People's March October 2007
Friday, September 28, 2007
Dear friends,
People's March October 2007 articles are placed down below.
People's March `October 2007 in PDF format will posted on 29th September 2007
P.Govindan Kutty
Editor, People's March
Hail Historic May 1st Declaration Against Revisionism!
Intensify Class Struggle, Combat Revisionism Worldwide!!
Declaration To Reaffirm The Significance And Relevance Of The Anti-revisionist Struggle And The GPCR
We, the undersigned Marxist-Leninist, Mao Zedong Thought and Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties and organizations, hereby issue this declaration to reaffirm the significance and relevance of the struggle against modern revisionism starting, in 1956 in opposition to the revisionist content of the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) in February 1956, leading to the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976 and continuing after the bourgeoisie seized power in China in 1976. We do so after one year of activities celebrating the 50th anniversary of the anti-revisionist struggle and renewing our commitment to pursue this struggle.
We honor and pay the highest respect to Comrade Mao Zedong for leading the Communist Party of China (CPC) and all Marxist-Leninist parties in the struggle against modern revisionism. He promptly caused the publication of the editorial of the People’s Daily, “On the Historical Experience of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat” in April 1956 in response to the 20th Congress of the CPSU. In this Congress the Khrushchev revisionist clique repudiated in February 1956 under the pretext of opposing “personality cult” the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism and the great revolutionary achievements of the Party of Lenin and Stalin in building socialism, fighting fascism and leading the international communist movement for more than 30 years.
The actions of the Soviet revisionists headed by Khrushchev laid bare the phenomenon of modern revisionism in opposition to the proletarian dictatorship and put the Soviet Union on the road of capitalist restoration. They reorganized the Soviet Party the state, the economy and the cultural institutions in order to subvert Marxism-Leninism and the socialist system.
They opposed the dictatorship of the proletariat and propagated bourgeois populism with the notions of “party of the whole people” and “state of the whole people” and bourgeois pacifism with the notions of “peaceful transition,” “peaceful competition” and “peaceful coexistence”. They undertook to undermine the international communist movement and pushed “peaceful coexistence” as the general line to oppose proletarian internationalism and to attack the international communist movement and the national liberation movements.
Revisionism destroyed all the formerly socialist countries. It transformed these into colonies of social imperialism, deprived the revolutionary world movement of its revolutionary center, destroyed revolutionary parties and brought confusion, division and liquidationism into the international communist and working class movement. It had a corroding effect on the proletarian class struggle and the anti-imperialist struggle and led to defeats involving heavy losses. The process of the international proletarian revolution has been set back for decades.
There are ideological, political, socio-economic and cultural causes of modern revisionism. The major causes include deviation from materialist dialectics, abandonment or waning of the proletarian class stand and class struggle, worship of outdated or revisionist Soviet examples and the degeneration of a great number of bureaucrats and intellectuals due to their petty bourgeois social conditions and ways of thinking, which are the gateway to modern revisionism as full bourgeois ideology.
Hankering for personal privileges, nepotism, careerism, abuse of power, enrichment and other forms of self-interest, those afflicted with the petty bourgeois mode of thinking gain the upper hand among the leading functionaries in the party, state, economy and cultural institutions and give rise to modern revisionism as bourgeois ideology and as a platform for bourgeois policies.
Comrade Mao defended the theory and practice of Marxism-Leninism against the line of modern revisionism. He denounced the revisionists for sowing confusion in the international communist movement and generating disorder and uprisings against the socialist cause in Yugoslavia, Poland, Hungary and elsewhere in Eastern Europe.
Under the direction of Comrade Mao, the delegation of the CPC pursued the anti-revisionist line in the Moscow meetings of the communist and workers’ parties in 1957 and 1960. Thereafter, the Marxist-Leninists led by the CPC launched an international ideological struggle on a comprehensive range of issues against the modern revisionists centered in the Soviet party.
Further on, the Marxist-Leninists led by Comrade Mao proceeded to the criticism and repudiation of the phenomenon of monopoly bureaucrat capitalism and social imperialism during the long regime of Brezhnev. Monopoly bureaucrat capitalism masqueraded as socialism while the bureaucrats and businessmen connived to steal from the state sector. In international relations, the Soviet revisionists engaged in socialist phrase mongering and in the practice of imperialism. Comrade Mao did not rest content with the critique of modern revisionism as it had arisen and grown in the Soviet Union and in the other countries of the Soviet bloc. He examined and analyzed the growth of modern revisionism in China, arising from both homegrown factors and external influences. Thus, he united the leading anti-revisionist revolutionaries in the CPC, who rallied forces to launch the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in May 1966 in order to carry out the theory of continuing revolution under proletarian dictatorship. This is to combat revisionism, prevent the restoration of capitalism and consolidate socialism.
The theory and practice of continuing revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat through the GPCR constituted a new and higher stage in the development of Marxism-Leninism. It posed a series of problems in the building of socialism, for a whole historical epoch in transition from capitalism to communism, and brought up the basic principles and methods for solving said problems, involving the existence of classes and class struggle in socialist society, the relations of the social base and superstructure, the mass line, cultural revolution, revolution and production, succession by the youth, leadership in the factories and communes and the formation of the organs of political power.
Many of these issues were not understood or could not have been understood through the decades of socialism in the Soviet Union. The launching of the GPCR reflected an understanding and summation of that Soviet experience, and was an unprecedented political mobilization of the masses against revisionism, this time in the CPC.
Comrade Mao successfully led the Chinese proletariat and people from victory to victory in the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution against tremendous odds and against powerful adversaries. But soon after his death, the enemies of the Chinese proletariat and people made a coup and reversed his proletarian revolutionary line in carrying out socialist revolution and construction. Since then the new bourgeois rulers in China have launched the most brutal attacks against the Chinese workers and peasants. While they have continued to claim the title of the “Communist Party of China”, they in fact, are now the worst oppressors and exploiters and abusers of the Chinese people.
There are manifestations of China’s all-round retrogression and degradation to the status of being a big-comprador neocolonial adjunct of the US and other imperialist powers. China has completely tied itself to the policy of imperialist globalization pushed by the US and other imperialist powers. But China is also trying to become a relatively autonomous imperialist power, extending its economic investment and political influence on a world scale in places such as Africa, Latin America and Asia. It is reminiscent of a generally backward and poor but imperialist Russia before the Bolshevik revolution.
The full restoration of capitalism in China and in the former Soviet bloc countries vindicates the teaching of Comrade Mao that socialism is lost when the revisionist line prevails within the ruling communist or workers’ party and that eventually the bourgeoisie within the party and state succeeds in unleashing a coup and overthrowing the proletariat.
Comrade Mao has bequeathed to us a legacy with which we can combat and defeat modern revisionism and with which we can revive and further develop the forces of socialism. We are alert to and oppose the continuing dangers of revisionism, modern revisionism and other forms of opportunism.
We reaffirm Comrade Mao’s revolutionary theory and practice of continuing revolution under proletarian dictatorship through the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. We condemn the betrayal of socialism and of Comrade Mao’s proletarian revolutionary line by the Liu Shaoqi-Deng Xiaoping clique and the new Chinese bourgeoisie.
We renew our determination and efforts to carry out the historic mission of the proletariat, which is to carry out a new-democratic and socialist revolution and construction. All the evils that have beset the former revisionist-ruled countries drive us to uphold Marxism-Leninism-Maoism against modern revisionism and to pursue the revolutionary cause of socialism.
Upon the temporary success of modern revisionism against Marxism-Leninism and the dictatorship of the proletariat, monopoly capitalism headed by US imperialism has been able to launch the worst attacks against the proletariat and the oppressed peoples, such as “free market” globalization, racism, repression and wars of aggression. In response to the escalation of oppression and exploitation, the proletariat and people are intensifying their resistance through armed struggle and other forms of resistance.
It is not enough to defend Marxism-Leninism and Maoism in order to generate a new upswing in the struggle for genuine socialism. The international Marxist-Leninist and working class movement must draw the lessons from the defeat of socialism by revisionism and from the successes of the 50 years of struggle against revisionism.
The building of Marxist-Leninist parties world-wide, the overcoming of the fragmentation, the strengthening proletarian revolutionary parties closely linked to the masses and their international revolutionary collaboration are the essential ideological, political and organizational preconditions for the liberation of humankind.
It is the internationalist duty of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties to unite and to arouse, organize and mobilize the proletariat and people in their respective countries and in the world at large in the struggle for national liberation, democracy and socialism against imperialism, revisionism and reaction. We renew our commitment to persevere in the revolutionary struggle and strive to win ever-greater victories under the guidance of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. Uphold, defend and advance the teachings of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao!
Reaffirm Marxism-Leninism-Maoism against modern revisionism!
Carry forward the revolution against imperialism, revisionism and reaction!
Glory to the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution!
Long live all Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties!
Long live proletarian internationalism!
Long live Marxism-Leninism-Maoism!
SIGNATORIES as on August 23rd [In alphabetical order (English) by country]:
Afghanistan - Marxist-Leninist Organization of Afghanistan
Argentina - Revolutionary Communist Party of Argentina*
Belarus - Revolutionary Communist Group ‘Red Wedge’
Bolivia - Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist) of Bolivia
Brazil - Communist Party of Brazil (Red Fraction)
Colombia - Colombia Communist Party - Maoist
Germany - Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany
Greece - Communist Party of Greece-ML
Greece - Communist Organization of Greece
India - Communist Party of India (Maoist)
Indonesia - Communist League of Indonesia
Iran - Ranjbaran
Italy - Committee to Support Resistance - for Communism (CARC)
Luxembourg - Communist Organization of Luxemburg
Moldova - Maoist Anti-Imperialist Circle
Netherlands - Group of Marxist-Leninists / Rode Morgen
Panama - Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist) of Panama
Peru - Communist Party of Peru (ML)
Philippines - Communist Party of the Philippines***
Russia - Russian Maoist Party
South Africa - Communist Party of South Africa (ML)
Turkey - Communist Party of Turkey/Marxist-Leninist (TKP/ML)
United States - MLM Revolutionary Study Group****
Uruguay - Revolutionary Communist Party of Uruguay
(Note: Any signatory may qualify its agreement on any point in this declaration with an annotation.)
*Revolutionary Communist Party of Argentina considers: (1) that the bourgeoisie seized power in China during the 12th Plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in December 1978 rather than in 1976 (see 1st paragraph); and (2) that China today is an imperialist country (see 15th paragraph).
***Communist Party of the Philippines regards the Communist Party of China ( CPC ) as the Marxist-Leninist center of the international communist movement in the period after the Communist Party of the Soviet Union became revisionist and before the CPC itself became revisionist (see 5th paragraph).
**** MLM Revolutionary Study Group ( United States ) regards the final goal to be communism worldwide — not socialism, which is the transitional period between capitalism and communism (See paragraph 24). Also, during this transitional period, the enemy of the dictatorship of the proletariat is the new bourgeoisie, which arises from the contradictions of socialism and is concentrated by those in party leadership who are taking the capitalist road (old habits and petty bourgeois thinking among the masses are utilized by this new bourgeoisie, but such features are not the cause of revisionism) (See paragraphs 6 and 7). And MLM RSG regards the “rise to power of revisionism as the rise of the bourgeoisie” and the defeat of the proletariat — not as the beginning of capitalist restoration in a corrupted socialist state. (See paragraphs 2, 4, 8, and 10).
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P.Govindan kutty
Editor, People's March
Hydrabad Blasts Provide An Alibi for adding more Teeth to a Fascist State
Nitin
On August 25, two powerful bombs exploded in a span of ten minutes at an auditorium in Lumbini Park and an eatery called Gokul Chat in the busy Kothi area of Hydrabad city killing 42 people and injuring over a hundred. Exactly hundred days prior to these incidents it was the old city, which had witnessed such a bomb, attack at the holy Muslim shrine of Mecca Masjid on May 18. The bombs, contrary to the claims of the ruling Congress, the Hindu fascist BJP, VHP and others, and by several writers and correspondents of the print and electronic media, were not aimed at the majority Hindu community. Facts show that half of the dead belonged to the Muslim minority. In the Mecca Masjid blasts it was the Muslims alone who had to bear the entire brunt of both the blasts as well as the indiscriminate police firing in the immediate aftermath of the blasts.
The YSR government, without an iota of evidence, came out immediately with irresponsible statements placing the blame for the unfortunate incidents on the Muslim terrorist organizations and the neighbouring countries. The Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy himself claimed on the very next day that there were Bangladeshi and Pakistani connections to the twin explosions that rocked Hydrabad although intelligence agencies had not announced any breakthrough in their investigations. Without giving any details of the investigation, he merely stated that this “dastardly attack against humanity” had similarities with the May 18 blast in Mecca Masjid (in which HuJI operatives were suspected to have links). Denying that there was intelligence failure, he said the police could not be blamed for not foiling a plot hatched in a neighbouring country, and executed here.
The sheer audacity with which they vehemently assert, even without a trace of concrete evidence, that Muslim terrorist organizations and countries like Bangladesh and Pakistan are involved in every bomb blast in India, shows not just the deep-rooted prejudice and hatred towards these entities, but point to a deeper conspiracy to communalize the situation and to seek justification for strengthening the repressive machinery and draconian laws. The impotence of the government is also revealed in the statement made by the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to set up a permanent fund for providing relief to the victims of terror attacks accepting by implication that such terrorist attacks are here to stay and the helpless government can only think of providing relief to the victims.
All in all, the twin bomb blasts in Hydrabad on the evening of August 25 have come as a boon to the crisis-ridden Congress government in Andhra Pradesh led by the cunning and highly corrupt rowdy Chief Minister, YS Rajshekhar Reddy. For months, his government has been facing the ire of the people and almost the entire opposition has stood up against his high-handed corrupt governance. There has been no respite for his government for over a year as one scandal after another, and one issue after another, rocked the state. The bomb blasts, whoever might be the culprits, had helped the beleaguered government, which appealed for the cooperation and unity of all political parties in the hour of crisis to combat terrorism.
Rulers unleash massive repression in the name of combating terrorism:
Every terrorist attack or what is projected to the public as a terrorist attack, has been used by the reactionary ruling classes to strengthen the state’s repressive machinery and the draconian laws. The ruling classes to suppress the people’s movements rather than really containing terrorism have used these. They have also been misused by the ruling parties against their opponents as done by the AIDMK’s Jayalalitha when she was in power in Tamil Nadu, against the innocent Muslims in Gujarat by Narendra Modi and by the rulers in Kashmir, against tribals in Jharkhand, and so on.
