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"NAXALITE" MOVEMENT in INDIA by Sharad Jhaveri

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-518- We are not yet prepared to call ism, feudalism and comprador-bureaucrat the leaders of the CPI(M) "counter-revo- capital"! -- whatever that might mean. lutionaries" although objectively they play the role of defenders of bourgeois Indeed the "Naxalite" revolt against property. That is a logical consequence the leadership of the CPI(M) reflects to an of their opportunist class-collaboration- extent the growing revolt of the rank and ist policies emanating out of their er- file against the opportunist sins of the roneous and unhistorical strategy of a leadership. The ranks react in a blind and "people's democratic revolution'' in India. often adventurist manner to the betrayals of the masses by the traditional Stalinist But then the Naxalites, despite parties. all their fiery pronouncements regarding armed action and "guerrilla warfare," are For the present, Maoism, with its also committed to the strategy of a four- slogan "power flows from the barrel of a class "people's democratic front" -- a gun," has a romantic appeal to these rev- front of the proletariat with the peasant- olutionary romanticists. But the honest ry, middle class, and the national bour- revolutionaries among them will be con- geoisie to achieve a "people's democratic vinced in the course of emerging mass revolution. struggles that the alternative to the op- portunism of the CPI(M) is not Maoist ad- What is worse, the Naxalites under- venturism but a consciously planned rev- rate the role of the urban proletariat as olutionary struggle of workers and peas- the leaders of the coming socialist revo- ants, aimed at overthrowing the capital- lution in India. Their emphasis is on a ist state and achieving a socialist revo- peasant-led revolution against "imperial- lution in India. THE "NAXALITE" MOVEMENT IN INDIA By Sharad Jhaveri Jamnagar ing the Naxalite "evil." It has been reported in the press It is reported that Chavan has that at a May Day meeting in Calcutta, already written a circular to various Kanu Sanyal, the leader of the peasant opposition leaders informing them that struggles of Naxalbari (in the Darjeeling the government is thinking of amending District of West Bengal),had announced the Unlawful Activities Act so as to the formation of a third Communist party, cover the case of the Naxalite party also. styled as the "Communist Party of India It is significant that the pro-Moscow Com- (Marxist-Leninist).'' It is reported that munist party has opposed this move while Mr. Sanyal had openly proclaimed the need there are obvious differences amongst the for an armed insurrection based on the leaders of the Communist party (Marxist) peasantry. Asit Sen, another theoretician of India. Mr. Jyoti Basu, deputy leader of the "Naxalites," who presided over of the West Bengal United Front govern- this meeting, hailed the Chinese Commu- ment and leader of CPI(M),views the nist party and said they will be guided Naxalite movement merely as a "law and by Chairman Mao's thoughts. order" problem, while Mr. Namboodiripad, another CPI(M) leader and chief minister This reported constitution of the of the Kerala United Front government Naxalites into a single all-India party dominated by CPI(M), is inclined to treat has raised a veritable war cry amongst it as a political problem. the bourgeois spokesmen and papers. The matter was raised in parliament and many At present the strength of the members, mainly from the rightist Swatan- Naxalites is estimated at 4,500. tra party and the ruling Congress party, urged Home Minister Chavan to take a In West Bengal during the midterm serious view of this development and nip elections [in February 19691, they it in the bud. (Indian Express, 8 May launched a boycott movement which proved 1969. a total failure. So far not a single sys- tematic approach to create revolutionary Chavan has assured the members by bases in rural areas has been reported. observing that the government is against armed revolution, no matter who it came In Uttar Pradesh CUP1 and Bihar from -- Mao, Marx, or Manu (a reactionary the Naxalites have the support of an in- ideologue of the Indian patriarchal sys- fluential section of the leaders who have tem -- S.J.). Chavan also stated in par- left the CPI(M). They are active in ten liament that he was trying to meet the districts of Bihar-Ranchi, Dhanbad, Pala- leaders of the opposition parties with a mau, Singhbhum and Bhagalpur. They have view to evolving the strategy of combat- penetrated into the tribal areas where -519- tribals are being