People’s War in India: Interview with Comrade Anand of the Communist Party of India (Maoist)

This article was published in Maoist Information Bulletin 13, dated December 7, 2009, which is available on Banned Thought:

Interview with Comrade Katakam Sudarshan,  Secretary, Central Regional Bureau, CPI(Maoist)

We are publishing below parts of an interview by our MIB correspondent with comrade Katakam Sudarshan aka Anand, Polit Bureau member and the secretary of Central regional Bureau, CPI(Maoist). He is incharge of one of the two major regions under the CPI(Maoist) where people’s war is raging with great intensity. For almost three decades he has been in the field leading the struggle of the oppressed in the flaming fields of North Telangana to the adivasi-inhabited regions of Dandakaranya. A few years ago, he lost his life-partner, fiery, vocal and highly talented comrade Sadhana, when she was the secretary of Adilabad district in North Telangana.

Short and soft-spoken, comrade Anand answered all the questions very patiently in his native tongue of Telugu. The questions were mainly related to the stand of the CPI(Maoist) regarding the proposal of talks by Union Home Minister Chidambaram, on the question of violence, and the other issues related to the Centre’s war against the Maoists and adivasis.

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MIB: You, as the Secretary of a very important zone of armed struggle in the country, must be studying the policies, plans and tactics of the enemy. How do you look at the Centre’s preparations for the final offensive or war on the Maoists?

Anand: To be frank enough, this is not something unexpected for our Party. In fact, we are in the midst of a cruel bitter war since several years. In fact, we had extended to Dandakaranya [DK] with a clear vision in the early 1980s as we were expecting a massive offensive in North Telangana in the course of the intensification of the class struggle in the region. Thus we made preparations to retreat to Dandakaranya when the need arose. And the course of development proved what precisely we had foreseen. Though we had put up a stiff fight and initiated a wave of armed mass resistance and mass struggles in North Telangana and throughout the state of Andhra Pradesh, at one point of time we had to retreat a large chunk of our forces to DK. In DK, the brutal state offensive had entered a new phase with the launching of the murderous terrorist armed campaign of salwa judum in June 2005 under the leadership of the Congress chieftain Mahendra Karma and the Hindu fascist Raman Singh government in Chhattisgarh.

Right from the time salwa judum received severe beating in our hands and was virtually on a backfoot after our heroic acts of resistance such as Ranibodili and Errabore, the reactionary rulers were preparing to intervene in a big way with their para-military and army if needed. Brigadier Ponwar, who is heading the Jungle Warfare School in Kanker, has been insisting ever since 2006 that salwa judum cannot deliver and that trained commando forces have to move in on a massive scale. This view is shared by several key figures in the political and police establishments.

We have been diligently studying the enemy’s imperialist sponsored policy of LIC, his multi-pronged counter-revolutionary strategy, his tactics and plans, especially after our serious losses in Andhra Pradesh. So it is not entirely an unexpected thing for us. Moreover, the imperialists and the comprador business houses in India are facing a severe crisis and there is acute competition in the global market. Hence cheap sources of raw materials are extremely essential for these vultures in order to compete in the world market and amass super profits. The MOUs began to enter the mineral-rich, adivasi-inhabited areas stretching from areas in West Bengal bordering Jharkhand to North Andhra and North Telangana. And these are also the regions where the people’s war led by the CPI(Maoist) is raging intensely.