The tactic of the rulers is to create a sense of insecurity among the public by pointing to the terrorist attacks, which kill innocent people. If no terrorist bombing takes place the security forces themselves would at times create such incidents in order to instill such a sense of insecurity among the people. There is sufficient ground to suspect the hand of the security agencies and politicians themselves in some of these incidents as proved time and again in Kashmir, North East, Salwa Judum atrocities in Chattisgarh and elsewhere in order to equip themselves with unbridled powers and obtain legitimacy from the public. Creating a sense of insecurity among the people at large and showing the ghost of terrorism by enacting a few deadly attacks is all that is required by the political parties and the security agencies to acquire legitimacy for their acts of suppression. The same cold calculated tenor of the Nazis could be heard in the voices of the political leaders and the police officials in the wake of the Hydrabad blasts.
For instance, the BJP leader L.K. Advani, who visited the blast sites, demanded that the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) be revived to serve as a deterrent for terrorists. He urged the Centre and the States to adopt “zero tolerance” towards terrorism. He barked that “Minorityism” was a “dangerous cult” which jeopardized the country’s security and that it was developed simply for the sake of “vote-banks”. His claims that POTA can reduce incidents of terrorism are hollow and against facts. Several incidents like the strikes on the Parliament, Akshardham temple, Red Fort etc took place when this draconian Act was in place.
The entire country knows how this neo-Nazi leader of the Hindu fascist thugs had misused POTA during the NDA regime to throw thousands of Muslims behind bars and how the notorious murderer, Narendra Modi, had used POTA as a weapon of mass detention of innocent Muslims in Gujarat. These fascist thugs are the real culprits who had given birth to minority terrorism due to their “zero tolerance” not towards terrorism but the minority Muslim community itself. Another Hindu fascist leader of the BJP, Venkayya Naidu, demanded that every house in Hydrabad, Nalgonda, Kamareddy, Nizamabad, Tadepalligudem and other such towns in AP where Muslims reside in considerable numbers be searched for terrorists. In the eyes of this Hindu fascist, every Muslim is a suspect.
While LK Advani lost no opportunity to target the Congress regime as “soft on terror” citing repeal of Pota as an example, the Congress, on the other hand, showed that it could act tough enough by hinting at a revival of the notorious Andhra Pradesh Control of Organized Crime Act (APCOCA). The APCOCA was allowed to lapse by the Y S Rajasekhara Reddy regime in November 2004 due to people’s strong opposition and the stubborn stand taken by Muslim leaders against special terror laws. The Chairman of the so-called Anti-Terrorist Front sponsored by the state, Manvinder Singh Bittta, after visiting the victims of the blasts called for “Anti-Terrorist Military Courts” to try the “terrorists” and to convict them within six months. Saying that “bullet should be met with bullet”, he demanded the repeal of the provision for referring cases of death sentences of those connected with terrorist acts for clemency to the President of India. He demanded that Afzal Guru be executed immediately (This scab of the ruling classes naturally cares a hoot to the public outrage over the grossly unjust and biased trial of Afzal Guru).The frenzy continued at a high pitch and a top defense scientist of the Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) warned that “the threat of terrorists carrying out small-scale nuclear, biological and chemical (NBC) strikes in India is ‘imminent’ and hence India needs to be prepared as many countries that have stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction could deliver these to the terrorists.”
One newspaper wrote “India has since 2004 lost more lives to terrorist incidents than all of North America, South America, Central America, Europe and Eurasia put together. All of these vast swathes of the globe lost a total of 3,280 lives in terrorist incidents between January 2004 and March this year. India alone lost 3,674 lives over the same period of three years and three months.” The paper deliberately avoids mentioning the fact that incomparably greater numbers of lives were lost in state and state-sponsored terrorist violence during the same period in India than those killed in so-called terrorist violence. In the state of Chattisgarh alone over 600 innocent tribals were brutally murdered by state and state-sponsored gangs in the last 2 ½ year period. In the state of Kashmir, killings and disappearances (euphemism for abduction by the security forces), rape of women has become a daily event. In Andhra Pradesh, murder of revolutionary activists and sympathizers goes on unabated in fake encounters.
An atmosphere of panic and insecurity was deliberately whipped up by the police officials, bureaucrats and political leaders with the aim of stepping up repressive measures. Police claimed to have found 19 unexploded bombs at bus stops, theatres, road junctions, and pedestrian bridges and near public water tap. The police with a view to create a state of paranoia in the public mind could as well cook all this up claims. In fact, such state-sponsored incidents are not uncommon in the political history of AP. In 1991, the ruling class politicians for their narrow political gains set off communal riots. The present fascist regime of YSR is itching to create such communal riots and achieve political gains.
The police further claimed that huge quantities of explosives had been transported by the foreign-based terrorists to Andhra Pradesh and other southern states, besides other states in the country, to unleash death and destruction, that no place in the country is safe now for the common citizen as any place of public gathering can be a soft target for the terrorists, that the terrorists are planning to hit the state in its belly by targeting vital installations and economic hubs, that south has become a recruiting hub for terrorists, and so on. There has been hectic activity by the police to carry out a special security plan for the IT corridors, with armed guards and check-posts. A separate Cyberabad Security Council was formed sometime back encompassing 130 software firms. The Chief Minister’s security was increased to 338 policemen including 2 SPs and 13 DySPs mainly to protect him from a probable Naxal attack.
The Centre sounded an alert and asked all state governments to tighten security and intensify the Intelligence network. More than 700 “suspicious elements” have been arrested in Chennai with the pretext of pre-empting such terrorist strikes in Tamil Nadu. All these are poor hapless citizens. 53 check-posts have been installed in and around the city and all vehicles entering Chennai are allowed only after thorough checking.
Andhra Pradesh will revive the Control of Organized Crimes Act and constitute an expert committee to counter ISI activities, the state home minister, Mr. K Jana Reddy, said after an all-party meeting. TNCOCA will be revived with some modifications.
Thus, by whipping up such frenzy against neighbouring Islamic countries and Muslim organizations within the country, and warning that terror strikes could take place anytime and anywhere in the country, legitimacy is being sought for a revival of the draconian Acts in the name of protecting the people from terrorism.
Anti Terrorist Squads: A new state terrorist outfit to terrorize the people in the name of anti-terrorism
Within ten days after the twin blasts in Hydrabad the government announced the setting up of an elite intelligence-cum-combat crack force called Anti-Terrorist Squad similar to the Greyhounds to tackle ‘terrorism’. On September 7, the Home Minister revealed the details of this new force. Christened OCTOPUS or Organization to Counter Terrorist Operations, this force will comprise 13,000 personnel. It will be headed by an Additional DGP and will have basically three wings: Intelligence & Analysis Wing, Technical Intelligence Wing and Research & Analysis Wing with branches at city, district and state levels. The formation of the ATS will be completed within a period of 1 ½ months. Huge funds to the tune of Rs. 300 crores have been already sanctioned for this ATS for terrorizing common people, particularly the Muslims, in the name of containing terrorism. The Muslim community of Hydrabad has been a target of state terror since long and thousands had been implicated in false cases and harassed continuously. Police high-handedness during the Mecca Masjid blasts a few months ago is still fresh in one’s memory. Some say that more people had died in the indiscriminate police firing on Muslims than in the blasts.
Lack of harmony between the main wing looking after political intelligence, the APSIB (State Intelligence Bureau), the VIP security wing, and the Special Branch has been identified as a major cause for the overall failure in anticipating the bomb blasts. The APSIB was set up exclusively for the purpose of checking Naxal activities while the Special Branch looks after field operations in each district. Instead of achieving coordination between these various wings the government is planning to set up yet another lawless institution called the ATS to terrorize the people.
As it is, the 10,000-strong city police force, assisted by several Rapid Action Force platoons, are continuing their vigil, searching, questioning and harassing anyone they like. The notorious Greyhounds forces kill people at will; destroy their property and rape hapless women. On 20th of August, the rape of 11 tribal women by these mercenary goondas in Vishakhapatnam tribal tract had created a furor in the state. A month earlier eight people died in the indiscriminate firing on protestors by these Greyhounds during a bandh in Mudigonda in Khammam district. These forces, along with the other special police forces, are obsessed with providing security to VIPs and VVIPs so that most of the force is said to be engaged in this single task of providing security to political leaders and cruel officers from probable Naxal attacks. A police officer himself wailed that there is no security to the common man despite Andhra Pradesh having such a huge well-trained elite crack force, and that most of the funds meant for the police department are consumed by these elite forces while the other wings are badly in dearth of funds. Political intervention in police postings too is cited as a reason for the inefficiency and lack of motivation and drive in the department. To cite one example, the Hydrabad city police commissioner was changed four times in just a span of three years.
The Hydrabad blasts had triggered off a series of measures aimed at strengthening the repressive machinery in neighbouring states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala, besides Andhra Pradesh, in the name of maintaining security. The Centre had also decided to deploy more security forces to the four southern states of AP, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala.
The Kerala Government has decided to raise 14 anti-terrorist squads in the wake of the Hydrabad blasts. The men for the proposed squads will be trained at the various facilities of the National Security Guards (NSG), Intelligence Bureau, the Border Security Force, the Central Reserve Police Force and the Tamil Nadu Police Commando School. The police recently acquired a portable X-ray machine from Belgium for scanning suspect baggage at railway stations and bus stands. A scanner has been bought for detecting explosive devices and substances concealed in parcels, particularly mail bombs. The squads are equipped with modern Russian equipment for detecting improvised explosive devices. Electromagnetic waves from the machines can sense electronic circuits in a wide area and identify the types used in remote-controlled bombs or those triggered by timing devices.
Mumbai already has such an ATS, which is headed by an IG who acts as the Joint Commissioner, two DIGs as Additional Commissioners, four SPs, several DySPs and over 300 personnel. It coordinates with the central Intelligence bureau and the RAW. This notorious lawless force is known for its concocted stories of terrorist strike plans such as Lashkar-e-Toiba terrorists’ alleged plan to blast Ajantha Caves. There are such squads in Delhi and Karnataka also.
These squads are not answerable to anyone for their unlawful activities such as murders in the name of encounters. They have enormous unaccounted funds and unlimited powers. The history of the APSIB and Greyhounds in AP, and the ATS in Mumbai show that setting up such lawless forces will further erode the basic human rights and fundamental freedoms of the common citizen guaranteed by the Indian Constitution and will further fuel terrorism.
Lawlessness of the police is a universally known fact. It sees light only when it is caught in a camera as the recent Bhagalpur atrocity of a petty thief being dragged by tying him to a motorcycle illustrated, or has a solid witness who can withstand boldly notwithstanding police threats—a rare thing to happen in our country. Even more alarming is the attitude of the successive governments in the police state of AP. When it is crystal clear that the Greyhounds had committed gory atrocities like murder of Naxalites after being caught and has well-recorded evidence enough to place the culprits behind bars, every government in AP had patted these goons for their achievement and gave special incentives like rewards and promotions. Now, one can imagine how miserable the life of the ordinary citizen would be when these trigger-happy, blood-thirsty gangs called ATS roam the streets equipped with unbridled powers under an equally callous, irresponsible and lawless, in short a fascist government that cares a hoot for the democratic rights of the people.
The plight of the Muslim citizens, in particular, would become unimaginable. Hydrabad is already notorious for the arrests, tortures, killings, and harassment of Muslims. It was one of the reasons for the Muslims to vote overwhelmingly against the TDP regime. Under YSR’s fascist regime it has been no different. The scenes captured by TV cameras in the aftermath of the Mecca blasts speak volumes of the high-handedness of the police of Hydria. Their communal bias further motivates them to unleash savage brutalities on hapless Muslims in the name of countering terrorists. The danger of arresting and torturing innocent Muslims to obtain information looms large.
In fact, whenever a major attack or crime takes place it is the common practice of the police to arrest some innocent person or a petty thief and claim to have achieved a break-through in the case by showing the hapless person who had accepted the crime under duress. Every terrorist attack will now be “solved” by producing such terrorists from the common Muslim masses. A news report on 31st of August cited how two men, a doctor and an employee in a restaurant, were picked up and interrogated for several hours on suspicion that they were the persons who had planted the bombs. The police rationale behind these arrests was that they had similarities with the sketch of the bomb planter in Lumbini Park prepared by a computer graphics expert and released throughout the state by the police department. Attracted by the rewards announced by the police someone called up the police that a person bearing similar features to the sketch was traveling from Nalgonda to Hydria. And immediately our great heroes swung into action arresting one Rakesh Singh from Haryana who was working in a Hydrabad restaurant.
In the second case of doctor Javed someone had informed that he was from Jammu & Kashmir and that was enough to send alarm bells in the ears of the brainless police. But after interrogation they found that he was a local resident. This shows how indiscriminately the police could act and just because one has some similarities with the accused or is said to hail from Kashmir how he/she has to face police harassment. City police commissioner Balvinder Singh said that the police regarding suspicious persons bearing similarities with the photos released by the police received 700 such phone calls. So a veritable hell awaits the common man due the highhanded behavior of the police goons. If the person in question has no social standing he would undoubtedly land up in jail and touted as one of the key leaders in the blasts. Such is the behavioral pattern and method employed by the police and the intelligence agencies. How many more such innocent citizens will have to bear the brunt of police baton is anybody’s guess.
Draconian Measures and continuing injustice and discrimination towards the Muslims would further fuel Terrorism:
The root causes for the emergence of Islamic terrorism should be fully grasped in order to find a lasting solution. It is a highly mistaken and mischievous theory that foreign-based terrorists could create havoc endlessly on Indian soil and that Indian Muslims would become prey to the machinations of such forces. The growth of Islamic terrorism is an offshoot of the gross discrimination, communal bias, Hindu fascist attacks, and the alienation of the average Muslim from the mainstream of the Indian society. The callousness and deliberate conspiracy of the ruling classes to divide and rule the people had aggravated the situation.
The worst communal carnage in Mumbai in 1992 perpetrated by the Congress and the Hindu fascist gangs against the Muslims cries for justice even to this day. Justice Sri Krishna Report has been put under the rug despite popular demand to implement its recommendations as several Shiv sena leaders such as Bal Thackeray, and some Congress leaders were indicted by the Report. The culprits involved in Babri Masjid demolition had ruled the country for long and are allowed to deliver inflammatory lectures against the Muslims to this day. The perpetrators of the worst-ever genocide in Gujarat occupy the high pedestals of power and continue to arrest and kill innocents from the Muslim community. In Kashmir over 80,000 Muslims had been decimated since 1989 and atrocities by the Indian security forces continue unabated. In fact, no report of any commission that had indicted Hindu fascist leaders and police officials had been implemented. The fate of the reports of all commissions appointed during the period since 1947 points to this stark truth. Whether it is the Jabalpur riots of 1961, Bhiwandi riots in 1970, Jamshedpur in 1979, Meerut in 1982, Bhagalpur in 1989, or the 1992 Mumbai riots, the story is same. A story of deliberate negligence and suppression of truth, and protection of the most rabid Hindu communalists and communally biased police officials from the laws of the land.
