September 26th the international Day of Solidarity and Struggle with the Indian masses in arms and struggle in that country has been observed. It was a day dedicated, first and foremost, to political prisoners in Indian jails. India holds the highest number of political prisoners in the world -more than ten thousands- of a multitude of shapes coming from a multitude of struggles against the Modi regime, that is a fascist regime allied with and serving world imperialism. Modi regime serves, above all, imperialist powers of a similar nature, the most reactionary and fascist ones, specifically Trump and American imperialism, as well as Netanyahu’s genocidal Zionist regime in Israel but also other reactionary regimes in the imperialist countries, as well he is close friend and ally to Meloni’s modern fascist government.
Modi and his regime serve and are allies of other imperialist powers, such as imperialist Russia, with maintain military and economic ties mainly -though not exclusively- centered on energy resources.
A similar relationship exists with imperialist China -characterized by both collusion and conflict- since India views itself as a China’s major rival across the region and the world, yet simultaneously seeks to emulate China by following its path of imperialist capitalist development. At the same time, situated within a region full of inter-imperialist contradictions, India keeps its hands free regarding imperialist alliances, with a view toward the prospect of war. That said, the political prisoners in India are primarily those involved in the people's war, a massive movement that has mobilized tens of thousands of fighters and millions of people in struggle. This movement spans the so-called "Red Corridor" -a number of states and regions where the Maoist-led people's war is viewed (and continues to be viewed) as the Modi regime's principal enemy and "main internal threat," a definition applied not only by the Modi regime but also by US imperialism and all those allied with India.
Indian prisons are filled with political prisoners drawn from the people's war and the party leading it: the Communist Party of India (Maoist).
These political prisoners are subjected to torture, solitary confinement, persecution, and death. In the eyes of Modi's fascist regime, they all represent the "Maoist danger". This label is applied to any organization or association fighting against repression in India, as well as the so-called "urban Maoists" -intellectuals operating in India's major cities and urban centers, within universities, and across the country in the cultural and arts spheres.
In the Indian context, the ranks of Maoist prisoners include entire segments of the population -and their representatives- drawn from indigenous communities, ranging from Adivasis to Dalits. Across various Indian regions, these groups have waged both mass struggles and armed resistance to defend their land and their future against the fierce aggression of Indian multinationals seeking to drive them out from their territories in order to exploit the land for the imperialist expansion of major Indian and global corporations. In many of these regions, the masses have put up resistance that has been met with massacres, arrests, persecution, criminalization, and occupation by the army and paramilitary groups.
At the same time, India’s prisons are being filled with all those who rebel and women, who face bestial treatment behind bars -including rape and torture that in several cases leads to death.
Recently, young people and students have become targets of repression in India; under the colorful yet significant name "Cockroach Movement," they launched the largest movement of Indian students and working-class youth from across the country to expose and oppose corruption and rigged exams -issues that struck a chord with young people and their families. The Cockroach Movement impacted the entire Indian society, forcing a minister to resign and the government to back down; yet, the regime is clearly retaliating with repressive campaigns targeting the movement's prominent figures and its support base.
Indian prisons hold a vast array of figures from national minority groups -from Kashmiris to Muslims- hat the Modi regime deems internal enemies, or threats to India and the regime's vision of the country's future. Consequently, the jails are filled with many leaders and representatives of these domestic movements for national liberation and self-determination.
Thus, India is effectively-as it has been said- a prison for such movements; while it claims to be the world's largest democracy, indeed it represents the greatest repressive state -marked by modern fascism and Hindu fundamentalism- existing in the world today, and perhaps, to a certain extent, that has ever existed.
On this day, therefore, we stand in solidarity and have called to mobilize for the release of all political prisoners in India -particularly the leaders of the CPI(Maoist) people's war who continue to resist while incarcerated. On this day, we also pay tribute to and express solidarity with all the martyrs of the Indian revolution -from the Naxalite peasant rebellion to the present. Throughout these years and decades, the Indian masses have chosen the path of revolution and people's war, inspired by the great people's war waged in China under the leadership of Mao and his thought. Guided by this example and the strategic principles known globally as "Maoism", this people's war has generated a saga of mass mobilization and dealt blows to the Indian regime in its various incarnations, culminating in the current Hindu fascist regime. These blows have undermined the regime's power, credibility, and future prospects, paving the way for a people's war in this vast country that -if victorious- will transform into a New Democratic revolution and subsequently a socialist revolution. It will follow the path and echo the message of the great revolutions carried out by the proletariat and the masses worldwide: from the Paris Commune and the October Revolution to the Great Chinese Revolution and its milestone, the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in socialist China.
