CENTRAL COMMITTEE
Press Release
May 11, 2012
Chidambaram has no
moral right to talk about ‘kidnaps’ by Maoists
While incarcerating
thousands of Adivasis and agitators in jails
On 9-05-2012 Home Minister P. Chidambaram while
replying in Rajya Sabha said - Maoists ‘kidnapping’ young collectors, elected
representatives and foreigners indicates a clear shift in the nature of the
Maoist extremism and shows that Maoists are resorting to ‘terror’ tactics to
bend the state government to their demands and that Maoists seek to stop
development in those districts. He reiterated his government’s resolve to
continue the anti-naxal operations by following a two-pronged strategy of
development and security related strategies to face this challenge.
Chidambaram was obviously referring to the recent
‘kidnaps’ of the Italian tourists and Jhina Hikaka (MLA) in Odisha and collector
Alex Paul Menon in Chhattisgarh. This statement also comes in the backdrop of
the centre pushing hard for the formation of the NCTC. The government wants to
put each and every just struggle under the head of so-called ‘terrorism’ and
suppress the movements that they are part of. With the May 5th
meeting with the Chief Ministers not reaching a decisive conclusion on the
formation of NCTC, P. Chidambaram even while trying every trick in his basket
to form it, is fast weaving his vicious web to create opinion that would push
every action taken by the people for their genuine demands into the so-called
‘terrorism’ vat and consequently makes every citizen who participates in these
struggle forms a so-called ‘terrorist’.
Firstly, we want to state that these are not ‘kidnaps’
done for ransom, vendetta, personal demands or settling scores. People are
‘arresting’ them and putting the genuine long-standing collective demands of
the oppressed people, particularly the Adivasis in those areas in front of the
government. All the demands are pertaining to the severe excruciating state
repression that has been unleashed on them, particularly for the release of
thousands of Adivasis incarcerated in the jails and their leaders. 3000
Adivasis are in jails in Chhattisgarh while 6000 Adivasis are in jails in
Jharkhand. Thousands more are jailed in Punjab, Uttarakhand, Bihar,
Maharashtra, Odisha, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Tamilnadu, Karnataka, Uttar
Pradesh and other states for fighting against displacement and for
Jal-Jungle-Zameen. Peasants fighting the land lords with the slogan ‘Land to
the tiller’ and fighting police atrocities have been put in jails in large
numbers in areas like Narayanapatna and Lalgarh. They had been implicated under
false cases and denied bails in the most unjust manner. Many had been arrested
in front of the jail gates after being granted bails and again put in jails
after foisting more false cases on them. In fact, most of them would have been
released even if they had been sentenced. Such is the callousness of the Indian
state towards the Adivasis and the poor of our country and the reason for this
is to pave the way for corporate loot of natural resources in the mineral rich
forest areas of our country.
The sole reason for such ‘arrests’ is not any
so-called ‘terrorist tendencies’ among the people or the CPI (Maoist) leading
them but the Indian
State. If at all it had
delivered justice to the people at any point of their life, people would not
have been forced to take up such struggle forms to get their demands fulfilled.
A people crushed under the iron heels of the State are very rarely taking up
such forms after taking up all kinds of struggle forms like dharnas, bandhs,
rallies, protest marches, hunger strikes - in one word every kind of collective
struggle form involving hundreds and thousands of people for days, weeks,
months or even years together to get their people (ranging from juveniles to
very elderly persons) released. The Indian state always answered with bullets,
more arrests, more beatings, more custodial deaths, more false cases and more
‘abductions’ of these agitators. The police, paramilitary, judiciary, civil
administration, bureaucracy etc that constitute the Indian State
are acting like the tentacles of a giant Octopus and entangling the people and
making them breathless. The struggles of political prisoners in the jails are
also being crushed most brutally. The rights to which prisoners are entitled
are also violated most blatantly. It is this suffocating situation inside and
outside jails that is leading to arrests of government representatives by
people.