In sharp contrast, one can witness the enthusiasm with which judgments are passed against Muslims and the rejoicing of the Hindu fascists over these judgments. Anyone watching the sentences awarded to Muslims in the 1993 Mumbai blasts, and the gross apathy and criminal negligence with regard to the culprits who had instigated the Mumbai riots in the wake of the Babri demolition a year before the blasts (and so clearly recorded by the Sri Krishna commission and submitted as far back as 1998), would know that we are living in a system that is highly biased against the Muslim minority.
Every atrocity and discrimination against the Muslim citizen is bound to create a desperate urge for revenge and retaliation. Every wrong confinement or prosecution of a Muslim will create the basis for the birth of several more terrorists. The angry reaction of the average Kashmiri citizen to an ugly incident on July 22 in Kashmir—the rape of a minor girl by the Indian army jawans—showed where the breeding ground for terrorism lies. When the chief of LeT, Hafeez Mohammed, angrily declared that from now on retaliatory violence is the only answer to such atrocities he was voicing the anger and sentiment of the Kashmiris who are forced to live with such army atrocities. There is no end to the list of atrocities against the Muslim masses. Besides, the average Muslim is worse off by any count than his Hindi counterpart. Poverty, landlessness, unemployment, and destitution are the bane of the Muslim population.
What else will all these generate except hatred, righteous indignation and frustration among the Muslim masses in general? Without understanding these ground realities one cannot understand why youth are attracted towards the holy Jihad or gladly volunteer to become suicide bombers.
Until the root causes for the alienation of the Muslim masses are addressed, until the perpetrators of worst-ever crimes against the Muslim masses remain unpunished, until a sense of security and equality is brought into the minds of the average Muslim, it is unlikely that any repressive measure would bring beneficial results. On the contrary, these would prove to be counter-productive and fan the fires of terrorism further.
Overall, the reenactment of APCOCA and the setting up of ATS in AP and similar measures in other states would further fuel terrorism. The greater the state resorts to repressive measures violating the fundamental rights of the people including their basic right to life, the greater will be the reaction from the masses. And those innocent Muslim citizens who become victims of savage brutality of the ATS and other khaki goons are forced to support terrorism or become terrorists themselves in order to take revenge on the perpetrators. This stark fact is proved by history.
In Iraq and Afghanistan, the more the imperialist forces commit atrocities on the people the more their cries of revenge are renting the air. The US and other imperialists had fuelled terrorism everywhere in the world and transformed it into a global phenomenon by perpetrating indescribable atrocities on the Muslim masses at large in the name of fighting global terrorism. The fascist regimes in various states such as that of YSR in AP and Sonia’s at the Centre will promote terrorism and help in its proliferation to the four corners of the country if they continue to strengthen the forces that kill at will and go scot-free.
We must all realize the great danger in the moves of the ruling classes to revive repressive Acts and set up gangs such as ATS with extra-constitutional powers. Instead of reducing acts of terrorism, as these measures are supposed to do, they would further increase terrorism to
the extent that it would make the lives of the people really insecure. Moreover, these measures, though claiming to be directed at the terrorists, are actually intended to suppress all democratic people’s movements, besides being misused against the common masses. We must resolutely oppose this fascisation of the state, communalization of the police force, and the conspiracies of the ruling classes to suppress the people’s movements against their reactionary anti-people policies. We must build a broad-based united democratic people’s movement to scrap all black Acts and institutions like the ATS and Greyhounds.
Gohana and Casteist bias of the Indian State
Suman
As usual after the murder of dalit youth leader, Rakesh Kumar (alias Lara) the police instead of nabbing the Jat murderers went on a rampage against the protesting dalits. Rakesh, aged 26, was a leading activist of the community in the area. Exactly two years back on this very same day a Jat financier was killed and in retaliation the Jats burned down all the dalit houses. Rakesh, and activist, was one of the accused in the killing. In 2006 Rakesh was acquitted of the murder of the Jat financier from neighboring Garhwal village. This angered the feudal Jat community and on the very day, August 27th, while Rakesh and a friend were walking three men on a motorcycle shot him dead.
Rakesh was a popular leader amongst the dalits and as news spread of the murder dalits from all over the area came on the streets ad burnt buses of the roadways and even a police check-post. The next day a Haryana Bandh call was given. On 28th morning when the police brought the body in a truck from the PGIMS, Rohtak, and handed it over to the local ‘peace committee’ in the local Valmiki Basti, all hell broke loose and the body was not allowed to be cremated till the evening. Violence spread to the whole state and even neighboring Punjab. Dalits were further angered by police inaction against the culprits and instead the launching of brutal attacks on the dalits and arresting many. There are also rumors that it could have been the police that killed Rakesh.
Gohana and neighboring areas were virtually turned into a police camp to protect the jats from dalit anger. In a military style operation eight companies of police were deployed in and around the town after dividing the area in as many sectors, each supervised by a duty magistrate. Till today a CRPF camp exists in the dalit basti of Gohana. In fact the police and upper-caste terror is at such a level that the dalits have left the village and only began returning around mid-September.
‘Dalit’ Congress dalals were rushed to the area to pacify the dalits. Ramdas Athawale was flown in from far-away Maharashtra that very day and even Buta Singh and Dashpath Ratan Ravan (ADI Dharam Samaj president) reached by the evening. To divert the anger the Chief Minister ordered an inquiry, but that too by the casteist SDM. The report was to be out in 15 days but till now there is no news. Till today the main culprits , Dinesh and Prahalad, have not been arrested and three mock arrests have been done of some lumpens who have recently been released from jail.
It is quite clear seeing the attitude of the State that the dalits of Gohana will never get justice. The semi-feudal jat elite are hand-in-glove with the establishment. The State will only act on their behalf.
This caste bias of the State is not only seen in such horrific atrocities on dalits but even in the bureaucracy and the judiciary.
So for example, in February 2007 Indian officials denied the very existence of caste discrimination and untouchability in India before a leading UN Human Rights body — The Committee in Charge of monitoring and implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. The very Indian solicitor general flatly denied that caste discrimination was something that the outside world should care about.
Worst still was the reported judgment of the Supreme Court on the question of reservation. While there are limitations to the reservation question in meting justice the statements made by the 5-judge bench were outright casteist and derogatory. The bench was hearing a batch of petitions assailing the provisions of the Central Education Institutions (Reservation in Admission) Act, 2006 providing 27% OBC quota. The ‘respected’ judges said that it upsets the harmony in society and that “this type of reservation is nothing but reverse discrimination”. They added “what upsets harmony in society is a brazenly political measure masquerading as social justice without doing the basic exercise”.
No doubt the ‘harmony’ of the elite, including the judges, will be affected by such reservations. The judges forget that today 40% of all judges in the higher courts have been Brahmans (and 47% of the Chief Justices), while brahmans constitute only 6.4% of the population. On the other hand only 3% of the judges in the higher courts are from SC/ST background though they comprise over 25% of the population. So what is the trash of reverse reservations that these judges are talking about?
Now a judge of the UP High Court has in an official judgment called on every one must read the Gita. In his judgment he said “It is the duty of every citizen under Article 51-A of the Constitution of India, irrespective of caste, creed or RELIGION, to follow dharma as propounded by the Gita”.
So we see that whether it is the police, the bureaucracy, and the judiciary or for that matter any other arm of the state they are all imbibed with the feudal brahminical outlook which looks down on the oppressed castes, particularly the dalits. Caste oppression and caste discrimination is an effective tool to keep the most oppressed sections of society in a de-humanized state subservient to the elite. The ruling feudal elite utilizes upper-caste affinity to isolate the dalits and crush them as was seen in Gohana. The majority of Jats are poverty striken yet they follow their elders in the anti-dalit hysteria being whipped up. Backwardness and the feudal mind-set allow this age-old custom to continue, poisoning society.
If the dalits of Gohana are to achieve justice they cannot rely on any of the wings of the state machinery nor the dalit ruling class agents (like Mayawati, Paswan, etc) who exchange dalit blood and self-respect for votes. Dalits can only achieve justice by joining the revolutionary mainstream in the country and administering justice through people’s courts held in the villages themselves.
Meanwhile, as we go to the press the news is coming in of yet another murder of a dalit by upper-castes of Razapur village in Gaziabad district near Delhi. Here too instead of arresting the culprits, thoroughly beat up the family of the victim. Again the dalits were furious; they blocked the highway and smashed busses. In yet another incident at Kanpur the dead bodies of two dalit boys were found with their eyes gouged out. The dalits retaliated by blocing the GT road and damaging dozens of vehicles. And in yet another incident at Patna (Shivala Mushari) boiling dal was poured on a mother and her infant child and women were beaten up when upper castes objected dalit children playing in the temple complex.
Maoists attack Mass Murderer and former chief minister Janardhan Reddy
Nitin
In the early hours of September 8th, a Maoist Special Action Team deputed by the CPI (Maoist) party in Andhra Pradesh carried out a daring attack on the former chief minister Nedurumalli Janardhan Reddy a few kilometers from his hometown of Vakadu in Nellore district bordering Tamil Nadu when he was proceeding to Tirupati to receive his honorary doctorate from Sri Venkateswara University. He, along with his wife Rajyalaxmi, who is a senior minister in the YS Rajasekhar Reddy’s state cabinet, were traveling in their car accompanied by a convoy of 26 cars including three security vehicles. Janardhan Reddy’s car, second in the convoy, was traveling at a speed of 90 kilometers when the blast took place missing it by a fraction of a second. The mine hit the fourth car in which two of his closest aides and important Congress leaders were traveling and they were killed on the spot along with the driver.
Janardhan Reddy is one of the three VVIPs who have Z category security in the state the other two being former chief minister Chandrababu Naidu and the present chief minister YS Rajashekhar Reddy. Immediately after the attack various Congress leaders from Sonia Gandhi to the local politicians conveyed their sympathy for the former chief minister. The leaders of the opposition, including the revisionist CPI and CPI(M), condemned the attack. After all, Janardhan Reddy is one of their own packs of ruling class leaders never mind if the color of his party is different.
In spite of their daily boasting that Maoists are no longer a threat, that they have been almost wiped out in the state, that Andhra Pradesh is a model state to the entire country on how to contain the Maoist movement and so on, these ruling class vultures virtually shiver with fear when they think of the Maoists. So much is their panic and obsession about their security that in the first week of September the incumbent chief minister increased his protection massively with the total strength of the force reaching 338 armed personnel. A year after his assumption of power a new mansion was constructed as a massive fortress at a huge cost to the exchequer. The strength of the special anti-Naxal force of Greyhounds has been doubled. Virtually every politician lobbies with the government and the police top brass to provide him/her with greater force for protection of their families and ill-gotten property. And this becomes virtually a stampede in front of the office of the chief minister and home minister whenever the Maoists hit a ruling party leader.
Notorious Mass Murderer:
Former Chief Minister Janardhan Reddy was notorious for unleashing large-scale terror on the revolutionary masses of Andhra Pradesh during the first half of 1990s. He succeeded Chenna Reddy as the Chief Minster in December 1990 and continued in power for a period of 3 ½ years. It was during his brutal reign of terror that the then CPI(ML)[People’s War] was banned along with six other revolutionary mass organizations.
The brutal terror was unleashed to suppress the growing tide of mass upsurge, which continued throughout 1990. The reactionary ruling classes were shaken to the hilt when a million peasants gathered for the conference of Rythu Coolie Sangham (Landless Peasant Association) in Warangal in May 1990. Lakhs of acres of forestland and lands of the big landlords were occupied by the landless. The ruling classes realized that if this militant mass movement and mobilization was allowed to continue the tide would wash away their seats of power. Hence communal riots were provoked in Hydrabad city and showing it as a pretext Chenna Reddy was removed in less than a year and Janardhan Reddy was brought to wield the reins of power.
After taking over the reins as chief minister this butcher massacred over 400 revolutionaries including the then Secretary of AP State Committee of CPI(ML)[People’s War], comrade Puli Anjanna (Sagar), State Committee member comrade Venkataswamy (Suryam), Regional Committee member and Singareni District Party Committee secretary comrade Katla Mallesh, Nizamabad district committee secretary and regional committee member comrade Shankar, district committee member comrade Padma, all of whom were legendary figures at that time. Several area committee members, professional revolutionaries, commanders and fighters of guerrilla squads, ordinary party members, members of revolutionary mass organizations, and revolutionary masses became martyrs during this period.
All fundamental rights of the people guaranteed by the Indian Constitution, however nominal they might have been, have altogether disappeared under Janardhan Reddy’s regime. Civil liberties of the citizens were trampled underfoot. The basic human right to life was snatched away. He turned Andhra Pradesh into literally a police state. It was the IPS officers who ruled the state, a phenomenon, which has been the hallmark of the state of Andhra Pradesh under every successive government since 1985. If the first undeclared war against the Maoist movement was unleashed by the preceding NTR government that was ousted out of power in the elections in end 1989, Janardhan Reddy took this war to a new peak and his fascist military offensive is described by the Maoists as the second undeclared war beginning in 1991. The terror that the police had begun to unleash during this period continued during the brief period of his successor, Vijaybhaskar Reddy, whose last days saw the massacre of revolutionary youth on a scale that was unheard of before. In just one week in December 1994, for instance, 36 youth were picked up and murdered. So much was the unbridled freedom given to the police in the state. No wonder, Maoists chose to pay back his due even after a decade had passed. Presently Janardhan Reddy continues to be an important leader of the ruling Congress and a Member of Parliament. He is behind every fascist measure taken by YSR’s government and the murder of several important leaders of CPI(Maoist) such as comrades Rajamouli, Chandramouli, Madhav, Yadanna, Sridhar, Raghavulu, Venkatesam, Somanna, Karuna, Prashanti and other revolutionaries. Vakadu blast creates a crisis in the ruling party:
Although Janardhan Reddy had survived the landmine blast triggered off by the Maoists, the attack had created a crisis within the ruling party. Janardhan Reddy, after recovering from the shock of the blast, blamed not only the intelligence agencies for their lapses in anticipating the attack, but also accused the government for its failure to provide him with sufficient security and not checking the route he was traveling for probable landmines. There was all round criticism of the police personnel who were providing security cover to the former chief minister for not venturing to go after the Maoists after they had triggered the landmine even after seeing them retreating from the site of the incident. More so as it was broad daylight and a terrain that is totally a plain.
The politicians of the ruling Congress party in the various districts of Andhra Pradesh fled to Hydrabad immediately following the Vakadu attack fearing for their own safety. They demanded the government to provide more protection to them and their families. Some like the central minister from Andhra Pradesh, Panabaki Laxmi, complained about the poor fighting qualities of the personnel guarding them. The Chief Minister assured the ministers and leaders of his party that more forces would be deployed to prevent such attacks in future.
The Vakadu incident showed how the Maoists, even if they had become weaker due to the continuous attacks by the Greyhounds, central paramilitary forces and other special police forces, can still deliver effective blows on the parasitic ruling class by adopting guerrilla methods of warfare and executing the plans with courage and determination. In fact, the attack on the former chief minister was not an easy job. It had to be executed in a plain terrain with hardly any cover to hide. It had to be executed according to the programme of the target and not in the dead of the night, which is the most convenient time for the guerrillas to retreat safely.