Hence we expected that after we defeated the murderous campaign by salwa judum, the Centre would get into its foot-steps and continue the murderous campaign (salwa judum II or Operation Tribal Hunt) on a far greater scale by sending huge contingents of central forces. How much the vultures—the corporate houses that are itching to lay their hands on the irresistible mineral wealth in the region—might have paid to the Congress, BJP, CPI(M), and other political parties, top police officials, bureaucrats and a big section of the media will remain a million-dollar guess. That these corporate houses had poured in huge sums is clear and that is why as soon as the UPA came to power for the second time the tempo was built up quite fast. Lies and statistics, facts and fiction, were combined dexterously and with great cunning to generate a Maoist monster devouring ordinary innocent people, obstructing development, extorting money, indulging in mindless violence, and what not. The Home Ministry prepared the ground for the massive offensive by first declaring the CPI(Maoist) as a terrorist organisation and imposing an All India ban. Simultaneously, 26 companies of central forces were sent to Lalgarh to crush a peaceful people’s movement. Whatever be the differences between various sections of the ruling classes, however intense their dog-fights, one thing is crystal-clear: all these  reactionaries—whether Gandhian Congress, swadeshi BJP or Marxist CPI(M)—are all united when it is a question of defending and advancing their common class interests vis-à-vis the revolutionary toiling masses.

It is because we had been preparing for this eventuality, the enemy could not cause much damage to the people’s war or the various revolutionary organisations in this entire belt in spite of his best efforts and mobilising his best troops. In the first half of June i.e., within a fortnight after the UPA assumed office, our Polit Bureau came out with a concrete assessment of the situation, what measures the enemy was most likely to take, and how we should counter his tactics. This circular has been already quoted by many news analysts and so-called defence experts in their analysis. As you can see, things have been moving exactly as we had predicted. So to put simply, the war moves by the reactionary rulers are on expected lines. And fascist ruling classes have always followed similar course in the entire human history. They cannot think in terms other than brute force and genocides, and dirty psychological war of white lies and malicious slander.

Lastly, it would be entirely misplaced to describe the current offensive by the reactionary rulers as the final offensive. The final battle by the Indian people led by the Maoist revolutionaries will have to be perhaps fought with the American imperialists. The present move by Chidambaram & Co will go down history as a foolish misadventure by the ruling classes. They will be tied down in an endless war and will be forced to continuously inject more forces as is being witnessed with every passing day. The entire region inhabited by the adivasis will prove to be India’s Vietnam. We are certain that this would also aggravate the economic and political crises and lead to country-wide conflagration. Operation Green Hunt will end up in a terrible disaster for the reactionary ruling classes and their imperialist masters, particularly the US imperialists.

MIB: But Chidambaram has gone on record that there is no such thing as Operation Green Hunt and that it is purely an invention of the media?

Com Anand: (smiles scoffingly). Perhaps he is right. The hunt is meant to exterminate and drive out the adivasis from the entire region so as to hand over the region’s wealth to the corporate houses. It would be more appropriate to re-christen it as Operation Adivasi Hunt or Operation Tribal Hunt. So let us agree with Chidambaram on that. What he wants to do is to resettle the adivasis in what could be called ’strategic hamlets’ as in Vietnam. But just as ’strategic hamlets’ could not save the mightiest American troops in Vietnam, the strategic hamlets in DK or elsewhere too cannot save Chidambaram’s forces and the reactionary, parasitic Indian ruling classes.

By saying that there is no big operation by the Centre and that it is only helping the states in dealing with Maoists, Chidambaram has proved to the world how big a liar he is. By continuously mobilising the central forces while pretending there is no big offensive he has revealed his ugly fascist features of a Hitler or George Bush. In fact, the vocabulary of the rulers is bizarre, to say the least. It is inverted and is always different from that of the people. When they say peace it should be understood as war. Likewise, encounter would mean cold-blooded murder. It has become so much a part of the rulers’ vocabulary that the police directly threaten a person that he would be encountered.

Mahendra Karma and Raman Singh describe salwa judum as peace campaign which actually means a campaign of murder, rape, arson and destruction. Relief camps set up by the government in Chhattisgarh mean strategic hamlets or nazi concentration camps. Development in the vocabulary of the rulers means displacement for the people. Rule of law means complete submission of the people to oppression and exploitation. Aam aadmi means ‘looting the aam aadmi’. Even Barack Obama was given Nobel peace prize for escalating war in Afghanistan and Pakistan, for murdering civilians through aerial bombardment in those countries and displacing millions of people. There is no end to the hypocrisy of language uttered by the ruling classes and imperialists. Thus the golden rule is to take the opposite of what the rulers say. More often than not, this turns out to be nearer to the truth.

