Quote Being far more rational people than the elitist bastards who ask them to lay down their arms now admit, the Adivasis sought and received the assistance of Maoists .. Unquote
The term "bastard" is unabashedly sexist, upholding certain social values which have become outdated and even repugnant within circles engaged with human liberation - women, in particular. One does not expect "R" to be particularly aware of all that. So let us leave this aspect at that. He has obviously used it as a term of nasty abuse against the people, "the "civil society" champions" who played a crucial role in turning the tide in the context of Singur / Nandigram, the latter in particular. These are also the people who are even today braving rather formidable threats to their persons to raise their voices of concern against the State and its committed operators unlike Raja shrieking hysterically from a safe enclave "in the citadel of imperialism". This is just to put things in perspective. I'd not here try to address the deliberate digression of Koraput based on a (slanted?) story carried by the "corporate media". (Not that I'm too knowledgeable on that.) Let us also not get diverted by the evident piece of blatant lie that the Maoists had any significant role in the Janandolan II in Nepal. That has already been exposed time and again. We would not revisit in any details the angry Maoist rejection of the King finally announcing reinstitution of the earlier dismissed parliament on April 24 2006 to be followed by a quick somersault. Let's come back to Lalgarh. And let's set aside some jargons like ""autonomously" and all that to obfuscate the issue. Let us come back to Chhatradhar Mahato, the leader of the PCAPA under the banner of which the resistance since last November was organised. But before that let us take up my central contention: Quote *The resistance, which had held for long seven months, collapsed almost overnight, within seven days of the Maoist misventure.* Unquote Quote The seven month long resistance crashed almost overnight with the Maoistscoming overground, claiming the authorship of the resistance, proudly declaring that they tried to kill the Chief Minister and would do it again and going on a violent spree including killings. That gave the state the perfect alibi to shed its diffidence of long seven months and breach the resistance. If Nandigarm had immobilised the state, after its brutal actions turned severely counter-productive, Lalgarh, or its latest phase, has helped radically reverse the trend. Unquote Quote ...the PCAPA under the banner of which the highly successful mass resistance was going on for the last seven months or so keeping the state administration out of its own territory even during the last Lok Sabha election and compelling it to set up voting booths just outside the lakshmanrekha to ensure that the villagers can cast their votes while still keeping the state out. That too amidst full-blooded campaign for vote boycott. Unquote Let's note that not a word on that! Not even pointless jargons. Also compare Pothik Ghosh (an editor of <radicalnotes.com>): Quote The Bengal government was extremely cagey until a few weeks ago to launch a crackdown. That was largely due to the movement’s mass insurrectionary character. In Lalgarh, violence has been a collective expression of disaffection against the oppressive socio-economic order the state defends. Even the guerrilla operations carried out by Maoists in the area have become a seamless extension of this insurrection, which enjoys wide-ranging legitimacy. It is this legitimacy, which derives from an assertion of popular sovereignty, that had compelled the West Bengal regime to keep its Stalinist proclivities — seen in Nandigram — in check for so long. A modern State formation also acts in the name of popular sovereignty. But in an insurrectionary situation, as in Lalgarh, the government comes to be seen as an external threat to the sovereignty of the people. That renders the legal-illegal dichotomy problematic and makes it difficult for the state to monopolise violence to crush popular movements in the name of curbing anti-sovereign insurgency. The CPI(M)-led Left Front could ill-afford such a risk after the electoral drubbing. Alas, Lalgarh has squandered that advantage, thanks to a tactical blunder by the Maoists. The recent claims by various Maoist leaders that the PCAPA was a front of their underground party has given the repressive arms of both the Bengal government and, to a lesser extent, the Centre, the alibi they had been waiting for. They know the police operation in Lalgarh will now be widely perceived as a legitimate measure to protect popular sovereignty from Maoist depredations. Unquote Now back to Chhatradhar Mahato. Quote *It is being alleged that Maoists are supporting the PCAPA. Is it true?* Not at all. These are concocted allegations by our detractors. Unquote In fact the hosting site < http://news.rediff.com/interview/2009/jun/22/interview-with-convenor-of-peoples-committee-against-police-atrocities.htm#write> gives also a link to Chhatradhar Mahato speaking, in Bengali, in a different format - making a sort of free flowing statement: < http://ishare.rediff.com/video/news-and-politics/chhtradhar-mahato-speaks-on-lalgarh-crisis/636111 >. Here, once again, Chhatradhar Mahato is visibly labouring to explain that the movement is against more than six decades long deprivation, discrimination and repression. He categorically rejects "the (slanderous) attempt of the state and central governments to brand the movement as "Maoist" in order to suppress it". He is ardently appealing for talks. Asking the government to address the fundamental causes of the grievances. Differentiate the movement from the Maoists. Not that whatever he speaks is gospel truth. But that's what he says. This is to be read together with the fact that not too long ago he was a leader of the Trinamool Congress. Also with the fact that when the Maoists were going full blast (rather literally) with their election boycott call, just about two months back, the PCAPA negotiated with the State Election Commission to have polling booths set up just outside the "liberated zone" to ensure voting by the villagers while disallowing the administration to come in till their demands are met. Sukla From: "R" To: foil <foi...