India’s Naxalites: Wages of feudalism
M D Nalapat
In 1966, on hearing of a peasant rebellion that had erupted in Naxalbari,
a small hamlet in West Bengal in India, Chairman Mao Zedong of China
said that “a single spark can light a prairie fire”. He likened the
forays of the small group of Maoists as sparks that would ignite
agrarian unrest in India to a level unbearable for the government. In a
year’s time, West Bengal saw the formation of a government led by the
the Communist Party of India -Marxist (CPM), but those who began the
“Naxalite” movement saw this party as dominated by the “oppressor
classes” and had formed their own “Communist Party of India
Marxist-Leninist (CPI-ML), that rejected the peaceful path of elections
in favour of armed struggle. Its leader,the frail but charismatic Charu
Mazumdar, was soon captured by the security forces,and died in custody.
His followers took to the jungles but soon fizzled out.
Why? The reason was that the Indian peasantry - especially the landless
- were too scared of the big landowners to risk their lives in armed
assaults. A few “class enemies” were killed,and some of them publicly
beheaded, but such sights failed to ignite rebellion in the broad
masses,who stayed quiet. Most had an option to armed struggle and used
it: elections. In the 1967 elections the once all-powerful Congress
Party was reduced to a minority in several states, including in Uttar
Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. Or perhaps it was not the din of democracy that
blocked the spark from settling the prairie aflame but the bitter memory
of the Communist agitation of the 1950s in Telengana ,which too had been
suppressed viciously . Hundreds of revolutionaries had been killed,and
the trauma was great enough to convince the Communist Party of India
that elections rather than armed struggle was the way of the future, a
course rejected by its “Maoist” cousin. By 1973, the Maoist “Naxalite”
movement had been brutally stamped out, although several of the cadres
of the CPI(ML) escaped death and imprisonment. Indeed, many went:
aboveground” and took to conventional careers. It was only during the
last years of the 1980s that the movement revived again, regaining its
1960s strength by the end of the 1990s. The reason was the income
inequality created by economic reform. While the new policies had made
about a quarter (and thereafter a third) of the Indian population
prosperous, the gap between them and those at the bottom of the ladder
increased enormously. Cable television,which spread from the 1980s,
opened the eyes of the rural poor to the lifestyles of the rich,and
although incomes grew,wants increased by much more. In several parts of
the country,those at the lower ends of the social ladder began moving
up,helped by a policy of providing low-cost education.In the South,
because unlike in the north of the country, the Muslim elite had not
migrated to Pakistan, the Muslim community began to prosper,matching the
rest of the population in education and income. Land reform began to get
implemented across the country in the 1970s,following Indira Gandhi’s
spectacular 1972 victory on the slogan of “Garibi Hatao” ( “Abolish
Poverty”). In Kerala,each landless labourer was given a tenth of an acre
of land on his landlord’s farm,thus making eviction impossible. As a
result of this new-found security, agitations for higher farm wages
multiplied,and Kerala farm wage rates went up by several times.In
Karnataka too, a vigorous labd reform was implemented that took land
away from landlords and gave it to tenants who till then did not own the
land they tilled. Wherever such reforms were successful, the local
economy flourished. However,in some parts of the country,diehard feudal
interests prevented land reforms from getting implemented. They ignored
the many laws passed in favour of the landless and the small peasant,and
continued to have despotic control over the many who worked on their
fields. Even today,a third of the country still retains vestiges of
feudalism.This includes parts of the states of Maharashtra,Andhra
Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh,Orissa, Jharkhand and Chattisgarh. Not
surprisingly, it is in such places that Naxalism has reared its violent
head. Because the landlords control the voting booths, and have the
local administrative machinery in their pockets,the very poor find that
democracy does not deliver for them. So they get attracted to the simple
message of the Naxalites: join us,and we will together vanquish your
oppressors. Since the 1990s, a tenth of India’s 600-plus districts have
come under the control of the Naxalites (or Maoists,as they are also
called), at least during the nights,when police dare not venture out
from their stations.
The only panacea for this situation is inclusive development, that
ensures a reasonable distribution of income to the underprivileged.The
problem facing authorities in India is that the Maoists seem totally
opposed to any form of development. They block the building of
factories,and sometimes even roads. Interestingly,in India,they have
been in the forefront of moves to ensure that the country’s uranium
reserves remain unmined. In each location where uranium gets
mined,Maoists protest. As a result,India’s nuclear reactors were starved
of fuel,until the 2008 nuclear agreement signed with the IAEA ensured a
steady supply. Maoist activities have held back development, so that
some claim that they wish to ensure that poverty continues,till such
time as they themselves will come to power.
In the meantime, areas where the insurgents are strong suffer.An example
is Nandigram in West Bengal,where a giant factory was to be set up by
the Tata Group to produce the world’s cheapest car,the Nano ( at a price
of Rupees One Lakh each). Political rivals of the ruling CPM party
joined hands with Maoists to ensure that the factory was not built,
despite the fact that more than 70,000 jobs would have been created
locally by the factory. In all regions controlled by them,the Maoists
are against big projects,fearful thatthe spread of prosperity will
affect their popularity, and bring in outsiders who are less amenable to
their control than the poor (largely tribal) population that forms the
bedrock of CPI(ML) support.
In Nepal, Indian government agencies stood aside as the Maoists took
control of the state. Only when they began to reveal their bias towards
China (and their hatred of India) did the Government of India realise
that it had been nurturing a Frankenstein. Till last year,Nepalese
Maoists were given sanctuary in India, especially in West Bengal. They
were assisted in numerous ways by officials in Delhi against the
Monarchy in Nepal, an institution that has always had a tense
relationship with Delhi,which has always favoured the democratic parties
rather than the Palace. In the 1980s, Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi
blockaded Nepal in order to force the King to abdicate his powers in
favour of elected representatives. The last King of Nepal,Gyanendra, has
seldom hidden his distrust of Delhi, a sentiment that was reciprocated.
However, once the Maoists came to power,they showed their true colours.
These days,there are reports that the Maoists (Naxalites) in India are
getting help from across the border in Nepal.If so,this would be a
worrisome development.
In India,the policy has always been to ignore a problem until it gets
too painful to remain unaddressed. Today,the Naxalite movement has
become - in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s words - the Number One
security problem in the country.The newly-appointed Home Minister,
Palaniappan Chidambaram, has vowed to tear up the roots of this violent
insurgency,and is creating special units for the purpose.Defense
Minister A K Antony has said that if needed,the armed forces will go
into operation against the Maoists. However, such police action should
be accompanied by anti-feudal measures as well as by an acceleration of
development projects. Economic growth fused to social justice is the
best defense against the Maoist insurgency that is growing in India.
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