Thus, the martyrs of the revolution serve global revolutionary processes; they stand alongside all those -in the last century and the current one- fighting for a socialist world, free from imperialism, exploitation, and capitalism in all its forms.
Honoring these martyrs is particularly important because the people's war and the Communist Party of India (Maoist) have suffered severe blows from a reactionary military offensive -bordering on genocide against Adivasi populations- waged against the people's war by the Modi regime supported by imperialist countries of world. After numerous operations aimed at wiping it out, the latest -named "Operation Kagar"- has indeed achieved significant results for the regime, pushing back the advance of the people's war and the Communist Party of India (Maoist). Its leaders have been killed or forcibly compelled to recant; others, faced with military defeat, chose to surrender and defect to the enemy, becoming instruments of repression against their own former comrades and tools of Modi's fascist regime and imperialism—used to dissuade the masses of India from pursuing the path of people's war, revolution, and the struggle for national and social liberation.
Yet, the Communist Party of India (Maoist) is immortal, because the reasons behind the Indian people's struggle for national and social liberation are immortal. Like the phoenix, it has always been able to reorganize and rise again along the saga of Naxalism; indeed, as part of an initiative here in Italy ,and alongside similar efforts carried out in countries across the globe, we are currently distributing a document issued by the faction of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) that survived the wave of State repression.
This document calls to celebrate the 22nd anniversary of the Party's formation everywhere with revolutionary zeal and enthusiasm; it calls for a struggle to defeat the cowardly attempts of the liquidators-traitors of their own party and people -whose apparent goal is to transform the Communist Party of India (Maoist) into an open, legal, electoral party, making it part of the peripheral landscape of India's sham parliamentary democracy -itself a component of the modern fascist regime led by Modi- and to abandon the principles of the revolutionary party, the Marxist-Leninist-Maoist party, and specifically the Leninist party: that is, a party organized clandestinely as a war machine to wage a real revolution led by the working class and the masses.
Instead, the Party’s statement calls for strengthening the "three magic weapons" through which the party will rise again, people's war will resume, and the path to victory will once more illuminate the way for the Indian proletariat and masses, as well as for the proletariat and masses across the world.
It calls for the party -rebuilding the party and the people's army, and defending all that still resists the reactionary offensive of the Modi regime- and for the united front -uniting under the leadership of the proletariat the vast peasant masses, the indigenous masses, and the impoverished masses who still constitute the overwhelming majority of the Indian people. It is essential to develop new guerrilla zones and guerrilla bases; clearly, in India, one cannot conceive of a legal struggle that is not the byproduct of building a people's war—a people's war that employs guerrilla tactics and establishes guerrilla bases serving as genuine launching points for the military offensive of the proletariat, its party, and the impoverished masses of India to regroup and expand.
The party’s statement reiterates the need to defeat attacks on the party line adopted by the Ninth Congress a congress that affirmed and further developed the strategy of organizing the broad masses to lead the New Democratic Revolution to victory.
Disseminating this message through initiatives worldwide -both on September 26th and throughout the ongoing, protracted campaign- is the weapon that communists across the world must use to provide practical, ideological, and political support on a global scale to the Communist Party of India (Maoist) and the heroic Maoist fighters currently resisting in these difficult times.
This crucial document should be read within all revolutionary, anti-imperialist, and communist organizations, as well as by any group standing in solidarity with exploited and oppressed masses worldwide -from Palestine to India and Latin America, to the vast oppressed populations of Asia and Africa. This document is a source of joy and confidence in front of the dramatic news coming from India -news of our comrades falling one by one each day, of traitors surrendering and defecting to the enemy, and of the Indian masses, who certainly do not surrender, losing their point of reference, their organized force, and the leadership that has been guiding their struggle.
Yet, this document reminds us that the birth of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) was the result of a unification process involving all the Maoist communist forces in India -forces that had already been waging a struggle against the Indian regime for years and united to found the Party; a founding that we in Italy are proud to have been the first to support and document, not only within our own country but on an international scale.
This document reassures us that the future of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) and the people's war will be revived and placed in the strong, generous hands of the comrades who have held firm, and of the proletarian and masses who will inevitably resume their advance and the struggle for their genuine liberation.
Clearly, this document also is given in the hands of the youth who gave life to the recent great movement of struggle against the regime, since the future of the people's war in India -inspired by the great example of the revolution's martyrs- lies in the hands of the new generations.
This document insists on the necessity of continuing the people's war.
In the Indian context, we are facing a situation of change; in many areas, India has developed along capitalist lines and with a massive working class that has staged colossal strikes, including the largest workers' strike in the world. This does not mean that the revolution in this country will not take the form of a revolutionary people's war, forged by the unity between the Indian proletariat and the peasant masses, the youth, and the impoverished masses across the country.
