The Naxalite Movement In India by Angira Chaudhury

[Reuters/UNI photo]

The recent violent killings of hundreds of people including large number of security forces by Naxal troops in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Maharashtra etc. have drawn the attention of the Indian media which has highlighted these events as acts of ‘terrorism’. However, a section of intellectuals and human right workers, most notably, Arundhati Roy has differed from such opinion. In my opinion, terrorism may have individual following but it has no mass base. Naxalism is quite different from terrorism as it has ideological mass base in many areas of the country. The genesis of ‘Naxalism’ is very interesting. It is a product of long ranging ideological differences within the Indian communist movement.

The Communist International (Comintern) was set up by Lenin in 1919, just after the October Revolution of 1917. The main aim of Comintern was determined to expand communist ideology and help establish communist parties wherever they did not exist. In this way Comintern also talked of International revolution. Lenin, aware of possible violent ideological thinking in the International communist movement wrote the famous book titled ‘Left Wing Communism: An Infantile Disorder’, cautioning communist leaders who believed in armed revolution.

However, there were always two currents in the Indian Communist Movement. The success of China’s communist revolution in 1949 after the Second World War had a deep impact on Indian Communist leaders. A section of the Movement started believing that an Indian revolution would be successful through armed struggle, as seen in China. Due to ideological differences of left and right, The Communist Party of India split in 1964 leading to the formation of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) or CPI (M).

When left front formed the coalition government in West Bengal in 1967, the ideological differences became very sharp within CPI (M). Incidentally, around the same time a tribal youth named Bimal was attacked by his landlord and his hoodlums as he tried to till his land after getting a judicial order for the same in Naxalbari, West Bengal. The local leaders of CPI (M) like Charu Majumdar, Kanu Sanyal and Khokan Majumdar etc., took out a procession in protest of the landlord’s actions on 25^th May 1967. The gathering of mostly tribal people was attacked by the police, initially killing 7 woman and two children. The event marked the beginning of the Naxalite movement.

The aforementioned local leaders of Siligudi came out with slogans of capturing state power through armed struggle. For this purpose, Charu Majumdar and Kanu Sanyal pledged to follow techniques of Guerilla warfare. Such was the popularity of the slogans that the Chinese media highlighted them too. This is how the ideology of armed struggle found a new base in West Bengal.

The movement spread towards Debra- Gopiballabhpur area of Midnapore district of Bengal and Mushari area of Bihar. Considering growing ideological base Charu Majumdar with the help of other local leaders of CPI (M) formed an organization known as All India Coordination Committee of Communist Revolutionaries.

Soon this movement found its base in the Telangana region of Andhra Pradesh. As a result Charu Majumdar and his followers decided to form a political party to lead armed revolution in India. In 1969, the anniversary of Lenin’s birthday, a new party was formed named Communist Party of India Marxist/ Leninist in Kolkata. After the formation of CPI (ML) Charu Majumdar provided a slogan to boycott elections in 1969.  He also called for a cultural revolution calling students to boycott the capitalist education system and burning libraries and laboratories; also dismantling the statues of national leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhash Chandra Bose etc.

In the matters of foreign policy Naxalite leaders emulated Chinese foreign policy in declaring the Soviet Union as a social imperialist nation. They also came out with a slogan ‘China’s chairman is our chairman’. Charu Majumdar also provided a slogan of individual annihilation of the class enemy. Individual killings would later become a rampant feature of the Naxalite Movement.

It is interesting to note that the movement has seen numerous splits throughout its history. In spite of all these weaknesses Naxalite groups have succeeded in spreading their mass base in different tribal areas of the country like Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Telangana and Orissa. At present, most of their activities are concentrated on killing central police and other security personnel. They have also adopted a policy of holding people for ransom. In this way their leadership has been converted into different groups of bandits.

Ashim Chatterjee, one of the leading figures of the bloody Naxalite revolt of the late 1960s, spoke to prokeralanews.com in April 2010 criticizing the present lot of Maoists, for only relying on arms and operating from the jungles by ignoring people and the doctrine of class struggle.

"Firstly, the conditions which set the stage for a revolutionary movement are absent in India. Secondly, these Maoists have not cared to build up class struggle. And when you fight against the state without caring to build up class struggle, it amounts to social terrorism. The blood that is being shed is meaningless," he said.

Their original ideologies have been lost in the wilderness; this is why voices from many corners are being raised to treat Naxalism as on par with terrorism. However, there is another opinion that the Naxalites have spread their mass base in areas where particularly tribal people suffer from lack of land reform, education and employment. Therefore, in dealing with the issue, the various individual causes and contextual details of the Naxalite revolution must be taken into consideration.