organised by Hirenmoy vital import. Roy, who pleads for a separate tribal state with the right of secession. These include: (1) The vital im- portance of the cities in the present InAndhraPradesh, a large chunk of context of the Indian economy. They are the CPI(M) has joined the movement led by being increasingly industrialised in T. Nagi Reddy who is fully committed to contrast to the forcible dismantling of Chinese strategy. the coastal cities of China by Japan after the defeat of the Second Chinese The Naxalite movement is distin- Revolution. (2) The increasingly indis- guished by its uncritical and absolutely pensable role of the Indian proletariat blind admiration for Mao and by its whole- in the process of production under the sale importation of Mao's strategy of par- bourgeoisie's ever-increasing emphasis tisan warfare in India, in total disre- on industrialisation. (3) The impossi- gard of the specific dialectic of the bility of maintaining isolated zones of Indian situation (well-developed network liberation in India in view of the highly of transportation and communication deep- developed science of counterinsurgency ly entrenched, highly centralized adminis- placed at the disposal of the Indian trative and state apparatus, lack of tra- bourgeoisie by the experiences of Ameri- ditions of protracted armed civil war, can imperialism, and in view of the still unexhausted parliamentary reformist easier accessibility and penetrability potential of the Indian bourgeoisie, etc.). of such zones under Indian geographical and social conditions by counterinsur- The Naxalites regard the state as gents as compared with the Latin-American representing the comprador-bureaucrat countries, etc. bourgeoisie and the feudal landlords; whereas in reality it is purely and sim- The Naxalites have still to evolve ply a state of the Indian bourgeoisie. a correct orientation on the question of Sanyal considers that the principal con- the nature of the next Indian revolution. tradiction is between the people and Is it bourgeois-democratic or socialist? feudalism (Liberation, Vol. 2, November Or will it be socialist, under proletar- 1968,.p. 30, "Report on the Peasant Move- ian hegemony, but solve first the unful- ment in Terai Region"). Thereby the en- filled tasks of a bourgeois-democratic tire capitalist growth of India since revolution, such as the agrarian ques- 1947 is wiped out. tion? The Naxalites have not even raised these questions. According to Sanyal, the peasants are the basis and main force of the anki- The Socialist Workers party of imperialist and antifeudal struggle. He India has viewed the adventurist activi- predicates the liberation of the other ties of the Naxalites as a reaction of oppressed classes on the liberation of petty-bourgeois radicals who still accept the peasants. Thereby the role of the the theory of a four-class alliance. Indian proletariat (so aptly and graphi- cally delineated in the programme of the The danger at present is that of Socialist Workers party of India [Trotsky- deliberate exaggeration of the activities istl)is obliterated. By centering their of this tendency by the bourgeoisie, out attention entirely on rural areas, in ac- of all proportion, to justify its own cordance with the Chinese model, the repressive throttling of the remnants of Naxalites overlook several factors of bourgeois liberty operative in India. IS SCOTLAND YARD OUT TO GET TPHE "BLACK DWA€""? Scotland Yard has begun what the merely reported the meeting without edi- London Guardian described May 7 as a torial comment. The Guardian reported that "blitz" against the radical and "under- a Scotland Yard detective "hinted that they ground" press in Britain. "After raids were considering a prosecution for crimi- last week on 'International T5mes' and nal libel, a rare forensic bloom that 'Oz , I' the Guardian said, "plainclothes could mean prison rather than damages for men have paid a couple of less than Tariq Ali, hero of the barricades and edi- friendly calls on the distributors of tor of the day." Black Dwarf. It "Criminal libel, the Guardian The pretext for these visits is added, "is defamation so damaging that it said to be the August 14, 1968, issue of might provoke a breach of the peace. The the paper, which contained a brief report last prosecution we could find was in on a public meeting where a prominent so- September, 1965, when a man was sent to cial worker made "certain allegations" prison for three years for accusing a against a police sergeant, implying he detective inspector of stealing %lo while was guilty of brutality. The Black Dwarf interrogating him. I' .
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