Thus Chidambaram’s denial of any big operation against the Maoists means he is certainly preparing for an all-out brutal counter-revolutionary war.

MIB: Chidambarm says he is ready to talk with the Maoists on all issues provided they halt violence. Are the Maoists ready to abjure violence and receive the olive branch offered by Chidambaram?

Anand: This endless chatter of Chidambaram could perhaps go down as the cruellest joke of this decade. You send thousands of troops to the adivasi areas, abduct innocent adivasis, torture them, murder them in the most inhuman way one could ever think of, gang-rape women at gun-point, slash out the tongue of a two-year-old child, chop off the breasts of a 80-year-old woman, burn down houses and entire villages, steal hens, pigs, goats and what not from the poor, helpless adivasis, commit indescribable atrocities through your armed vigilante gangs, and yet, you have the audacity to ask Maoists to stop the violence. Shame be upon this wretched man calling himself the soft-spoken Home Minister! He is soft to the murderers, rapists, bandits and dacoits in police uniform. He would not allow a single case to be filed against these uniformed goondas whatever be their inhuman crimes. He had even pledged that he would fight till the last drop of his blood to defend the rotten status quo and the interests of his class.

By repeating that he is ready to resolve all issues within 72 hours if the Maoists first abjured violence, what he is trying to do is to find justification for his cruel savage offensive on the people in the Maoist-dominated regions. He knows that as long as the salwa judum goondas, the SPOs, the state police forces, the CRPF, BSF, CoBRA forces continue to murder, rape and destroy the property of the people, Maoists will have no option but to retaliate in self-defence. He plans to use this situation to justify his blood-bath. Create a situation where the Maoists and the adivasis cannot but fight back in self-defence, then focus on this ‘violence’ of the Maoists, and launch a massive blood-bath on the plea that Maoists are continuing with their ’senseless’ violence notwithstanding the generous offer of talks by the government. Like George Bush in Iraq, once the reactionary rulers of our country have decided to clear up the mineral-rich forest regions, they will leave no stone unturned for achieving this dirty objective. Their modus operandi is simple and the proven track traversed by fascists all the world over.

Step up state violence and state-sponsored violence. Do not allow the media to visit the areas where the central and state forces are carrying out the worst forms of crimes against the adivasis. But when one police informer is punished by the Maoists, organise an official tour of media personnel to paint the Maoists as murderers of innocent people. Also arrange meetings of media personnel with vigilante gangs and the lumpen elements punished by the Maoists. With this fake build up aided by the loyal sections in the biased media, unleash the long-planned offensive to flush out the Maoists by resettling the adivasis in strategic hamlets—such is the hideous plan of Chidambaram which anyone with a little common sense cannot fail to grasp.

So it is not a question of our not responding to the so-called olive branch said to be offered by the government. There is nothing like a sincere offer for talks from the side of the government. It is ironic to see how a man, who has a knife stuck deep into the body of the adivasis, calls on them to halt violence. It is like a tiger with its claws stung into the sheep’s flesh asking the sheep to stop struggling against it. If Chidambaram has even an iota of sincerity he should first ask his uniformed men to stop murdering, torturing, raping adivasis, stop looting and destroying their property, and to withdraw these lawless rowdies in uniform. He should instruct Raman Singh to call off the salwa judum and initiate action against the crimes perpetrated by these goondas.

To say that he has no power to control the inhuman atrocities by the police and state-sponsored vigilante gangs in the states on the plea that law and order is a state subject is the worst form of opportunism, escapism and hypocrisy. It is a heinous way of evading responsibility as a Home Minister while sending his forces to escalate the violence by Raman Singh’s goons. If Chidambaram has not lent his helping hand to Raman Singh’s saffron fascist government by sending massive forces from the Centre the people led by our Party would have long back taught a fitting lesson to Raman Singh’s goons. In fact, precisely when salwa judum is tottering and is under attack from all sides, and the state policemen are refusing to fight against Maoists and innocent adivasis, Chidambaram had stepped in to strengthen the state’s rowdies with those of the Centre and continue the blood-bath in Chhattisgarh. Chidambaram has absolutely no moral right to call on the Maoists to halt violence so long as the repressive forces of the state continue to indulge in the worst forms of violence against the people.