As the target was proceeding in the early morning to Tirupati for receiving a doctorate from the University there, the plan had to be executed in daylight. The guerrillas thus showed great courage and dare-devilry in choosing such a time and terrain for launching the attack. And it is this factor, which had unnerved the police and the politicians most. The attack in Vakadu has brought home the fact that no place could be a safe zone for the reactionary leaders and cruel police officers. Vakadu has proved that Maoists can strike anywhere and at anytime and that they will punish those who had played holi (the famous Indian festival of colours) with the blood of the revolutionary masses. It also shattered the myth floated by the YSR government that Maoist movement is finished in Andhra Pradesh. The fascist Rajashekhar Reddy government will, no doubt, let loose more of his blood-hounds to eliminate the Maoists and unleash more brutal repression in the areas of armed struggle led by the CPI(Maoist). But, as history has proved time and again, every act of repression breeds greater resistance. Maoist guerrillas are bound to step up their resistance and carry out counteroffensives as an answer to the brutal offensive of the police state in AP.
The Fairy Tale of CPM’s Industrialization and development
Dr Gupta
The imperialist powers with the USA at the head, imposes on India a ‘development model’ that suits their interests. The western capitalist model is preached as an alternative to the socialist model and this in turn is adopted and preached by the leaders from Manmohan Singh, Narendra Modi to Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee. The curious aspect of it is that even for the capitalist mode of production, England, France etc. had to launch deadly attacks on and then abolish feudalism while the USA had to successfully carry out the war of independence from the British Empire. The World Bank, IMF, and such imperialist agencies do have a strong control over the Indian economy and the state, and semi-feudal land relations do control the villages. In such a situation even the fond hope of smooth capitalist development or even the western type of industrialization is never to be fruitful. The imperialist organizations push the one-size-fits-all view knowing fully well that such ‘industrial development’ in countries like India results in actually a greater and greater dependence on them.
A few facts from the European experience are necessary to make things clear. In the early stage of the industrial revolution, there was extreme misery of the common masses in the cities. However, in the later stage the unemployment caused by a new economic drive was mostly absorbed. In England this industrial revolution was preceded by and accompanied with the breakdown of the feudal system, a commercial revolution based on the rapid growth of long distance trade, accumulation of capital from the rural sector, new classes occupying the State machinery, unification of the emerging home market, a new culture, secular values etc. Simultaneously with the main internal factors, the loot of countries like India made an industrial revolution possible. England, despite the new and old socio-economic problems, particularly unemployment, could stay afloat and proceed through some other solutions. England could transport vast number of unemployed called “vagabonds” to Australia, while many Irish and a large number of other people could land in the New Land called America. Besides that England could send quite a considerable section of its population to India and other colonies, thanks to the huge fortune opened by the might of the colonial state.
Britain exported 20 million people from the 16th century to the early 20th century. While the steam engine and power loom played the pivotal role in the industrial revolution, in that early stage along with other measures as mentioned above the Poor Law rationalized state support of the poor in line with laissez-faire doctrines. To be specific, industrialization of England, obviously not depending on imperialism as in case of India, had to pass through 3 stages. The initial phase (1760-1840) started with the cotton mills, the second phase (1840-1875) came with growing use of the steam engine, the third stage (sometimes known as the Scientific-technical revolution) began in the late 1800s involving the development of steel, chemical, electricity industries and then in the 20th century it developed with the automobiles and later with petro chemicals, computers, etc. It is absurd for India to even imagine to negotiate a similar path of industrialization.
After World War II, in the age of neo-colonialism, the oligopolistic multinational corporation of the West began pouring capital into countries like India as a mode of expansion with the direct assistance of the client states and the power of the IMF, World Bank, etc. facilitating an “investment climate”. It is nonsensical to think that multinational capital, World Bank ‘assistance’, IMF prescriptions, etc, will ‘develop’ India and allow a really indigenous’ process of industrialization.
Unlike in Europe where the new technology at that formative stage of industrialization was definitely labor-intensive to absorb a huge chunk of the labor force, the current technology itself is extremely capital-intensive with minimum absorption capability. When Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee repeats the mantra that the ‘industrialization’ drive in West Bengal is for giving jobs to the unemployed, one understands it is a hoax in the present stage of highly capital-intensive modern technology. The present ‘industrialization’ drive induced by the World Bank, IMF, etc., to follow the one-dimensional Western model of capitalism (which even cannot succeed) is disastrous for the people already steeped in misery. In our country the ruling classes and their parties like the CPM, Congress, BJP, etc. day dream that an “emerging tiger” like India with more than 9 per cent growth may have their own colonies elsewhere with the imperialist masters turning reclusive, tying blinkers on their eyes. Besides all these above factors, one cannot afford to ignore the ecological aspects of the impending disaster on a vast scale caused by the destruction of nature associated with big industries, urbanization, etc.
The ‘industrialization’ drive is a part of the so-called reforms programme imposed on India by imperialism and accepted by the Central and all State Governments. It is no wonder that the CPM in West Bengal, the BJP in Gujarat or the Janata Dal in Orissa have now concentrated on ‘industrialization’ with infrastructural development and SEZs. The story of employment generation as the CPM is propagating is simply false. Corporate industrialization can never generate more than a little direct employment. Facts tell us about near constant employment figures in the past one and a half decades in absolute terms. The story of a spate of ancillary industries that absorb the peasants dispossessed of their lands through indirect employment after the operation of the Tata car factory is patently false. The votaries of the neo-liberal policy do not disclose the harsh reality that even while employment is created for some people directly and indirectly by such industries, there is a simultaneous reduction of employment in activities supplanted by such corporate industrialization. We leave aside here the other very relevant questions like urbanization or spawning real estate business, etc. being passed off for industrialization in India. In fact, if the output of such corporate units do not meet the demands of large sections of the masses, or real wages are not increased adequately with labor productivity to expand aggregate demand, such corporate units of industrial barons will have little relevance in respect of net employment and fulfillment of the needs of the masses of people. Thus tall talk about employment generation through steel plants in Purulia, the car factories in Singur or the Chemical Hub in Nandigram are nothing but the pursuit of profit under globalization and such false promises are made to elicit consent of the peasant masses for whom displacement holds out a doomed future.
The ‘Left Front’ government has decided to forcibly acquire at least 1 lakh 40 thousand acres of land. Out of this acquisition, notices have been served or are being served on 40 thousand acres of land. On one lakh forty thousand acres of land the peasant households will be more than 5 lakhs. Among these families there are recorded and unrecorded bargadars, agricultural laborers, etc. So if 5 members on an average constitute a household then that huge land acquisition will displace 25 lakh peasants.
According to Walter Fernandez, director of the Guwahati based North Eastern Social Research Centre, after an intensive survey on displacement and rehabilitation; the glaring scenario is like this “During 1947-2000, development projects in West Bengal have used 47 lakh acres of land and affected 70 lakh people. Thirty-Six lakh were displaced (DP) and 34 lakh deprived of livelihood without being physically relocated (project affected people, or PAP). Our studies point to 60 million DP/PAP during 1947-2000 all over India. That would put over 10 percent of them in West Bengal. As for the type of DP/PAP, tribals are 6 percent of the state’s population but 20 percent of its DP/PAP. Dalits are 30 percent and another 20 percent are the poorest of the backwards, such as fish and quarry workers. In the rest of India too, more that 40 percent of the 60 million DP/PAP are tribal and 20 percent are Dalits and backwards. However, 80 percent of them are voiceless.
That perhaps explains the poor rehabilitation record West Bengal has rehabilitated only 9 percent of the DPs, most of them of the Damodar Valley projects in the 1950s and the World Bank funded projects in the 1980s. The state boasts of a people’s government but its rehabilitation record is abysmal.”
Secondly, at this stage of global crisis of capitalism, the apologists of ‘industrialization’ scream relentlessly that it would be right at this moment to shift the surplus labor from agriculture to industry. It is another lie. The CPM mouthpiece Ganashakti (07.06.2007) itself ‘inadvertently’ disclosed that the annual report of the Central Labour Bureau has made a detailed state-wise survey on the industries in India. The Survey has found that the investment on labor is steadily decreasing in comparison to expenses on the production of commodities. In 1999-2000 7.84% was spent on labor, it came down to 7.78% in 2000-01, to 7.68% in 2001-02, 7.15% in 2002-03 and it further slipped to 6.82% in 2003-04. The survey adds that in 1999-2000 workers in industries were 81 lakh and 76 thousand and in the following years the number had come down to 79 lakhs, 77 lakhs, 79 lakhs and then to 78 lakhs. It goes on to say that while contract laborers continuously increased in the same years starting from 12 lakhs 40 thousand, to 12 lakhs 53 thousand, 12lakhs 97 thousand, to 14 lakhs 22 thousand and it further moved upto 14 lakhs 95 thousand.
The above is the portrayal of the industrial scenario in India. In a recently published booklet in Bengali, Buddhadeb has calculatedly used the title “The Orientation of Development is the Poor People”. The CPM Chief Minister has written it to preach industrialization, its scope of employment. He has never told the outcome of the present day corporate based industrialization requiring high technical skill and steady dwindling scope of employment generation. The CPM leaders have so long painted a rosy picture about job generation at the Tata car factory. The irony is that less than 72 hours after the CPM minister Mr. Nirupam Sen had announced the cruel fact that there would be no job guarantee to the land-losers for the Tata Motor project, 187 trainees from land losing families at the ITI Howrah began an immediate class boycott on 21st June 2007 demanding a written assurance for jobs. The trainees clearly said that coming from a rural background it was highly impossible to clear 90 percent marks as demanded for job consideration. [Statesman, 22nd June 2007]. The simmering discontent spread to other ITIs where the Singur boys are undergoing training expecting jobs. The cry of the rural students is justified. The CPM Chief Minister and other leaders suppress the telling fact that Tata Steel in Jamshedpur itself while increasing its annual output five times between 1991 and 2005 has halved its workforce from 85,000 to 44,000.
One will be startled by the State government declaration that under CPM rule, now college going boys and girls from a rural background might easily secure jobs commensurate with their qualifications. We do not count the exceptions As a slap on the ‘Left’ Front when it was celebrating its 30 years of rule crying hoarse on ‘industrialization’, 253 post graduate and honours graduates (out of 348 candidates) turned up for jobs for (1) washing and cleaning of glass apparatus and (2) cleaning of room/table, etc. at the microbiology unit of the West Bengal Public Health Laboratory under the West Bengal government. [Statesman 21.06.2007]. This is the cruel joke on ‘development’ and ‘expansion’ of the job market for the educated in West Bengal.
The CPM CC member and always-aggressive peasant front leader Mr. Benoy Konar has strongly justified the necessity of reducing the peasant population arguing “Is the life of a peasant so much covetous?” He has also referred to the very small percentage of people engaged in agriculture in the USA. For such worshippers of the USA or the West a few facts need to be told. First, we should know that in the highly developed capitalist countries like the USA, a deadly combination of economies of scale, capital, capital intensive technology and the all-encompassing rule of the market led to large corporations which have cornered agricultural production, processing and also marketing. This has absolutely reduced the role of small and medium-size firms to a nominal role with very little engagement of farmers. The huge agricultural farms or corporations rule the roost. And even with all such developments agriculture receives huge subsidies spelling disaster for a country like ours having been dependent on the US and other rich western countries by importing paddy; wheat, etc. The CPM leaders who preach against the ‘backward’ mode of agricultural production and argue for the Western industrial economy conveniently conceal their love for and devotion to WTO dictates. Examples are galore to prove how from Mexico to many Latin American countries economics are being crippled and are reeling under a heavy debt burden due to the neo-liberal prescriptions. Both agricultural and industrial sectors are in a chronic crisis. All those countries are now forced to import food grains from the West. In the so-called newly industrializing economies like the Philippines, Thailand, etc. in Asia it is the same story of greater and greater dependence on imported food grains from the West and displacement of millions of peasants. Even the Indian government has just contracted to import a gigantic eight lakh tones of wheat at a rate that is double what they pay the Indian farmer. What appears to be a boom in industrialization is accompanied by the pauperization of millions, the rule of consumerism and dependence on the West, the U.S in particular. A conspiracy is clearly evident to destroy agriculture and our CPM leaders are accomplices in this deadly game. Even if the huge population is shifted from agriculture fondly expecting a bright future of industrialization, the question of food crisis apart, there shall be no room for the absorption of the crores of uprooted peasantry in any other sector. One can indulge in daydreaming but the reality is stark. Secondly, why West Bengal or the entire country has to emulate the Western model? We strongly oppose such dangerous views for India deliberately nurtured by the globalization lobby.
The CPM led government has been giving highly exaggerated statements on the expansion of a huge market in West Bengal under ‘left’ Front rule. On this false premise the CM, Buddahdeb Bhattacharjee, stresses that the ground is clear for steady industrialization working within the capitalist model. Even setting aside the relevant question of model and corporate capital, one has to understand that the type of commodities produced, the quantum, where to be produced, etc. are market and class(es) of consumers determined. So far as common necessary goods are concerned the economic capability of the buyers in the market should stand supreme to create the demand of the goods. This situation calls for the creation of a home market. The imperialist stranglehold, semi-feudal land relations in different forms stand in the way of generating the market based on the economic welfare of the masses of the people. With a huge percentage of people below the poverty line and 69.29 percent of the villages of West Bengal having been forced to remain detached most of the time of the year even now, all tall talk of fertile ground for renewed industrialization under the CPM regime are downright false. The State Human Development Report prepared by the ‘Left’ Front Government also clearly tells that between 1980-81 and 2001 in 9 districts, the average income of the people has also come down. We should add here that the ‘Left’ Front minister Surya Kanta Mishra along with Vikas Rawal has gone on record that 93 percent of the land holdings in rural West Bengal, accounting for about 72 percent of the land, are operated by marginal and small farmers. “A sizeable number of these cultivators produce mostly for their subsistence and not for the market” [Agrarian Relations in Contemporary West Bengal and Tasks for the Left, in Ramachandran and Swaminathan (eds), Agrarian Studies, Tulika 2002 , P338]. This stark fact belies the presentation of the CPM that function of the market has vastly expanded in West Bengal, as a precursor to industrialization drive.
Here we should add that the market that has grown over the 30 years of ‘Left’ Front rule is the market of the neo-rich cum feudal elements, traders, party bosses, upper middle class, etc. – the people who can afford to buy motor cars, two-wheelers, electronic gadgets and such luxury items. And those classes have become the pillars of the CPM in its ‘development’ and ‘industrialization’ drive. The common people in the CPM fold, who are still mesmerized into believing in the creation of mass scale jobs on the acquired lands, would soon be thrown to the stark reality. Globalization, ‘development’, ‘industrialization’, etc. are not for the Indian masses, but for the imperialist masters, MNCs, Indian compradors and their agents.