The Party's strategy, founded on people's war, will certainly be updated in light of these changes and the lessons drawn from the recent military defeat.
Finally, the document reaffirms the importance -at this juncture- of rebuilding the Party's leadership and intensifying the struggle against opportunism, liquidationism, and revisionism. This reconstruction must be grounded in clandestine work and the central battle: transforming spontaneous mass movements against the Indian State into organized movements. It means resuming the path -the only path capable of rebuilding the Party and the people's war- based on the necessity of forging deep ties with the masses.
At the same time, the final section of the document appeals to the people, calling on everyone to participate in the political-ideological struggle both within and outside the Party; upon this depends the effective resumption of the Indian revolution's course and, consequently, the fate of the people of that country.
The Party must remain true to its nature; it was not created to participate in the electoral circus, nor to become a party that embraces the notion that "the movement is everything and the goal is nothing," thereby leaving the Indian masses without the actual reality of a reorganized people's war and without the future prospect of an authentic New Democratic revolution that transforms into a socialist revolution.
However, the primary objective today is to safeguard the Party -its nature, its program, and its organization- and in this regard, the final appeal aligns with the actual main slogan of this International Day of Action.
This international day calls upon intellectuals, lawyers, and democrats across various professions to assist us in supporting political prisoners, backing their legal battles and their struggle for survival in prison. It calls on all democratic forces to unite against torture and extrajudicial killings targeting Maoist revolutionaries, and to demand the immediate release of communist revolutionaries who have remained steadfast in their loyalty to the Party and the People's War -refusing to yield or surrender to the regime- specifically comrades Pramod Mishra, Sagar Da, Sheila Di, Kishore Da, Deepak Rao, and others.
A "National Week for Indian Political Prisoners" took place from September 6 to 13, and many other battles are underway as a result. Recently, Indian courts sentenced ten comrades to death, holding them responsible for one of the most high-profile military action the Party has carried out during these long years of guerrilla warfare and military operations. These comrades have received no clemency from the regime, which sought the death penalty against them in court.
Clearly, a campaign is developing in India -and we are acting as its voice worldwide- to prevent the death sentences against these ten comrades from being executed. We are calling for a fair trial that acknowledges the rationale behind their actions which, even within the limits of Indian sham democracy, constitute a liberation struggle rather than terrorism and for their lives to be spared. It is essential to address the entire youth movement, the students movements and those who oppose the repression targeting the representatives the most significant youth struggle in India, known as the "Cockroaches" movement. This movement remains a threat to the Indian regime because it genuinely engages millions of young people; consequently, the repression against aims to prevent these millions from rebelling not only against issues concerning their educational and professional futures but also against the endless, multifaceted oppression on the Indian proletariat and masses.
We support all these movements and, through the International Committee in Support of the People's War in India, we develop solidarity activities on their behalf. In this sense, September 26th was a "historic" day, as it thwarted the Indian regime -and all its domestic and international accomplices (governments, the press, parties, and organizations opposed to the liberation of peoples)- who seek to claim that Maoists in India have been crushed and have vanished, that the masses are not struggling, and that India is free to grow within the global imperialist system as a new major power joining other imperialist powers on the path of war and support for genocide.
A clear point must be made regarding this support for genocide: after American imperialism, the Modi regime is the world's leading supporter of the Zionist regime in Israel.
Speaking to the Israeli Parliament, Modi himself declared the complete affinity between the ideology he professes -Brahmanical fascism- and Zionism. He stated that what unites with the Zionist state of Israel is a shared ideology and a shared role they intend to play -not only within their own countries but globally- to spread the neo-Nazi forms (for that is what they are) of the Hindu fascist regime, the Israeli Zionist regime, and all reactionary regimes. At the same time, they join forces to repress all opposition -labelled as "terrorism", "Islamism", etc.- and in the name of that, they proceed with the genocide of the Palestinian people, just as they do with the genocide of the rebelling Indian masses and India's national minorities. It is therefore evident that there can be no Palestinian liberation movement that does not embrace the arguments we put forward: linking the battle to support the Palestinian people's liberation with the struggle against a mortal enemy of that people, the Indian regime, and viewing the impoverished, armed, and struggling masses of India as their primary brothers-in-arms worldwide, fighting the same battle for liberation from Gaza to Calcutta, Bastar, and across all Indian regions.
A statement from the Palestinian youth organization already highlights this common struggle. We report that the secretary of this organization was recently arrested and detained in Israeli prisons, demonstrating the deep connection between the Palestinian people's liberation struggle and India's liberation movement.