The so-called mindless violence by Maoists is nothing but legitimate and just counter-violence in the defence of the poor and helpless adivasis and other oppressed sections who have been at the receiving end since decades and even centuries. If Chidambaram ends the indiscriminate, sadistic, ghastly, terrifying, spine-chilling, blood-curdling, savage and macabre violence by his uniformed men on the unarmed, poor, helpless adivasi men, women and children, then peace will prevail without much difficulty. From our side, we assure the civil society that the need for counter-violence would automatically end once the brutal state violence comes to a halt.

We reiterate that the violence of the Maoists and the oppressed is only counter-violence to defend oneself from the unbridled state violence. And this counter-violence of the oppressed is justified by any count. Chidambarm’s desperate attempts to isolate us in the name of unleashing ‘mindless violence’ will end up in smoke. Bush was able to fool and dupe the American people for a while by manipulating the media and manufacturing consent for his despicable lies against Saddam. Today his successor Obama is doing the same thing by showing the ghost of Al Qaeda and creating a blood-bath in Afghanistan and its extension to Pakistan. Every reactionary and fascist ruler invents an enemy to carry out his ulterior aims. If the greed for oil drove George Bush to weave absurd lies and unleash a heart-rending blood-bath in Iraq and Afghanistan, the greed for minerals drives our Chidambaram to weave a web of lies about Maoist violence. Some sections of the media that are in the pay-roll of the corporate big business houses sing in chorus without any compunction.

MIB: Then do you see any possibility in foreseeable future of an end to state violence and some sort of a dialogue between the Maoists and the state?

Anand: This depends on a multiplicity of factors and not on the wishes of the Maoists or a Chidambaram. Just as a Bush went ahead to bomb and invade Iraq egged on by a tiny military-industrial complex ruling America, notwithstanding the fact that the majority of the world’s nations were opposed to this imperialist act, the tiny corporate elite of India—the billionaires club—would push their political representatives Manmohan, Chidambarm et al, to go ahead to clear up and hand over the region’s wealth to them. But it is the extent of people’s protests and Maoist resistance that would ultimately set the limits to the onslaught of the rulers.

If the protests mount throughout the country and other battle-fronts open up, I mean not just armed resistance struggles and offensives by Maoists, but also movements against price-rise, corruption, displacement, separate statehoods like Telangana, Gorkhaland, Bundelkhand and others, against climate destruction, unemployment, land-acquisition or snatching of land by the bureaucrat-corporate-criminal mafia, police atrocities, atrocities against dalits, women, religious minorities and so on, Chidambaram will find it impossible to carry out his brutal aggression on the people. Peace movement by genuine democratic forces and the civil society with a clear, uncompromising, and principled stand against state violence, and in defence of the oppressed, would contribute much to dissuade Chidambaram and his band of vultures to unleash a blood-bath in the areas of armed struggle led by the CPI(Maoist).

Last but not the least, the heroic resistance of the oppressed in areas invaded by the state’s rowdy forces and the victories achieved by the people led by our Party would lead to a fear psychosis among the mercenary troops similar to the Vietnam syndrome among the American mercenary troops during the Vietnam war. This could precipitate revolts and desertions among the forces and compel Chidambaram and Raman Singh to reconsider their aggressive and abominable strategy of strategic hamlets and decimation of the local adivasi population. By turning the vast area stretching from West Bengal to Andhra Pradesh into a flaming field of intense armed struggle and spreading the armed resistance of the people to newer areas we can pin down the enemy forces into a Vietnam-like situation and push them into the defensive. Our Party is leaving no stone unturned to create such a situation. Only then, will Manmohan, Chidambaram or whoever is in the fore-front in unleashing the brutal counter-revolutionary war, will stop talking meaningless trash and begin placing serious proposals for talks by first putting a stop to state violence. There is no short-cut method.