To end, we once again come to the recent booklet written by Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee titled ‘The Orientation of Transition to Industry will be the Poor People’ [March 2007]. It is now circulated for mass consumption. About agriculture the Chief Minister cum Politburo member of the CPM deals with the question of agriculture with all disdain saying that agriculture in West Bengal is to be brought down from the present 26% and the share of industry is to be upped from the existing 24% of the West Bengal economy. It is curious that this apologist of ‘industrialization’ does not specify the extent of lowering down of the percentage of agriculture.
If agriculture denotes an out-moded sector of the economy then we can justifiably ask the CPM theoretician why not opt for 0% in agriculture as the ‘best development’ option? And what would be the condition of the masses if the paradise of industries falls on the agricultural economy? The faithful protagonists of capitalism have gone berserk, lost all logic, in order to push through the strategy of imperialism.
In any case without breaking loose from the shackles of global imperialism, without destroying the semi-feudal relations, without developing its genuine home market India cannot conceiveof industrialization. We cannot recreate the industrial revolution of England in the same way in the 21st century. Experiences of so many decades of unequal international relations, the power of imperialism and the MNCs, the question of a huge number of India’s population to be fed, the problem of global warming and the destruction of nature etc. need to be seriously considered. Agriculture cannot only feed the masses it can also provide employment. Agriculture also provides many essential raw materials for industry. Industry is also essential but we cannot support the mad drive for ‘industrialization’- a prescription of the imperialist masters of the West to push this land to disaster and further tightening of their grip. The Indian reality does not allow for corporate industrialization and the drive for urbanization, SEZs, etc. by destroying agriculture, displacing millions of peasants and tightening the noose around India’s neck for recolonisation. ‘Development’, ‘urbanization’, ‘industrialization’ and such World Bank prescriptions faithfully followed in India as such and West Bengal in particular are a war on the common people that needs to be resisted at any cost.
Press Release
Communist Party of India (Maoist)Central Committee
Hail the Martyrdom of central committee member of CPI (Maoist) and beloved leader of the Indian people comrade Ajayda!
Comrade Ajayda, the beloved and respected senior leader of CPI(Maoist), passed away suddenly on 15th August 2007 due to severe attack of cerebral malaria. Comrade Ajayda was attacked by malaria in the first week of August after his return from one of the Guerrilla Zones where he had gone to attend an important meeting. It was suspected to be viral fever first but since it was malaria his condition worsened and, even the best efforts of doctors could not save his life. In fact, due to the existing unjust social system and the pro-imperialist policies of the reactionary Indian ruling classes, diseases like malaria devour millions upon millions of people every year and comrade Ajayda has also become one of such victims.
With the martyrdom of Comrade Ajayda CPI (Maoist) has lost one of its elderly leaders who played a significant role in three decades of Indian revolution and in the formation of the new Party. CC, CPI (Maoist), on behalf of the entire Party, Central Military Commission (CMC) and the entire PLGA, all the organs of revolutionary people’s democratic power, all the revolutionary and democratic mass organizations, and all the revolutionary sympathizers and revolutionary masses of our country bows its head humbly and pays its red homage to our beloved leader comrade Ajayda. It shares its grief with heavy heart with the rank and file of the Party, the West Bengal State Committee in particular, the entire revolutionary camp, and his family members and friends and expresses its deep, heart-felt revolutionary condolences to all of them.
Comrade Ajayda was a veteran leader of our Party with almost four decades of revolutionary life. He was inspired by communist politics during his student days in 1960s in West Bengal. He was one among the thousands of young pioneers of the new generation who originated from the ideological and political struggle in the international arena by the CPC under the leadership of Mao against the modern revisionism of CPSU and the great Cultural Revolution that shook the entire world. He was a product of the bitter ideological-political struggle against the revisionist and neo-revisionist leadership of CPI and CPI(Marxist). When working as a government employee he was inspired very much by the great Naxalbari revolutionary armed uprising and the leadership of comrade Charu Mazumdar and joined the CPI(ML) in the end of 1960s. He was arrested in 1972 and spent over five years in different prisons of Kolkata in inhuman conditions during the fascist President Rule and black days of the ‘Emergency’ period.
He was one of founding members of CPI (ML)-Party Unity and one of the first State Committee members of the CPI (ML). He was also one of the leaders of heroic peasant armed struggles of Nadia district of West Bengal. As a CCM and a senior leader of CPI (ML)-PU, he played a significant role in achieving the unity between the PU and PW and latter on unity between MCCI and PW. He was a founding CCM of Unified CPI (ML)[PW] formed in August 1998 and also the CPI (Maoist).
Since the beginning of the revolutionary movement of West Bengal in the late sixties, he stood firmly and steadfastly at the time of barbarous repression, in the midst of heavy losses, and in the period of long setback of the revolutionary movement in the entire country. He firmly upheld the Party line in the long period of setback, splits and hardships. He boldly faced the cruel enemy. Comrade Ajayda firmly upheld the red bright banner of MLM and bitterly opposed revisionism of all hues that reared its ugly head in the international arena and in the communist movement of our country. Throughout his long revolutionary life he never compromised on principles, and fought spiritedly not only against the reactionary Indian ruling classes and the monster of imperialism, but also against revisionism in all its varied forms.
Neither his lean physique, ill health nor growing age [63] ever dampened his spirits or made him shirk from his revolutionary responsibilities. He boldly fought against deviations from the Party line during the internal crisis in PU in 1987 and on other occasions. He served as the head of Party’s education department—SCOPE—for about two years after the 2001 Party Congress of erstwhile CPI (ML)[PW]. He played a notable role in studying agrarian relations in the countryside and could mingle easily with the cadres and masses. Comrade Ajayda served in the publication department for a long time and contributed to the Party magazines both in erstwhile PU, unified PW and the new Party. He wrote proficiently both in English and Bengali. He had great ideological-political depth rooted in long period of diligent study of theory of MLM combined with practical experience.
Throughout his revolutionary life comrade Ajayda upheld communist values and ideals. He was known for his simplicity, commitment and gentle nature. He remained a bachelor all his life driven by the idealistic notion prevalent in the early period of the revolutionary upsurge that marriage would come in the way of revolutionary activity.
The martyrdom of comrade Ajayda is a great loss to the Indian revolution. The CC calls upon the entire Party cadre, PLGA fighters and the revolutionary masses to face this situation boldly and carry forward the cause for which comrade Ajayda had laid down his life with unflinching determination. The CC vows to persist in the great task of building PLA and establishing base areas and intensifying and expanding the people’s war throughout the country to complete the liberation of our country from the clutches of imperialism, CBB and feudalism and establish a new classless society.
Ganapathy
General Secretary,
CPI(Maoist)
Press Release
Scrap the Indo-US Nuclear Deal! Oppose UPA’s traitorous policy of mortgaging our country’s interests to the US imperialists!
The so-called Indo-US Civil Nuclear Energy Deal or the 123 Agreement, hailed as a historic pact by the comprador Congress party, is actually a total sell-out of the country’s interests and sovereignty to the US imperialists. The CC, CPI(Maoist), considers this Agreement as anti-national and anti-people and condemns this abject surrender by the comprador Congress-led UPA government to US imperialist pressure. It warns that the Nuclear Deal will lead to perpetual dependence of our country on US imperialism.
The deal is shrouded in utmost secrecy and the entire country is kept in the dark for almost two weeks since it’s signing by the two sides on July 22. Finally, with the consent of the US, the traitorous UPA regime released the text of the Agreement on 3rd August. Public consent was sought to be manufactured through lies and distorted information by the Prime Minister and other Congress leaders and government officials. Anil Kakodkar, Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), canvassed for support even before the text of the Agreement was released. The actual content of the Agreement and the Clauses that compromise India’s sovereignty were hidden behind a barrage of official lies and deliberate distortions. The undemocratic and conspiratorial nature of the Agreement is that it is dictated by Washington and not even placed before the Parliament.
Based on the notorious Henry Hyde Act of the US Congress, the 123 agreements restricts the right to nuclear testing by India. The US President will have discretionary powers to terminate the civil nuclear cooperation if India conducts a nuclear test. The real essence of the 123 agreement can be captured from the remarks made by US Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns, who negotiated the Agreement on behalf of the US, that the U.S. had “preserved intact” the President’s right under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 to ask for return of nuclear fuel or nuclear technologies transferred by American firms if India conducted a nuclear test. He categorically stated that the Agreement was fully in accordance with the Hyde Act. A Clause of the 123 Agreement makes it obligatory for India to facilitate the entry of experts “when execution of an agreement or contract pursuant to this agreement” requires this.
Moreover, the civilian nuclear agreement between India and the U.S would threaten regional stability and widen the gulf between India and Pakistan. By facilitating India to produce significant quantities of fissile material and nuclear weapons with US blessings, the Nuclear Deal will ignite an arms race in South Asia with serious implications for the strategic stability of the region. India would become the regional satrap for American imperialism and will be used by the latter for furthering American hegemony over South Asia. The dalals in Delhi had shamelessly agreed to place the interests of our country and people at the feet of the US imperialists and the US multinational companies in exchange for a few concessions and crumbs. The expansionist Indian ruling classes, with their eyes on the neighboring countries, have stooped like slaves before the US imperialists in order to play the role of regional chieftains.
It is the US MNCs like GE and Westinghouse, which will derive huge profits from the energy contracts, and hence these vultures played a key role in pushing the Deal onto India’s back. Thus at one stroke, the American imperialists would curtail India’s sovereignty as well as squeeze it of its wealth. The nuclear deal makes our country fully dependent on the US for nuclear fuel supplies and by giving the U.S. the right to terminate the agreement “on one year’s written notice”; India will be pushed deep into the vice-like grip of the US imperialists. It will have no other alternative than to dance to American imperialist tune and will become a victim of US blackmail. The Agreement is a grave insult to more than a billion people of our country. The entire country should stand up unitedly to boldly oppose this despicable act of the comprador UPA government led by the Congress which mortgages our country’s sovereignty to US imperialism, places the country completely at the mercy and whims of the US, undermines indigenous development, and transforms India into a willing pawn of US imperialism. The so-called Left parties, which have been crying hoarse that the 123 Agreement is a surrender to US by the Manmohan Singh Government, are shamelessly continuing to support the very same government and thus are acting as accomplices. They should immediately withdraw their support to the UPA government or else they will go down in history as no less responsible for this abject surrender of the country’s interests to US imperialism.
Azad,
Spokesperson,
Central Committee,
CPI(Maoist)
16th August 2007
Rape of 11 Tribal women in Vishakha Agency area by the mercenary Greyhounds is part of a larger ploy to evict the tribals and make room for the imperialist MNCs and comprador houses
Nitin
On the night of August 20 the elite crack force that was set up to counter the Maoist movement in Andhra Pradesh—Greyhounds—committed an atrocity on poor helpless tribal women that would put any civilized society to shame. Even more shameful and obnoxious is the way the Chief Minister, Home Minister, DGP and several police officials and political leaders reacted to the heinous incident. This mercenary anti-Naxal special force going by the nomenclature of Greyhounds exhibited their savage beastly nature by raping 11 tribal women in Vakapalli village in G Madugula mandal in Vishakhapanam Agency area. DGP Basith, in his usual language of a liar, denied there had been a rape and resorted to counterattack, alleging that the whole thing was “baseless and a ploy by Maoists to discourage the police from carrying out combing operations in the agency areas.” Police officials agreed that the greyhounds forces went to the village in search of a squad commander Ganesh but no atrocity was committed as alleged by the women. Promptly the biggest liars of all, YS Rajashekhar Reddy and his lieutenant Jana Reddy who is in charge of the Home ministry, issued similar statements without even a preliminary investigation into the complaints of the victims.
Even after their naked terror and ugly atrocities were exposed to the entire world, and after a fortnight of public furor and massive protests, the police officials continue to roll out stories of a Maoist plot to denigrate and demoralize the police. The SP of Vishkhapatnam, one Akun Sabharwal, unabashedly praised his men for their exemplary behavior and cordial relations with the tribal population. He asserted that the preliminary medical investigation of the alleged victims proved that the rape was a concocted story deliberately propagated by the Maoists and their sympathizers. The revenue department, by issuing 10 Kilos of rice and a bottle of kerosene to the victims, showed what price the authorities fix for rape.
The samples of the 11 tribal women were sent to the AP Forensic Lab two days after the atrocity and the report were sent by the Lab after a week. As expected, the fabricated forensic report prepared by the police doctors in Hydrabad found nothing in the samples to prove that rape was committed on the said women. The tutored forensic reports vindicated once again the fact that in a class society, science too has a class bias, that however developed a science could be, it will not serve the common people or become a powerful weapon to establish truth as long as it is in the hands of the exploiters but will be used to tamper with truth to serve the ruling class.
The irresponsible and provocative statements by the state’s police chief and other police officials evoked instant reaction from the progressive and democratic forces, particularly the women’s organizations all over the state. They held protest demonstrations in Hydrabad, Vishakhapatnam, Vijayawada and other cities demanding the suspension of the DGP for making irresponsible statements and shielding the guilty policemen. 16 revolutionary and democratic organizations such as POW, Mahila Chetana, Mahila Samakhya, RWA, Stree Shakti, Stree Vimukti, Arunodaya, Civil Liberties Committee, Human Rights Forum, AIDWA, DYFI etc held a big rally in Vishakhapatnam city. The protests are continuing even after a fortnight. The democratic and civil rights organizations and individuals, tribal associations, various women’s organizations, revolutionary writers and artists, and the opposition parties had reiterated that the agitation will continue until justice is done to the victims and the guilty are taken to task. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) too, although waking up late from its slumber, issued a notice to the DGP and Vishakhapatnam SP to send a report of the facts related to the incident within four weeks.
While the government and the police officials vehemently deny that there had been an instance of rape there is not an iota of doubt in the minds of the people. They very well know that when the culprits themselves become the judges truth is the natural victim. They know that the government doctors and the police are hand in glove and never would forensic labs reveal the truth as long as they are under the shadow of the state. The tribal associations of teachers, students and employees as well as the entire opposition called for a bandh in 11 Mandals in the Agency areas of Vishakhapatnam district on August 22 in protest against the rape and demanding the suspension of the concerned greyhounds personnel. Protest rallies were held in G Madugula, Paderu, Hukumpeta, Pedabayalu, Araku valley, Dumbriguda, Anantagiri and other places. They blocked all roads bringing the entire traffic to a halt. In Chintapalli, a Maoist area since long, 15 policemen who were coming in a bus were forced to get down outside the town and were forced to go back to the police station. They called for the dismissal and arrest of the greyhounds personnel, a high-level enquiry into the heinous act, and the immediate release of the two tribal youth of Vakapalli village who were abducted by the police on August 14 from a weekly market. There was no organization, barring the ruling Congress, which did not condemn the incident and demanded a judicial enquiry.