Clearly, we must recognize that in our own country, we have many reasons to inform ourselves, organize, and support the struggles of the Indian masses.
The primary reason is evidently that the Meloni government and the Italian imperialist bourgeoisie have established a strategic partnership with Modi’s India.
Meloni was hailed as a friend and Modi as a "super-friend"; they danced and sang together, united by a shared fascist nature and common interests -namely, belonging to an imperialist world that treats peoples in the most reactionary and fascist manner possible.
At the same time, however, imperialist Europe -and particularly Italy- has established relations to develop a trade route serving as an alternative to Chinese influence, aiming to strengthen economic ties, freight transport, and communication links between India, Israel, and Italy—a project known as IMEC.
So, our country -through its government- is a close ally of the Modi regime; it shares the regime's plans and is an active part of them. That is why fighting in this country in solidarity with our class brothers in India against the Modi regime is an essential task for all who call themselves friends of the Palestinian people, for all who stand in solidarity with the Palestinian masses, and for all who struggle against the government.
This is one of the reasons why the campaign regarding India must grow, and we are proud to be its pioneers and initiators.
The other major issue concerns Indian workers. Our country is home to many Indian workers -farm laborers found across the territory- who are super-exploited and enslaved, and who have paid the ultimate price with their lives. These are the laborers involved in the grimmest stories this country has to tell -stories of employer-imposed slavery and of farmhands being killed. These Indian farm laborers -our class brothers- are people who fled, first and foremost, from the Indian regime; they escaped poverty, hunger, and oppression in their homeland. Like so many other migrants, they came to our countries -filling factories in some areas and becoming workers and farm laborers here- only to face double exploitation and enslavement, completely devoid of any protections.
Trade unions in this country only take notice of Indian workers when they appear in crime reports -following a death or operations that expose their extreme exploitation. This is true across all regions from the province of Taranto to Amendolara, Latina, and beyond, wherever Indian workers are found. They are part of the great wave of migration that brought people to our country to escape a deadly regime, the Indian regime characterized by oppression, poverty, and war against the people.
Therefore, it is crucial to view the Indian workers in this country not merely as a significant segment of the immigrant proletariat, part of our nation's working class, which, like any nationality, must be united and organized, but also as a vital contingent capable of contributing to the struggle against the Meloni government, against the alliance between the Meloni and Modi governments, and against the Modi government and the imperialism, which is their main guide and content.
We have a thousand and one reasons to fuel a large movement of solidarity, unity, internationalism, and class solidarity with the Indian masses in this country; a movement of communist and proletarian solidarity with the Indian communists who are actively fighting and dying for the cause in their own country -and for the world cause of communism- sharing with us the battle to free our countries and the world from imperialist oppression, capitalism, war, and fascism.
That is the purpose of this day. Although this day of action is observed primarily by small groups like ours -in the cities where we are present, from Taranto to Bergamo to Palermo and elsewhere- it represents a fundamental aspect of the class struggle in Italy. Precisely because it is a fundamental aspect of that struggle, this battle goes along with a harsh critique of the existing movement, against the underestimation, ignorance, and silence surrounding events in India, and against the failure to participate in initiatives that we propose on all fronts, initiatives that stem directly from the call of Indian comrades belonging to both the Maoist Communist Party and the various democratic, revolutionary, and anti-imperialist organizations in that country.
Yet the political and ideological poverty of the movement in Italy -whether it defines itself as communist or anti-imperialist- the reluctance to take up the "India question" is a symptom of a broader inability to understand the actual state of the world: to distinguish friends from enemies, and to recognize how crucial it is -in our country and others, across the world- to truly have a line, an ideology, a strategy and a tactic aimed to overthrow imperialism and capitalism, along with their governments of every political stripe, and -particularly today, amidst the rise of modern fascism- fascist governments. In this regard, there is no distinction between the struggle in India and the struggle in Italy; what exists is the need for a common strategy and set of tactics applied across different countries. For us, having a strategy and tactics applicable worldwide means applying them here at home; it means boldly raising the banner of revolutionary war -of people's war- because only revolutionary war, only people's war, can (whether in India or Italy) overthrow current regimes and the existing system, and pave the way for a genuine struggle for a new society, for socialism, and for the revolution that can truly liberate us from the monsters spawned by the imperialist and capitalist system.
Ultimately, the message of this day is this: it calls us to wage an all-out battle against those who underestimate this struggle and against those who wish to remain within the confines of the battles they are already fighting, refusing to embark on this strategic battle, essential to escape the quagmire of opportunism, reformism, and overcome the strategic, ideological, and political weaknesses of our movement in this country, and take the path of revolution.
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