MIB: So the CPI(Maoist), its PLGA, and the people are prepared for a long-drawn war against the invading forces?

Anand: Of course, we are. At the outset, let me clarify that our strategy is the strategy of protracted people’s war. This is the only correct and appropriate strategy in India for dealing with a superior enemy by taking advantage of the vast terrain, weak infrastructure in backward areas, a huge agrarian population, and the dog-fights among the ruling classes. We are prepared for a protracted people’s war. If the enemy wants to wipe us out in 2, 3 or 5 years, as their various representatives and spokespersons have been saying at different times, and if he concentrates on selected pockets to clear us out, our strategy is to extend the areas of armed and other forms of struggle to yet wider areas, extending to even the heart of the enemy, i.e., his hitherto urban citadels. It is impossible for the enemy to prevent this from happening however much he might improve his intelligence network and repressive apparatus in the urban areas where a huge population that is more than the population of entire Europe is seething with unrest.

If the enemy thinks he has taken hold of a certain area from the hands of the guerrillas he will be perplexed to find he has lost some other areas from his hands in other places. It will be a see-saw battle with the enemy seizing our territories here and there, and we seizing the territories hitherto under his control elsewhere besides re-capturing our former strong-holds. Try as he might, the enemy cannot succeed even in his dreams to wipe out the Maoist movement which will culminate in the total liberation of our country from the clutches of imperialism, feudalism and comprador bureaucrat capitalism. As long as hunger and starvation, poverty and misery, deprivation and destitution, unemployment and disease, discrimination and oppression, and exploitation in various forms exist, Maoist movement will continue to thrive and make big strides. Our entire strategy revolves around the concept of bringing the vast majority of the anti-imperialist, anti-feudal forces into the people’s war to overthrow the state of the exploiters and oppressors. So our preparations are in accordance with this clear vision and strategy.

MIB: Manmohan Singh, Chidambaram and a host of spokespersons of the ruling classes have been saying that the Maoists would never sit for talks and can never think in terms of peaceful resolution of people’s issues. They say that if at all Maoists come to talks it will be with an ulterior motive to strengthen their Party and army since their ultimate aim is to capture state power through armed struggle. Then how do you think the state can ever think of talks? Can there ever be a piece-meal solution to a problem that is related to the capture of state power?

Anand: I am glad you placed this very important question before me. At the outset, let me clarify that there are grave misgivings even among a sincere section of the people (I am not speaking of the deliberate distortions indulged in by the paid agents of the ruling classes) that, since the Maoists believe in armed revolution, they can never think in terms of peaceful resolution of people’s issues. If that were the case, the Maoists would not take up people’s issues such as minimum wages, retrenchments, wage cuts, subsidy for essential commodities, schools and hospitals, irrigation facilities, remunerative prices for agricultural produce, anti-price hike and anti-fee hike agitations, demands for separate statehood, and so on. If people’s issues are not the concern of the Maoists, then there is no reason for their existence.

However, the Maoists firmly believe, and is proved by historical experience, that the reactionary rulers would never solve the basic problems of the people since the problems are directly related to the exploitation and oppression by these very rulers. On the contrary, the rulers would resort to brutal, fascist suppression of the democratic and peaceful movements of the various sections of the oppressed people. It is in the course of fighting for the issues of the people that the Maoists aim to capture political power. If the people’s real problems are resolved peacefully then why would they wage armed revolution for capturing power risking their lives?