On August 27, the Maoists in the entire called a bandh East Division and the neighbouring Malkagiri district in Orissa to protest against the Vakapalli atrocity. In an interview to reporters in the dense jungles along the Andhra-Orissa border, Maoist leader Ganesh alleged that the AP Government and the police are continuing to commit atrocities on the poor, workers and innocent people in the name of fighting Leftwing guerrillas. He warned that the Maoists would lead the people in punishing the guilty police personnel and justice will be meted out at any cost. On the day of the bandh the Maoists set off a landmine in the Kalimela area when a posse of CRPF personnel were passing in a vehicle. The 17 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel had a narrow escape when the landmine blast occurred seconds after the CRPF vehicle crossed the spot. The Maoists also blocked traffic on important roads in Motu and Kalimela areas during the bandh called by the Malkangiri naxal division. Shops, business establishments and commercial centres remained closed and normal life was affected in Naxal-affected areas of the district during the bandh.
Even as the protests are spreading throughout the state the police have been going ahead with their usual practice of issuing threats and ultimatums to the victims. One Pangi Sridevi, who is one of the 11 hapless tribal women, complained that she was threatened that her husband would be killed if she dared to reveal the truth. Others may not even have mustered enough courage to say what threats the police officials have issued to them. Even the tribal MLA of Paderu, Lake Raja Rao, attracted the ire of the policemen for his role in bringing the heinous incident into light and demanding the dismissal of all the 21 Greyhound personnel involved in the rape. A case is being filed against him for provoking the tribal women against the police. Constant vigil is on his every movement with a view to establish his links with the Maoists.
The forensic report was submitted to the High Court on 29th of August. The report concluded that on the basis of preliminary investigation there is no basis to say that rape had taken place. It wanted a month’s time for DNA tests to be completed. Arguing on behalf of the victims in a case filed by the Girijan Samakhya (Tribal Federation), senior lawyer, N Ramachandra Rao, said that it was shocking to see the Chief Minister, Home Minister, DGP and other officials conclude, even before carrying out any preliminary investigation into the matter, that such incident of rape had not occurred. He said that under the SC, ST Atrocities (Prevention) Act, the accused policemen should be arrested and cases filed based on the FIR. An Identification Parade of the police before the victims to identify the culprits was not ordered even though the victims have been saying that they would identify the men who had raped them. He said that sending samples for medical examination was deliberately delayed so that the case gets weak since samples after 24 hours will be of no use. He cited a Supreme Court ruling in a case that when policemen were involved in committing a crime it should be investigated through a Judge. He said that none had visited the site of the atrocity and clothes and other materials were still lying there.
Why Vakapalli had to bear the brunt of Greyhounds ire?
Vakapalli is a tribal village in G Madugula Mandal in the Agency area of Vishakhapatnam district. The entire Agency area comes under the jurisdiction of the Andhra Orissa Border Special Zonal Committee (AOB) of the CPI(Maoist). The area has been a hotbed of the Maoist movement right from the early 1980s. and police atrocities in this tribal tract had often made headlines such as the burning down of 45 tribal hamlets in 1987, eviction of tribals from scores of villages, arrests and killings of tribal youth who sympathies with the Maoists, gang rape of tribal women in Innigaruvu village in 1993, killings of innocent tribals after every attack by the Maoists on police camps, and a whole catalogue of crimes. When Maoist women cadre were caught or fell unconscious during an encounter, they were killed after being raped by these notorious mercenaries. Several women like Chinnabullekka, Ruppi, Tubri became such victims
in the past.
Besides the aim of suppressing the Maoist movement in the area another important reason for the growing attacks on the people by the police is to evict them from the areas and to resettle them elsewhere so that the imperialists, big comprador houses, big contractors can loot the mineral wealth from the region without any hindrance. The forest region of North Andhra is rich in mineral wealth such as bauxite, dolomite, manganese, iron ore, coal etc., and naturally attracted the big industrial and mining sharks like Jindal, Essar and various MNCs, who are bent upon draining the natural wealth of the region. In fact, as has been pointed out by the Maoists umpteen times in the past, this has been the strategy employed by the reactionary rulers in all regions that have abundant mineral and other forest wealth.
Salwa Judum in Dandakaranya region in Chattisgarh is organized specifically with the two-fold aim of suppressing the Maoist movement which is becoming a model to be emulated elsewhere, and to drive the entire tribal population away from their natural habitat so as to loot the entire wealth. So-called relief camps set up by the Chattisgarh government are meant to be resettlement camps of the tribals to ensure that they do not return to their traditional homes in the forest. The same is the case in Jharkhand, Orissa and North Andhra since all these places abound in natural wealth and have become the hunting grounds for big business houses and the imperialists.
No wonder, Vakapalli has been selected for carrying out this gruesome plan of evicting the tribals from their traditional dwelling places. Like several other villages in the Agency area of Vishakhapatnam, Vakapalli is also a stronghold of the Maoists since long. This village of around 50 huts and a population of over 200 people was chosen by the greyhounds to teach a lesson to the people of not only Vakapalli but other villages in the area what would be the consequences if they continued to support the Maoists and also to instill such a fear that they would think it a better option to vacate the villages.
Whenever the policemen attack a village, the men are beaten up, maimed for life or killed, while women become victims of rape, which is the most humiliating thing in their lives. Rape is the worst and most dreaded form of humiliation and punishment for women delivered by the state’s mercenary forces in order to control and cow them down. The Naga, Mizo personnel, CRPF, local police and Salwa Judum goons in neighbouring Chattisgarh to stop them from supporting the Maoists and to evict them from their hamlets, had raped scores of women. Rape of Kashmiri women by the CRPF, Rashtriya Rifles and the Indian Army personnel has become a daily event and evokes massive protests against these outrages. Whether it is the revolutionary movement, national liberation movement or any other people’s movement rape has become the stratagem of the so-called security forces to create insecurity and instill terror in the women folk and the population at large. Thereby these mercenaries think that the struggles could be contained. Very often the officers involved in such crimes against humanity are awarded with prizes and special incentives.
In fact, the attacks on Vakapalli village began a week prior to the rape of the tribal women. In the midst of the intensified combing operations by the greyhounds Maoists hoisted black flags all across the Agency area to mark the Black Day on August 15. On August 14, a police batch whisked away two youth, Pangi Suryam and Prakash, for their alleged links with the Maoists when they had gone to a nearby weekly market. Suryam had earlier worked with the Maoists but had settled down in the village and was leading a normal life. For a week their parents did not know the whereabouts of the abducted youth. On the morning of August 20 the police brought Suryam to the village and began harassing the women to reveal information about the Naxalites hidden by them. There were no men folk at the time and the greyhounds took the women to the turmeric fields and raped them. The two youth were released after a fortnight and were saved from the usual encounter only due to the vehement protests from the tribal associations and democratic organizations. After his release from the illegal police custody Suryam explained to the media how he and Prakash were picked up from a weekly bazaar on august 14, tortured severely, provided with guerrilla uniforms and kits, and threatened to be eliminated in encounters if they did not cooperate with the police and act as their agents to nab the Maoists.
Let us fight for the just rights of the tribals
It is high time the democratic forces throughout the country fight back the state’s offensive against the tribals in the name of countering Maoists. They should realize that the sole aim of the reactionary ruling classes to unleash a brutal offensive against the tribals and the Maoist movement is to clear the way for the MNCs and the big comprador houses to loot the forest wealth of these regions without hindrance. The diabolic designs of the rulers must be fought tooth and nail by everyone who has concern for the country, its people, and democratic rights and fundamental freedoms.
The Vakapalli outrage is a grave insult to the entire women community and a calculated attack on their rights acquired after several decades of struggle. When 11 women speak out boldly pointing out how they were raped by 21 Greyhounds personnel, it is not considered as enough evidence to arrest the culprits and file cases against them. On the contrary, the shameless police officers publicly lie that the women are goaded on by the Maoists to make such allegations. Would a woman ever say that she had been raped which means humiliation for all her life even if someone asks them to do so? No rational being would believe it. And would they fear the Maoists more than the police?
On the contrary, thousands of women who are victims of rape and all sorts of humiliation have no scope for airing them publicly due to the fear of social castigation and the fear of the perpetrators. And in this case, the husbands of the tribal women victims of rape had refused to meet their spouses and had not done so even at the time of writing. They were not even allowed to breast-feed their children. One can imagine the trauma these women had been undergoing since the atrocious incident. Adding salt to the injury are the statements of the hyenas ruling the state—YSR, Jana, Bhasith & Co—who had been accusing the victims themselves of telling lies under Maoist tutorship!
While sympathizing with these victims and sharing their mental agony, one has also to be proud of the grit and enormous courage displayed by these women in the face of continuous police threats and dissuasion by their husbands. Two women victims, Pangi Sridevi and Janakamma, threatened to commit suicide in front of the ITDA office in Paderu town if justice was not done to them. Meanwhile the High Court ordered the district administration and ITDA authorities to provide relief measures to the victims. The district collector announced that they would try to convince the families of the victims to accept them back and if the victims are not accepted by their families they would be rehabilitated in women’s’ hostels in Vishakhapatnam.
The AP government can also be taken to task for its gross violation of the rule of law for not filing cases based on the statements of the victims of rape and for not conducting an Identification Parade of the Greyhounds policemen. When a woman says that she is raped a case should be immediately filed against the accused persons under IPC 376. And according to the Indian Evidence Act 113 and 114, the compliant of a woman is enough evidence for the courts to proceed with the case. No other evidence is required and there have been several instances when the courts had given judgments based on the victim’s statement. Moreover, as tribal women are involved in the Vakapalli atrocity, any responsible government must initiate measures based on the special SC, ST Atrocities (Prevention) Act. But such minimum concern and responsible behavior cannot be anticipated from rowdy politicians and IPS officers ruling the lumpen-police raj in AP—YSR, Jana, Bhasit et al—whose lumpen culture and values are in no way different from their rapist and sadist mercenaries comprising the so-called elite crack force of Greyhounds.
Let us build a mighty movement to protect the rights, dignity and self-respect of women by demanding punishment to the greyhounds culprits, the officials like DGP Bhasith and SP Sabharwal who defend the rapes and indescribable atrocities by their men in uniform, and the khadi-clad callous lumpen rulers of YSR’s Congress who have no respect for the rights of the women and people at large.
It is not surprising that Sonia Gandhi had not uttered a single word even as the Vakapalli incident had caused a furor for over a week. For the likes of her, the interests of the imperialist MNCs and the big comprador houses are more important that protecting women from rapes and humiliation. Rape by Greyhounds personnel of tribal women in Vakapalli is a prelude to the rape, on a much grander scale, of the mineral and forest wealth in the tribal tract stretching from North Andhra to Jharkhand by the imperialists and the comprador big business houses like the Jindals, Mittals,Tatas,Essars & Co.
Red Salute to Comrade Arnab Ghatak (Benoy, Prasanta)
It takes a longer period to send news of martyrdom when the revolutionary war is on. This happened in case of the martyrdom of Comrade Arnab Ghatak, popularly known in the revolutionary ranks and among the people as Benoy or Prasanta. Comrade Arnab (Prasanta, Benoy) was martyred in an accidental explosion at AOB (Andhra-Orissa Border Region) while preparing a ‘Bobby Trap’ along with another comrade.
The martyred communist revolutionary was born in 1968 and grew up in a refuge colony at Jadavpur in South Kolkata. His growing up in a leftist family atmosphere taught him about the bitter socio-economic realities in the country. Arnab had endeared himself to the local people and got involved in social work, lending his hand of co-operation to the people in distress. A grown up Arnab took up jobs of newspaper distribution from door to door, driving cars, etc. to assist his family. While in the tenth standard he was drawn to student politics and he stood by his Jadavpur High School students protesting against the wrong done to them by the school authorities. After graduation he enrolled at the Kolkata University to do his Masters.
Comrade Arnab at first joined the PDSF, then the All Bengal Students Association (ABSA). Standing in opposition to the revisionism of the ABSA he left it to join Radical Students Association (RSA). During post-graduation our martyred comrade had done a good job in propagating revolutionary politics among the students. From 1992 to 1996 he worked among the students. From 1997 to 2004 Comrade Arnab had been in the villages of Murshidabad district to disseminate revolutionary politics among the peasants. It is here he became popular as comrade Prashanta. Later he came to be known as comrade Benoy. Comrade Arnab organized the jute-growing peasants to fight for their demands. He led land struggles, wage-rise struggles; struggles against corruption in ration shops, etc. in the Murshidabad, Malda or in the BJO region. And everywhere he could win over the hearts of the people. Our martyred comrade Arnab was unflinching in his dedication, maintaining high communist values, pursuing military discipline. A serious reader of Marxist literature, revolutionary novels, poems, etc. he developed great analytical skills, and taught others to learn many things.
Comrade Arnab was shifted to some other place in 2004 as a member of the central instructors’ team. Before that at first he was the member of the Nadia-Murshidabad-Malda divisional committee. Then became the member of the BJO regional committee.
In 2005 he joined the camp of instructors and in many state level camps in West Bengal he played the important role as an instructor. He always displayed much revolutionary spirits on the grounds and classes at the camps. His exerted enormously during physical and military exercises, not relaxing even under excessive stress. His firm resolve in carrying on revolutionary struggle against all odds has left a permanent stamp on his comrades. Red salute to comrade Arnab whose martyrdom is a great loss but he shall remain perpetually in the hearts of the masses as a communist hero who laid down his precious life for the emancipation of the Indian masses.
Ambush at Urpalmetta
On July 9th the para-military from the Errabore camp as usual went on a spree to harass the people. They launched an attack on the people and militia of Muraigudda village in the Konta region. They burnt their houses and beat the villagers. By afternoon the news reached company 3 of the PLGA, which was stationed in the area to defend the people in times of such harassment. The entire company and a platoon rushed in the direction of the village. After about two hours the PLGA reached the area and lay in ambush. After two hours of ravaging the village the para-military began to return. At 4 pm they were attacked from all sides. The mercenary forces put up a strong fight using their sophisticated automatic weapons and 2 inch mortars. The heroic PLGA forces continued to advance amidst the heavy firing mowing down the government forces. The bravery of the PLGA fighters was such that one comrade was martyred at just a distance of 15 feet from the enemy. The battle continued for nearly two hours in which 24 police (16 CRPF Jawans including a assistant Commandant and 8 SPOs) and para-military forces were killed. It was a battle the first of its kind where such an effective victory was scored without a pre-plan and the use of mines. It marks an important advance in the people’s war. Large amount of weaponry and ammunition was also seized including 8 AK-47s, 3 LMGs, 1 SLR and 4 .303. the entire people of the Konta region were inspired by the action and gave them more confidence to stand firm in the face of the brutal repression unleashed in Bastar.
15 Cops killed in Maoist ambush
At least 15 Chhattisgarh security personnel including 11 Special Police Officers(SPOs) were killed in an ambush laid by Maoists near village Par Metla in Bastar region on Aug 28th.