With all doors closed for justice, such struggle forms
are taken up to find some respite from the umpteen numbers of violations of
human rights of the Adivasi people by the central and state armed forces. In a
country where media corporations are in cahoots with the interests of the
imperialists, MNCs and the big land lords and do not lend their voice or space
to the poor people, sometimes such struggle forms are being used by the people
to even bring the genuine demands of theirs to the attention of the citizens of
this country.
A quick perusal of the main demands put forward during
such arrests would give anybody a fair idea about the ordeal of people under Operation
Green Hunt (OGH). They are demanding the release of ordinary Adivasis who were
‘kidnapped’ by the state and have been traceless since then or were put in
jails under fabricated charges and they are demanding the release of their
leaders. On such occasions, they are also focusing the demand to end the
multi-pronged country-wide offensive named OGH but in reality a ‘War on People’
- on the toiling masses of our country, most of whom are Dalits and Adivasis
and half of whom are invariably women.
The young collectors that Chidambaram is speaking of
are implementing the ‘development’ part of the two-pronged strategy and this
development leads to nothing but the impoverishment and displacement of the
hundreds of thousands of Adivasis and is nothing but the other side of the coin
that has repression on one side. And the foreigners he is speaking of were
taking objectionable photos of Adivasi women as part of tourism that the Indian
state wants to promote at the cost of the dignity of the Adivasi people. There
is no need to write much about the ‘elected representatives’ that are part of
the rotten parliamentary system reeking of corruption, nepotism and is
implementing nothing but anti-people policies as dictated by their imperialist
masters. These representatives have done nothing to get the poor Adivasis
released from the jails and deliver justice to them in all the years of their
tenure. In fact, they are very much part of the implementation of OGH in their
areas.
So we appeal to all democrats and citizens of this
country to truly distinguish who the real ‘terrorists’ are – is it the poor
Adivasis led by their party the CPI (Maoist) resorting to some struggle forms
for their genuine demands or the Indian State that is unleashing ‘terror’ day
in and day out on the disadvantaged destitute of our country? We appeal to the Indian masses to support
the genuine demands put forward by the people during such arrests and fight for
their fulfillment by joining hands with them. Our party firmly believes that a
broad united struggle of the Indian masses is compulsory and necessary for
getting the indisputable democratic rights of the deprived to be realized in
practice.
It is the democratic right of the people to take up
various struggle forms for fulfilling their genuine demands or even to
propagate them when every inch of democratic space is being gradually but
rapidly occupied by the giant octopus that is the Indian State.
When this space is getting shrunk with each passing day due to the marching of
the security forces in their hamlets and villages and now with the formation of
a fascist institution like the NCTC, it is the inalienable right of the people
to resort to various struggle forms including arrests of this kind. No struggle
form is anathema to the fighting people as long as they adhere to mass line and
class line as taught by our Marxist Teachers.
Chidambaram is saying that formation of NCTC is the
‘need of the hour’. Through this fascist institution modeled on the NCTC of US,
the Indian ruling classes and the imperialists, particularly the US
imperialists backing them wish to crush every democratic aspiration and genuine
demand of the people. The ‘need of the hour’ is to fight back such fascist
attempts by the Indian
State to crush every
political struggle and struggle form in the name of so-called ‘terrorism’. The
Indian people would definitely defeat the two-pronged strategy of 'development'
and repression (two sides of the same coin) of the central and state
governments by creatively inaugurating a rainbow of myriad struggle forms. Yes,
of course, Mr. Chidambaram! The people led by the CPI (Maoist) definitely wish
to put a stop to your anti-people, pro-imperialist, undemocratic and repressive
‘development’ model. They categorically reject it and are very clear about it.
They would prove with their uncompromising struggle for New Democratic
Revolution that true ‘development’ is what they aspire for while having the
interests of their children and their ecology at heart and not what the ruling
classes want to impose on them while having the interests of the MNCs and the
big land lords at heart.
(Abhay)
Spokesperson,
Central Committee,
CPI (Maoist
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