Our clear understanding is that the exploitation and oppression by the imperialist, feudal and comprador rulers are the root cause for the problems faced by the people and hence these can never be resolved by the rulers. However, people can achieve significant gains through organized mass movements and we organise such mass struggles on every problem faced by the people to make living conditions better for them. For those who survive with one meal a day even the slightest increase in their incomes means a lot to their lives. Ad when it comes to issues like displacement you can imagine the enormous significance to the lives of the people. We are prepared to discuss with the government on ways to resolve all those people’s issues that can be resolved within the present system. But we have absolutely no illusions that the government would really implement even its own laws and constitutional provisions as we had witnessed in the case of land reforms drama, without fierce resistance by the people. The central and various state governments have been implementing all the anti-people policies and plans with full knowledge of their disastrous consequences. Bandits and plunderers do not think of the consequences of their acts.

Having said that, I also think that the government would be compelled to resolve at least some issues of the people depending on the heat it faces from mass movements and all-round pressure. We are always prepared to do whatever possible in the basic interests of the people. We have no interests of our own apart from those of the oppressed people. Unless this is grasped thoroughly and looked at through glasses not tainted with bias against the Maoists, one cannot understand the reason for the existence of the Maoist party itself.

If the reactionary governments do not place restrictions on the legal activities of the Maoists, if they do not obstruct the peaceful meetings, rallies, mass strikes and struggles organised by the oppressed people led by the Maoists, then where is the need for them to take up arms? Arms are for the self-defence of the people and are used only when the state obstructs all avenues of peaceful struggle and resorts to brutal violence on democratic struggles of the people. We see this everywhere from Nagaland, Assam to Kashmir. If the demand raised by the majority of the people—whatever the demand may be, including secession from India—is conceded, then where is the need for armed confrontation? If the police did not go about beating up adivasi men, women and children, blinding them, destroying their property, letting loose vigilante harmad gangs of the social fascists on the people, why would the people of Lalgarh come out as one fighting fist demanding apology by the police chief? And if the SP got rid of his arrogance and apologised for the high-handedness, instead of sending in more repressive forces to the area, then why would the Lalgarh people’s movement assume armed form?

The story is the same everywhere. People generally resort to peaceful struggles on their issues, right from submitting petitions, sitting on hunger-strikes, organising dharnas and rallies, but these are crushed with an iron hand by the rulers through their police forces. It is at that point of time that people begin to pursue more militant forms including armed form of struggle.

As an advanced detachment of the working class in India, our Party formed the PLGA for defending the rights and just struggles of the oppressed people and advance their struggle to the culmination of capture of state power without which it is impossible to resolve any of their basic issues. Thus, the ultimate aim of our revolution and the means to achieve it are non-negotiable. However, it is possible to resolve some issues if there is sincerity on the part of the government. If the government does not obstruct peaceful activities and struggles of the Maoists, lifts the ban on the legitimate organisations of the people, then violence would automatically come down. The entire responsibility for the escalation of violence lies with the obstinacy and repressive stand of the rulers. We are always for a peaceful resolution of every issue but we are also prepared to take up arms for self-defence when compelled by the enemy. Chidambaram cannot confuse people by saying that Maoists are not serious to resolve people’s issues. But the first and foremost issue of the people is an end to unbridled state violence. Only when this is done, there would be any progress in the de-escalation of violence.

MIB: And you had some experience in Andhra Pradesh in this regard?

Anand: Yes. That is why I can confidently say that levels of violence will rapidly come down if the state puts an end to its unbridled violence on unarmed innocent people. Impartial obersvers of the period of talks in Andhra Pradesh can see how counter-violence by Maoists had come down to absolute zero for over six months inspite of frequent provocations by the police to break the cease-fire. Eventually, it was the YSR Reddy’s government which broke off from the talks and broke the cease-fire when it found it impossible to solve any of the demands raised by the Maoists. Interestingly, all the demands placed by the Maoist delegation were within the constitutional framework! After seeing the hypocrisy and ulterior motives of the Congress government in Andhra Pradesh which launched a brutal offensive after breaking off from the talks, would anyone believe Chidambarm’s rhetoric about talks? Our experience in Andhra Pradesh has shown that revolutionaries should not go for talks with such enemies who use it only as a pretext for unleashing more brutal attacks. But there could be a cease-fire if the state first ends its cruel violence.

