be talking to whom and about what. If the state has to start the dialogue — as the strongest party in the conversation — it should be conversing with several groups:

1. Those living in the rural areas and the forested areas affected by the current civil strife, frequently referred to as ‘the people.’ This should be the primary and most important dialogue. It is not about who is right and who is wrong but about what is it that is leading to people becoming embroiled in revolts. People do not support insurgent groups or get imposed upon by such groups unless there is a reason. The adivasis live in areas where the benefits of development hardly ever reach them. Education, health care, communication, access to justice are mentioned sotto voce, since in most places they don’t exist. Our Prime Minister and Home Minister have had long tenures in earlier governments as finance ministers and have been well aware of patterns of development. Did they and their colleagues not recognise the injustice of unequal “development” and the anger it could produce? The same applies to the State governments of these areas who have not exactly distinguished themselves in addressing the problems of the adivasis. The situation now demands attention because it has turned violent.

2. Then there is the state. What has the state done in these areas to annul the terror of poverty over the last 60 years? Perhaps terrorism and its victims should be redefined to include many more varieties of terror than the ones we constantly speak of. The spectacular increase of wealth despite the recession has still done little to make poverty less immanent in much of the country. As the arbiter of Indian citizens, it might explain what it would propose to change in order to remove the injustices that encourage poverty. For example, what should be the terms and conditions that should prevail in a transfer of land between adivasis and others?

3. Many areas under Maoist control are those that the corporate world would like to “develop.” These have rich mineral resources — once again, almost as in earlier times, the attraction is timber, and water, and also mineral wealth such as coal, iron, bauxite. There is of course a history to such “development” since colonial times: except that it has now been intensified given the increase in the number of corporates and more importantly, their hold on the state. Are the corporates the new factor, as some would argue? The state acquiring land to hand over to private corporations is not identical with the appropriating of the land and resources of the forest-dwellers in earlier times, but there are some echoes. Both the appropriators and the appropriated have to have their say in any dialogue with due respect to PESA (Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas Act, 1996), which recognises the right of the adivasis to decide on the use of their land. For any successful dialogue, the state has to be neutral without biases in favour of corporations in its notion of “development” in these areas.

4. The Naxals/Maoists. Are they a unified party with a common programme? And is their programme tied to development for the people only through a revolution accompanied by bloodied violence? Do they reflect immediate demands related to the daily life of the people that sustains them or an ambiguous promised utopia that may never come? Discussions between the state, the Maoists, and the people on the implementation of development are far too compelling to be ignored.

If there is such a dialogue, what should the corporates be concerned with? Clearly land is the key issue and most of it is in forested areas. Is all and any land up for grabs? Surely there should be some categories of land that should be left alone if we are to survive on this planet. Is the demand for large tracts of land in these areas not a subversion of the much-vaunted Forest and Tribal Act of 2006, which promised 2.5 hectares to every tribal family that had rights to the land? And what does the forest dweller get in return for selling his land? He cannot use the money to secure his future income since there are no such facilities available to him. He is left with money with which to buy hooch — the pattern that was followed all over the colonial world in North America, Australia, and Africa. Are we now internalising a colonial history to repeat it on our own citizens?

And where lands have already been sold to corporations, one does not hear of the corporate organisations first setting in motion the essentials of development in education, health care, communication, and access to justice among the displaced or resettled communities, before they actually start working for profit on the land they acquire. Should this not be considered as part of the sale deeds, particularly as the state is the broker? Corporates are good at drawing up contracts so there should be contracts with the people, vetted by lawyers representing the people where agreements can be examined and negotiated, and those that have been pushed around can still make demands with the possibility that they might be heard.

Such actions may be more effective, certainly in the long run but even in the short run, than an Operation Green Hunt. Violence is a dead end even for the Maoists. When practised by the state on its own citizens, its collateral damage is unacceptable in a democracy; lasting civil strife escalating into a civil war in these areas will create its own demons of the arbitrary repression of ordinary citizens. An alternative form of intervention ushered in through a multi-lateral dialogue involving all the concerned parties is not merely an option, it is imperative.

(Amit Bhaduri is an economist and Professor Emeritus at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Romila Thapar is a historian and Professor Emeritus at JNU.)