@insaf.net> Date: Mon, 22 Jun 2009 15:00:29 -0400 Subject: Re: [foil] Lalgarh and Its Broader Implications Mahato: The PCAPA came into being seven to eight months back, whereas the Maoists have been here since ages Sukla: The seven month long resistance crashed almost overnight with the Maoists coming overground, claiming the authorship of the resistance There is something in Mahato's statement that jars with Sukla's assertion that there is on the one hand the "resistance" as he calls it, and on the other, the spoiling actions of the Maoists. The assumption is that these two are separate and distinct. That's where the crux of the strategy lies - a pro-establishment lie-machine that constantly churns out silly claims - recall it echoes what Sukla and company said about Nepal as well. There supposedly an autonomous "civil society" led the "resistance" against Gyanendra, and the Maoists simply came and "claimed authorship" - In Sukla's political world, the Maoists are no more than spoilers who come and claim authorship over things that otherwise happen "autonomously." Let us put Mahato's statement about the differences in perspective. He said that the PCAPA uses only "traditional" weapons while the Maoists use landmines, etc. Is it conceivable that a population so terribly marginalized by the state and the society of caste Hindu India can defeat the state with bows and arrows? Being far more rational people than the elitist bastards who ask them to lay down their arms now admit, the Adivasis sought and received the assistance of Maoists; there is a blurred situation here where large numbers of local people are not only sympathetic to, but also have embraced the Maoist struggle. Is this so inconceivable as to escape the sharp wits of the "civil society" champions who perhaps in their raging urgency to stake spaces for their own irrelevant brand of politics, feel the need to mangle the facts on the ground and come up with assertions that almost match the idiocy of Mamta Bannerji's rantings? raja.. http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/StoryPage.aspx?sectionName=HomePage&id=c93006b9-d91f-4dda-8d08-99a6d39250d9&Headline=Koraput+headed+the+Lalgarh+way It’s a similar story, headed for a similar ending. Koraput, an under-developed Orissa district, has been cut off from the world for the last five days and looks in danger of becoming another area “liberated” by Maoists. Like Lalgarh in West Bengal, before it was won back. Dispossessed tribals on one side and alleged grabbers on the other are in the middle of a violent battle for land waging in Koraput, which is 560 km from Bhubaneshwar. And no prizes for guessing who is winning. The administration exists on ground but only just. It has no clue as to how much land was lost by tribals and is able to only hazard a guess about how much has been reclaimed by them through peaceful or not-so-peaceful means. The tribals don’t bring their complaints to the local administration any more. They go straight to organisations backed by the Maoists. In fact, the tribals are not complaining at all. They simply grab back what was grabbed from them. “They come and hoist a red flag in our agricultural land, signaling the end of our possession over it. I owned 11 acres of land. Now, I’m hiding in the houses of my relatives,” said Madhusudan Pondu, 72, of Balipeta village. Both the locals and the administration said Chasi Muliya Adivasi Sangha, an organisation of dispossessed tribals, is spearheading the agitation. But its violent ways are blamed on a more radical section within it. The targeted non-tribals have no choice but to leave the area completely – an estimated 200 people have left the Narayanpatna block of which Pondu’s Balipeta village is a part, in recent days. The Narayanpatna area has been completely cut off for the last five days as sangha activists have blocked the main arterial road with trees. On Thursday, nine personnel of the Orissa Special Striking Force who tried to clear the road were killed in a landmine blast triggered by the Maoists. Now, no policeman wants to go anywhere near Narayanpatna. The mainstream sangh leaders held a convention on Saturday but the hotheads from Narayanpatna stayed away. One of them, Nachika Ling, a tribal in his 30s, is believed to be leading the radicals. This is where the Maoists come in — they are believed to be Linga’s chief backers. And this is where the story begins to sound like Lalagarh’s, where a committee of locals agitating against the police took on the state with the help of Maoists. “The Maoists want the hawks within the CMAS to take over the organization so that they can guide the tribal movement in the manner the Naxals have done in Lalgarh,” said a senior official refusing to be identified. “Linga is hand-in-glove with the Maoists,” Sanjeev Panda, DIG of Koraput area, told Hindustan Times. “He was arrested before and spent two to three years in jail before he was released on bail.” Linga and his group are reported to have forcibly occupied hundreds of acres of land and handed them over to the tribals. The group has also damaged nearly hundred houses belonging to alleged “land usurpers”. But the state hasn’t given up here yet, unlike in Lalgarh. “Presently, 100 CRPF personnel, about 30 men of India Reserve Battalion and one unit of Orissa Special Striking Force are deployed in Narayanpatna,” said police officer Panda. And they are not leaving. Not yet. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To post to this group, send email to greenyouth@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to greenyouth+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth?hl=en-GB -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