MIB: You had once worked as the Secretary of the North Telangana Special Zonal Committee. Recent reports in the media point to a revival of the Maoist movement in Andhra Pradesh, particularly in North Telangana (NT). What is the precise situation there on the ground?

Anand: At present I cannot say more than the fact that there has been some revival of our activity in parts of NT. We have changed our methods and tactics in the zone keeping in view our relatively weaker subjective forces and the extensive informer network and heavy deployment of the enemy force.  In the north Andhra districts which fall under the Andhra-Orissa Border Special Zone, the activity of our Party, PLGA and revolutionary mass organisations, has always been there. The wiping out of 38 Grey Hounds and some other offensives carried out by our PLGA in North Andhra and in the bordering areas of Orissa has created a favourable situation for the movement of our forces and have also aroused the people to a good extent.

MIB: There are strong opinions among some sections of people that the Maoists had unduly intervened in the culture, customs, traditions etc of the adivasis besides opposing development works by the government and this had angered the adivasis. This is cited as the main reason why the adivasis had joined salwa judum.

Anand: This is a white lie fabricated by the reactionary rulers, the police top brass and bureaucrats as part of their psychological war meant to justify the state-sponsored terrorist campaign of salwa judum. Through such totally baseless lies they have been trying to project their armed vigilante goons of salwa judum as spontaneous mobilization of the adivasis and as a rebellion of the local people against the Maoists. Paid agents of the corporate business houses have been trying to din into the ears of the gullible people that it is because of the materialistic outlook and impatience of the Maoists that they are getting isolated from the local adivasi population which is increasingly turnig towards the government. Besides Chhattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh and other BJP ministers and leaders, Congress leaders like Mahendra Karma, there are others like retired DG of BSF, Prakash Singh, former chief of IB, Doval, and others who have been carrying out this malicious propaganda without citing a single instance of interference by the Maoists into the cultural lives and traditions of adivasis.

Maoists have been in Dandakaranya for almost three decades now. And today 90% of the Party membership, most of the members in the various leading Party committees, PLGA fighters, and the leadership of all mass organizations, organs of people’s democratic power or janathana sarkars hail from local adivasis. The adivasis constitute the life-blood of the Maoist movement in entire DK as well as Jharkhand, Orissa and other states at the present stage. In all the nealy three decades of our existence there was never any friction with the adivasi population but some of the heads of the tribes or tribal elders who had been lording over the general adivasi masses, have some grouse since the ongoing class struggle had replaced them with young militant leadership. But even among these elders a significant section is with the Party.

Maoists had tried to instill new content to adivasi traditions, culture, songs etc., while fighting against patriarchy, blind belief and other evils. In fact, even this struggle against the evils was waged through the local adivasi leadership and hence revolutionary change became possible. Their collective life and customs were not only preserved but also strengthened and extended to new spheres like co-operatives. It is this further consolidation of their collective life that has made their resistance to the state and state-sponsored terrorism too into a collective movement and has angered the parliamentary political parties, police, the bureaucrats and the non-adivasi exploiters and oppressors who find it almost impossible to pick up informers from the areas where the adivasis are consolidated. And that is why their houses and entire villages are burned down by the police, para-military and salwa judum goondas, their women raped and men murdered. It is these vultures who had uprooted the adivasis and destroyed their culture. It is a shame that people like Prakash Singh and Ajit Doval are spreading such malicious slander. These were the only two dissenters in the entire fact-finding team which visited Dantewada in 2006. They were parroting the stories of the SPOs and salwa judum goons whom they met in government-run camps and they did not even bother to meet the thousands of real victims who had fled to the forests or remained in the villages.

However much the reactionary rulers and their paid agents cry, they cannot hide the fact that Maoists enjoy immense support of the vast adivasi population, and that after the state had unleashed the savage salwa judum the support for the Maoists had further increased. The vultures that are waiting greedily to plunder the wealth in the adivasi areas cannot hide the true fascist nature of the salwa judum by spreading canards against the Maoists.