Two platoons of armed security personnel belonging to the State police and Chattisgarh Armed Force (CAF) commanded by Inspector Hemant Kumar were escorting the villagers for the road repair work near village Par Metla 40 kms from the nearest police out post at Jagargunda. The Maoists ambushed the rear party of the armed personnel with heavy machinegun fire and mortar bombs.
DGP runs away
Maoists on Thursday opened fire at the helicopter in which DGP of Chattisgarh Viswa Rajan was traveling in. The incident occurred Chintalnar village in Dantewada district.
Mr. Viswa Rajan was on his way to Mukaram village where 15 police personnel were killed by CPI (Maoist) cadres on 28th. Accompanied by Bastar Range IGP, R. K. Vij, he was planning to travel 6 km from the village by road to reach the spot where the policemen were waylaid and killed.
The naxalites fired five rounds from a distance in the direction of the chopper.
Police forces deployed in the village threw a security ring around the two senior police officers and guided them back to the helicopter which took off within 15 minutes of its landing.
Fake Encounter in Karnataka & People’s Mass Resistance
State police goons murdered 5 people in Atyadka near Menasinahadya of Koppa talluk. In that incident our Malanadu Area Committee member com Goutham is one among them. All others are poor adivasi village people. The state armed goons (anti naxalite force) of the state indiscriminately fired on the house from all sides intentionally without caring about the sleeping people there. They did not consider sparing the house owner and others lives even though they could have avoided the bloodshed.
They caught them and later killed them in order to create terror among the struggling people. Now they have concocted the story of encounter and some wounded police etc to cover up their fascist cruelty. After killing then they played the drama of encounter by firing indiscriminately on that house for a few minutes.
No real encounter happened. They avoided that the public and media see the dead bodies until 4 pm yesterday. They tried to wipe out all evidence; including that of the householder, of this fake encounter. They only allowed the viewing of the bodies after completing their drama and stories of lies, even as people protested strongly. Before that they floated the news of 2 dead, 5 arrested, and a few were surrendered, with 5 police were seriously wounded in 3 hours of gunfight etc in the media.
The Kumara Swami’s coalition government started creating the ground for this type of fascist repression on the struggling people through creating fear among the intellectuals, people and democrats who have been voicing their protests against the government’s anti people policies and acts. Some intellectuals even fell prey to these threats and they made public apologies to the government by saying that the armed struggle of the people is anti people, against the people’s interests, etc; and they are opposing it and supporting the government for maintaining democracy, peace!
Com Goutham hailed from a poor peasant family of Thurvihal village of Sindhnoor talluk in Raichur district. He completed his post graduation, worked as a lecturer for short period and joined our squad few years back. Though he was not familiar with the conditions of the Malnad he adjusted himself. He became an area committee member in 2005. He was a good reader; reading of new books was his enthusiastic habit. He was simple and dedicated his life to the people’s cause until his last breath.
Com. Parmeshwara hailed from a poor adivasi family of Hatyadka of Koppa talluk, Chickmagalore dist. He was active in adivasi struggles and took a leading role in several struggles. He was serving as general secretary of the anti national park federation. He is much interested in grasping the politics of exploitation, feudalism, imperialism etc. He never misses any chance to gain knowledge.
Rame Gowdlu, Kaveramma and Sundaresh were poor adivasi peasants of Menasina Hadya and Atyadka. They actively participated in struggles, and were good, simple and loving people. They were always on the side of the masses. They served our squads with affection.
We salute these great martyrs. We heartily share the sorrows of their family and relatives.
By inflicting these types of crimes on humanity and the struggling people, the revolutionary movement cannot be stopped. The fascist ruling classes here have started applying their entire fascist weapons to destroy and suppress the revolutionary and peoples movement as their last resort. They are not comfortable with the so-called democracy, rules, norms etc for their exploitation and loot. The fascist Kumara Swami government must take responsibility of these political murders.
The Ruling class and imperialist stooges Kumara swami, Yadiyurappa,
M.P Prakash like politicians and Shankarbidari, A.M. Prasad, Vipulkumar like police officers will learn proper lessons from the people and will have to pay a price for these crimes.
We strongly condemn these cold-blooded murders and strongly demand to conduct an independent judicial enquiry into the matter,
We demand that murder cases be booked on the respective police officers and that they be arrested immediately. We appeal to all pro people organizations and individuals to condemn these state murders and fight against it.
We appeal to all intellectuals and democrats to condemn this state murder for safeguarding people, their cause, democratic rights and human rights. We are appealing to all human rights organizations and activists to conduct independent enquiries on this matter and reveal the actual facts before the public.
In struggle
Greetings
Yours,
Gangadhara
For the state committee CPI (Maoist)
11-07-07
Karnataka
Newspapers reported a mass sympathy wave for the Maoists in large parts of Western Karnataka. The were spontaneous and wide scale protests against the fake encounter in the entire region. The police swooped on the protesting masses and arrested hundreds. Police have booked 60 tribals of Menasinahadya in two separate cases, for obstructing their duty. More than 125 persons were arrested, including Kuduremukh National Park Virodhi Horata Okkuta president Kalkuli Vittal Hegde, Adivasi Girijana Hitarakshana Vedike president Kempegouda, secretary Mariappa, Gous Mohiyuddin and Puttaswamy.
Cases were registered against five persons encountered for misuse of weapons, illegal activity, firing on police etc, based on a complaint lodged by Koppa inspector Anil Kumar. Protest: On Tuesday, Menasinahadya villagers staged a protest till 2 pm, alleging that the police had killed innocent people.
IGP Prasad and SP Vipul Kumar stayed at Wodeyaramutt, as the villagers blocked the road with stones and set a vehicle ablaze. Police resorted to lathicharge on protesters and the road to the village was opened at 5 am on Wednesday. (Newindpress)
In their retaliation they burned a police vehicle.
EMERGING SPROUTS OF PEOPLE”S POWER
Voices from the PLGA
- A talk with Company comrades in DK
Raago
Theirs is a mercenary army. Ours is a people’s army. So the police, military and the para military cannot defeat us despite all their modern weapons, artillery, aerial facilities and other such things’.
‘They have modern weapons. But we mobilize the masses and are also ready for ‘balidaan’ (sacrifice)’.
‘The police are not familiar with the terrain. We know every bit of this land. So it is not easy for them to defeat us’.
These are some of the reflections of comrades working in a company of the People’s Liberation Guerilla Army (PLGA) of the CPI(Maoist) in Dandakaranyam. Most of them are below 25 years. They are dynamic, daring with great self-confidence.
What is the significance of Company in your army?
In fact we had military formations since a long time. We had Local Guerilla Squads (LGS) and platoons. In the light of increasing repression, our party decided to go for higher formations and so started forming companies.
What is the composition of a Company?
We have three platoons, a Headquarter, a supply team, and scout and artillery units.
Why did you plan Ranibodili in such a big way? You killed so many persons?
Yes. The fascist military campaign – Salva Judum — was creating hell for the people. Most of the participants in the Ranibodili raid are from the place where SJ started. They include the main force, secondary force and the basic force, the militia. We have seen and if we did not see, we heard about the ill deeds of the Salva Judum goondas. The level of cruelty was unexplainable. Foetuses were thrown into the fire, women raped in the most brutal way and what not? It was a terror campaign.
We had seen all these things before our eyes. So however much we were injured we went forward with the action on the police camp. Our comrades laid down their lives in the gun battle but their death only pushed us ahead.
How many of your comrades died in this action?
Six of our comrades were martyred including one District Committee member, who was vital in the preparations for the raid. He was also the Division Command in charge. We brought all their bodies and cremated them with military honors.
In which other incidents have you participated?
We participated in four to five incidents in the past two years. After the Salva Judum started we took up the raid on the Gangalur camp. This was the first incident that shook the Salva Judum goondas. The raid on the CISF camp of the NMDC, the raid on the Murkinar police station followed this. There were many incidents of ambush.
Recently some intellectuals suggested to your party that it would be better to leave weapons and fight in a peaceful manner. What do you say about it?
If they leave weapons we too would leave them. There is a wrong propaganda that the people are suffering in between the naxalites and the police. In fact it is wrong to separate naxalites and the people. They are one and the same. We ourselves were ordinary adivasis before we came in touch with the party. In a period of seven to eight years we were educated in the struggle and the politics of struggle. Now we are able to talk like this. We know what we are doing. It is clear that the people would not be able to bring a change in their lives without arms. The journalists too are not allowed to come into our areas freely. If so they would be able to meet us and see the true situation here.
The Special Police Officers (SPO), the force established after starting Salva Judum, is constituted with none others than the adivasis. How do you explain this?
The ruling classes have been unleashing repressive campaigns for a long time. They used to take up periodical offensives. But they were not successful in repressing the movement. So they have struck on this evil idea of posing people against the people. They have lured a section that had already deviated from normal people’s living; the lumpen elements. This section that has now joined the SJ comprises many of the vested interests and their hangers on. They have been a parasitic section in the society for a considerable time. It feared and expected gains out of the SJ.
But some of the leaders of mass organizations too joined the SJ?
Yes. It is true. Some senior leaders joined the SJ camp. They thought that the police and the Raman Singh government would gain the upper hand. They feared that naxalites would be driven out of the area. They were not clear in their mind and in revolutionary politics. So they drifted. On the other hand there are a lot of incidents in which the parents of squad members were pressurized to recall their sons and daughters. Ordinary sangh activists too were pressurized.
They withstood the pressure. Times change and people change. But the basic characteristic of the masses, the exploitation on them does not change without struggle. So the revolution advances.
The government has a considerably strong army. They have ultra modern weapons. How would you fight and succeed?
The police/para-military work for a salary. They are afraid of death. They think about their families. They think about the benefits. They do not have any other goal. But we are fighting for a cause. We have strong politics. We have lesser arms but we have a strong will. Moreover, we have the mountains, the terrain. The police are not familiar with the terrain. We know each and every part of the land in the jungle.
If the police have ultra modern weapons, OK, we are already seizing them. You must have known some incidents of this year such as the Jaraghati ambush and Kurdu ambush. In the Jara ambush 12 policemen were coming on 6 motorcycles. We blasted the mine and fired. Three escaped and 9 died. We seized their weapons that included AK 47s, SLRs, 2 inch mortars.
Most importantly the people are with us. We are with the people. Even if they plan aerial bombing, how many places could they attack? They cannot bomb the whole jungle. We have the experience of Vietnam where the American imperialists bombed to suppress the revolution. But they were not successful.
When we take up major raids the police lose morale. But we are ready to give away our lives for the cause we believe in. Though they hold a weapon in their hands they can fire it only when they have the moral strength.
You too face defeats at times. Then don’t you lose morale?
No. for example the raid on Doula police station near Narayanpur was a failure. We lost four of our comrades right in the beginning when we were entering the premises. They fought until their last breath. It is true that we were disappointed, having made so many arrangements and preparing so much. But Mao taught us that ‘failure is the mother of victory’. We imbibe such Maoist principles. We understand anything in a political manner in the specific objective situation and the subjective situation.
Does your company take up only retaliatory actions? What about your other activities?
We take up revolutionary propaganda activity. We participate in production. Recently we had political classes in which the recent documents passed by our Unity Congress–Ninth Congress were explained. We also take up collective study as a part of our daily routine.
Says A, the first commander of the first company in DK – “The basic fact that the masses have been exploited and suppressed for generations creates class hatred in them. This is what makes them so daring and sacrificing. The strength of our PLGA is the hatred towards the exploitation and oppression and the urge to have a better life”.
EMERGING SPROUTS OF PEOPLE”S POWER
How the Maoists are running academic mobile and political schools in Dandakaranya
Raago
It is a popular belief that Naxalites teach only politics and military science to the cadre and the masses. It is also felt that they are injected with the ideology of politics of violence. But in fact they teach many things to the cadre, including reading and writing. A newly recruited member is given a slate and a pencil. A member of the squad is given the responsibility of teacher in the squad. This member is not necessarily an academic student. He/She might even have been educated only after joining the squad.
Academic study is a part of the daily routine of the squad. A timetable is set for the day, which also includes daily exercises and collective study. When questioned where she/he was going, a comrade would say, ‘Nanna eschool daayamunthon’ (I am going to school) either in the morning or in the afternoon. This school would be nothing but a plastic sheet put on the ground.
Sometimes the routine would be disturbed due to other works. There would be meetings in the villages. There would be couriering work and other such things.
Collective study is another daily program in which a party magazine or any other book is taken up for study. Since most of the members cannot read and understand on their own, one who could do this would be assigned to lead the discussions. Pamphlets, circulars released from the higher committees, would be read and explained.
Apart from this program the Maoist party established a Mobile Academic School (MAS) and Mobile Political School (MOPOS). These two teams of teachers go around the Special Zone and conduct education camps. A syllabus was formulated for a few weeks, which changes according to the situation. After a few experiences the syllabus was reconstructed and modified. Let us look at experiences of the teacher comrades working in these departments:
Interestingly most of the members in these teams are women. And, none of them have studied in any town. Some had their education in relatively big villages where the government set up ashram schools.
“I studied until the 8th class in my village. After I joined the party, I worked in organization for 6 months. Then MAS was formed in DK, after the 9th Congress (of erstwhile PW) in 2001 and I was one of the team” said Chandana.
In the past five years she gained considerable experience. Here is how she explained their teaching methods, the syllabus, the subjects, the problems in teaching and their achievements. As she spoke, Neelo, Rajitha and Jamno added their experiences.
MAS takes up language, social, science and mathematics. Starting with a fundamental level of teaching, now there are textbooks in each subject in Gondi and Hindi languages.
When they first started teaching language, the students turned teachers had a problem in identifying certain letters. Gondi language does not have a script. So it has to be written in Hindi. For example they could not pronounce ‘Sha’ and ‘Sa’ differently. They had only one pronunciation – ‘Cha’. Like in Hindi, Gondi did not need all the three letters. Only ‘Cha’ was enough. Coming to words, they do not pronounce ‘Gadi’ and ‘Ghadi’. They pronounce only ‘Gadi’. Then there was also a problem with ‘Kha’, ‘Gha’, ‘Cha’ and ‘Jha’. So there was a discussion between the teachers and their guides, the leaders of the party. They decided that it was not necessary to teach those letters that are difficult for the adivasi students. Anyhow they decided to introduce them and leave it to them to learn at a later stage.
In Grammar they teach the related letters giving different sounds like ‘aa’, ‘ee’, ‘vuu’ and other such things. They also teach sentence formation, tense and common names. In science, they explain the birth of the earth, Sun, Moon, human evolution and other such things. They plan to include human anatomy in the coming days.
However, they have a little problem in explaining science. The local people beliefs about the evolution are that a tree was cut. The various pieces fell scattered out of which the earth, sun, moon and the stars were born. Regarding eclipse they think that the tiger eats the moon or the sun and so there is an eclipse. When the eclipse is over they say the tiger could not eat and so left without eating. There is one more story, which says that the sun ate its child and the moon released the stars. The half moon is explained to have been the beaten moon by the sun. Yet another belief is that the earth is standing on the hood of a cobra.
Neelo says that the students could not believe when told that the earth rotates and revolves. They question that if it is true, why does not the tree or the hill move?! Then, Neelo says they explained them that humans went on to the moon and then wrote all these things.
MAS has certain teaching aids. It is occasionally showing CDs regarding history, science. Mostly it uses charts prepared on the subjects being taught. The teachers use globe, torchlight and other such things to explain these things. Placing students and making them move like the sun and the moon show the rotation of the earth and eclipses. Short stories are written on the chart and they are read everyday.
The daily routine goes on with four subjects, 90 minutes each. There is a group meeting in the evening time. The students are made into groups in which they discuss the day’s lessons with the help of questions the teachers give them. The teachers only monitor the group discussions leaving mostly to the students to discuss amongst themselves. There would be 25–30 students and normally three teachers. Depending on the situation the mobile academic school would run for 15 – 20 days to 25 – 30 days. If the area is tense with the movements of the police, few chapters in the syllabus would be cut down and the duration of the school reduced.
After each school there is a review in which the teachers know from the students how they felt about the classes, the problems in understanding the subjects and the method of teaching. Later the teachers discuss these issues with their leaders and then draw lessons for improvement.
MAS is running the schools like any academic school. It does not have a building and other such paraphernalia. But it definitely has the essence necessary for education. It has prepared textbooks in mathematics, language, science and history. There are proposals to prepare textbooks on people’s culture and language as primary and advanced courses.
The people’s government is running ashram schools in many places over Dandakaranya. There are 20 - 35 students in such schools with teachers too staying with them. The teachers are party members and Professional Revolutionaries (PR).
The day starts with a gathering in which the day’s news is told and the international song is sung. The gathering precedes to breakfast. The school starts with teaching the subjects with a break of two hours in the afternoon. In the evening there are games after which there is another gathering that closes the day. Initially the parents were not serious in sending their children to the school. The teachers took up a campaign in the villages and explained the necessity and use of education. Now the existing schools have consistent students. In such villages where there is a school an evening school is being taken up for adults. In fact there is a demand from the adults to teach them to read and write. Despite the daylong hard labor in agriculture, they manage to sit and learn for at least one hour a day in the evening.
The necessary funds to run the schools are provided mostly by the people’s governments. At times the party too helps.
Juri, one of the foremost teachers in the team says that the formation of MAS helped a lot for the fast development of education of the activists and squad members. She says that the students studying in the ashram schools right from the beginning are able to pick up tables and mathematics quite fast. MAS also helped the members to read and understand the magazines brought out in Gondi by the DK Special Zonal Committee (DKSZC).
She recounted one incident in which the police attacked a village where one of the schools was running. As soon as the village militia informed the arrival of the police, the teachers took away the students on to a hillock at the end of the village. The villagers immediately went into the school premises and cleared away all the material that would indicate a school. When the teachers returned after the police left, they could not find a single piece of paper in the school. Books, rice and all such material too were safely hidden and the school camouflaged. The police did not realize that it was a school.
Coming to the experience of the Mobile Political School (MOPOS), the teacher comrade taught the members of the village level people’s government (the janathana sarkars), members of the militia and leaders and activists of the mass organizations.
She says that they are very much interested to know the subjects. But then, since they are not used to sit for a long time, they would take long intervals. The fact that the adivasi people could not exercise their brains with this kind of intellectual labor for the past so many generations, would explain this.
As Comrade D, the first in charge of these departments from the SZC put it, “given the first experience for the adivasi society in learning, it was a challenge to teach them. But our party met the challenge successfully. We are now taking new strides in teaching”.
Strongly Condemn Raids on NDFP Leaders & the Illegal Detention of Com. Sison In The Netherlands
On the morning of August 28, Dutch plainclothes police raided the home of exiled Filipino revolutionary leader Jose Maria Sison in Utrecht, the Netherlands, arrested him and charged him with ordering the murder of two persons in the Philippines in 2003. According to his wife, they broke down the front door without bothering to ring or knock, bruising her arm as they prevented her from making a phone call. They carted away computers, documents, CDs, and other files, remaining until the evening while she was instructed to sit in a corner.
Eight other locations were simultaneously raided. Sison was not at home the time. Luis Jalandoni, the chief peace negotiator for the Filipino Maoist rebels in their talks with the Government of the Philippines, details what happened:
“The Dutch Police called up Prof. Sison to invite him to the police station because according to them there were new developments on the complaint that Prof. Sison had filed in 2001. Thinking that it was about the complaint he filed on an assassination plot that was hatched by the then incumbent [Joseph] Estrada government against him, Prof. Sison brought with him some documents pertinent to the said complaint.”
“But when he arrived at the police station, he was separated from his three companions that included his lawyer. They learned later that Prof. Sison had been whisked away to a jail complex in Scheveningen, formerly used by the Nazis for detaining Dutch resistance fighters, on the patently spurious charge of ordering the murder of [Arturo] Kintanar and [Romulo] Tabara.”
A source however said Sison’s house was also subjected to a search by Dutch authorities. The source also said the houses of National Democratic Front (NDF) negotiating panel head Luis Jalandoni and Ruth de Leon, Dutch authorities searched executive director of NDF international information office. Computers and files were reportedly taken.
Sison was in the National Penitentiary in Scheveningen in The Hague where the judge before whom he appeared August 31 ruled that he would remain in solitary confinement for up to 14 days. According to his lawyer, Jan Fermon, the official charge against him is “incitement to murders” in the Philippines. Its proximate cause, according to the Philippines mainstream press, was affidavits filed with the Philippines Department of Justice last year by the wives of Kintanar and Tabara (themselves former communists expelled from the movement) followed by visits to the Dutch Embassy in Manila.
Ironically the NDFP consultant’s arrest comes shortly after the Supreme Court’s dismissal of trumped-up rebellion charges against him and several other personalities in connection with the 2006 alleged “Left-Right conspiracy” to unseat the Arroyo administration. It also comes just barely over a month after the Luxembourg-based European Court of First Instance annulled Sison’s inclusion in the Council of the European Union’s “terrorist list” for lack of basis. In 2002, the CPP-NPA was included by the U.S. Department of State in its list of “foreign terrorist organizations.” Sison was likewise listed as a “foreign terrorist.” The Council of the European Union followed suit later that year. On May 29, the Council of the European Union decided to retain Sison in its “terrorist” list. This decision was annulled by the July 11 verdict of the ECFI.
Today com Sison is a consultant to the NDFP and is the Chairperson of the ILPS (International League of People’s Struggle). It is reported that he has no direct involvement in the Communist party of the Philippines, which conducted the actions on the two traitors who were collaborating with the fascist Philippines government. CPP officials in a parking lot apprehended Tabara, according to the Maoists, on Sept. 26, 2004. He pulled a gun when they attempted to arrest him for murdering an elderly peasant leader and they shot him to death. This happened in a society in which the regime in power employs death squads. The human rights group Karapatan states that more than 800 left-wing activists have been extra-judicially killed since 2001. The Bush administration makes no fuss about that, or the fact that there were 1200 people on death row in the Philippines in June 2006 when the Philippines Congress passed a law banning the death penalty. The official justice system in the Philippines is widely perceived as fraudulent. But the U.S. and its allies validate it while treating the people’s courts as illegitimate and tools of terrorists answering to Sison in his Utrecht exile.
Sison has lived in Holland since 1987. The 68-year-old former professor of English literature and accomplished poet headed the newly reestablished Communist Party of the Philippines from 1968 to 1977. Sison has been on self-exile in the Netherlands since 1987. He had applied for but has not been granted political asylum. He could not be deported because he has claimed his life would be endangered upon his arrival in the Philippines.
During these years the party’s military arm, the New People’s Army (NPA), made extraordinary advances in its People’s War to topple the U.S.-backed dictatorship of Ferdinand Marcos. Captured by Marcos’ troops in 1977, Sison spent years in prison, including a year and a half strapped to a cot, in solitary confinement before he was released in 1986 by President Corazon Aquino following the “People Power” revolution that drove Marcos and his notorious wife Imelda out of the country. Since then he has served as chairman of the International League of Peoples Struggle, and Chief Political Consultant to the National Democratic Front of the Philippines in its off-again on-again peace talks with the Manila government.
Protests have broken out all over the world against the illegal detention of Sison by the Dutch government at the instigation of the US administration.
On Aug 29th about a hundred activists belonging to various organizations under the banner of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan or New Patriotic Alliance) rallied here earlier today to protest the arrest of National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) chief political consultant and International League of Peoples’ Struggle (ILPS) chairman Jose Maria Sison in Utrecht, The Netherlands.
Meanwhile Dutch and Filipino supporters are organizing a petition campaign. Hastily arranged demonstrations have occurred in the Philippines, Netherlands, U.S. (New York and L.A.) and Hong Kong. Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark has offered his services as an attorney, describing Sison as “a gentle person... and inspiring leader” and “great man.” “Everyone who is concerned about peace and freedom has to be greatly distressed over the arrest of Joma Sison,” he told members of the New York Committee for Human Rights in the Philippines last week. “Sison is a great spirit that the world needs to know about, a great voice that the world needs to hear. The demonization will destroy us if we permit it to continue.”
The National Lawyer’s Guild of the USA has taken up his case. The National Lawyers Guild, founded in 1937, is a progressive bar association in the United States working in the service of the people. Its national office is headquartered in New York and it has chapters in nearly every state, as well as over 100 law school chapters. In 2006, NLG lawyers participated in a delegation of women lawyers to the Philippines, which produced the report of atrocities.
As we go to the press the news has just come in that the European Court did not find any validity in the charges framed against Sison and he has been released. We demand all the material seized from him and NDFP leaders be forthwith returned and stern action taken for the illegal robbery of their material.
Long Live Comrade Ajoy (Parimal Sen)
Comrade Parimal Sen, who had assumed the name Atin in the 1970s and later till death Ajoy, has died at the age of 64. One of the few veterans of the Naxalbari generation in the Party, the CPI(Maoist) Central Committee member, Comrade Ajoy (Parimal Sen), breathed his last on August 15th 2007. He was attacked by cerebral malaria.
Com. Parimal Sen was first attracted to left politics in his student days and after the Naxalbari upsurge he got directly involved in Naxalbari politics led by the CPI (ML). An M.Com from Calcutta University Com. Parimal Sen was born and brought up in a middle class family with his brothers and sisters. He took up a job under the West Bengal government in his early life to help his family stave off financial burden. Inspired by the Great Debate led by the CPC under the leadership of Com. Mao he repudiated the Dangeite CPI and joined the CPI (M). The GPCR in China shook the young generation of communists at that time and he was no exception. Then came the spring thunder. Neo-revisionism of the CPI (M) was laid bare. Like hundreds of other real communists Com. Ajoy too joined the Revolutionary stream. Dalhousie Square, currently BBD Bag, the hub of mainly State government and other private concern offices, was his earliest place of spreading Naxalbari politics under the CPI (ML). At one time the Dalhousie unit of the CPI (ML) not only led many glorious movements of the group C and Group D workers, but also played a significant role in coordinating various state units when repression had reached its most ghoulish form and many of the central leadership were either thrown behind bars or murdered by the state.
After joining the CPI (ML) he worked in the Party Committee in the Dalhousie area of Kolkata. Com. Parimal Sen, our dear Ajoyda, had played a very significant role from the end of 1972 to 1973 when the setback of the movement rendered many comrades inactive. It was a time of white terror taking the upper-hand with the Naba Congress (Indira Gandhi led Congress) goons formed into criminal Pratirodh Bahinis (Resistance forces) in almost all the areas where revolutionary forces had to retreat in 1971-72. The breath of terror was all pervading in the city of Kolkata.
A determined comrade Ajoyda along with other committed revolutionaries kept the smoldering flame of revolutionary activities alive in his working area. Later the party broke into two parts on the question of Lin Piao after the 10th Congress of the CPC. Com. Ajoy remained in the M. Mukherjee-led CPI (ML) and became a state committee member in West Bengal. Later he got arrested in 1974 after he, along with some other comrades, had just dissociated from the Mahadeb group. Disillusioned with the Second CC tactics he set himself, along with some other comrades, in the Presidency Jail in Kolkata into rethinking the past mistakes. Tortured in jail, with a plastered hand, comrade Ajoy was dispatched from Burdwan Jail to Presidency Jail some time in 1975. And here after a jail escape on 24 February 1976 comrade Ajoy along with many other pro-Charu Mazumdar followers were segregated from others and locked-up 24 hours in condemned cells. A period of brutal repression followed. It continued till the Emergency was lifted in March 1977. Released in the middle of 1977 Com. Ajoy refused to resume his state government job on condition of giving an undertaking and rather he plunged into active revolutionary life by forming with other comrades the CPI (ML), Party Unity.
While in prison this search continued and before he, along with other comrades came out of jail in late 1977, a concrete line and understanding took shape. After coming out of prison efforts were taken to join any organization whose line would be close to theirs.
But as this did not materialize (one effort with Suniti Kr. Ghose failed) the comrades decided to form their organization, as that became necessary for carrying on the practice already undertaken. In November 1978 the CPI(ML)(PU) was formed with Com. Ajoy playing a leading role and he was elected as one of the Leading Team members. Some mergers with smaller groups followed. In 1982 the CPI (ML) (Party Unity) was formed after another merger and Com. Ajoy was in the WB State Committee. In the 1987 Conference he was elected to the COC of the PU. He worked in various capacities, was associated with the publication of the party organs, and was in charge, from the PU side, for the formation of the All India Cultural Organization with other parties.
Earlier, in 1978-79 he oversaw the student front. He played a prominent role in the heroic peasant struggle in Nadia dist. He also worked in Howrah and Hooghly. From Hooghly he developed contacts in the Haldia industrial township and developed some work there. He went to Kharagpur and did some work there. In 1978-79, for some period, he visited Bandamunda in Orissa for work among Railway Workers.
When the CPI (ML), Party Unity and the CPI (ML) People’s War merged Comrade Ajoyda rose to become the Central Committee member, and in the last Party Congress held after the merger with the MCC, he was elected to the Central Committee of the CPI (Maoist).
Com. Ajoy participated actively in many struggles and political debates but always tried to keep a low profile. Always austere with himself, our dear comrade Ajoyda was very careful even about his necessary expenses. An avid reader of Bengali literature he would always hunt for good books. A devoted communist till his last, Com. Ajoyda has etched in the memories of his comrades, party, sympathizers and people who had come into his contact an indelible figure, slightly bent forward, with specks and a beaming smile. Com. Ajoyda, a dedicated communist martyr to the cause of revolution, is no more.
Labels: People's March
posted by People's March @ 4:49 AM,
