When the state turns lawless

BY PRAFUL BIDWAI

27 May 2007
DESPITE its democracy, India isn’t exactly safe for human rights or rights activists. Noted rights activist Binayak Sen has just been detained under the Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act, 2005 (PSA). Sen, general secretary of the Chhattisgarh People’s Union for Civil Liberties, and PUCL’s national vice-president, was arrested for his alleged links with Maoist groups. This has caused widespread outrage.

The critical charge is that Sen met Maoist leader Narayan Sanyal more than 30 times in recent months in the Raipur jail.

The charge is preposterous. Sen met Sanyal with the authorities’ knowledge and consent and always in a jailer’s presence. It’s his legitimate function to meet detainees and defend their fundamental rights. Whether he met Sanyal 35 times or 100 times is irrelevant.

Yet, the Chhattisgarh government cavalierly levelled defamatory and scandalous charges against an activist-intellectual of Sen’s standing, who has an illustrious record as a paediatrician connected with the people’s health movement. Sen was involved with the setting up of the Shaheed Hospital, an initiative of the great trade unionist Shankar Guha Niyogi. …..

People’s War in Nepal: Genesis and Development

ANAND SWAROOP VERMA, GAUTAM NAVLAKHA

PW In Maoist understanding, People’s War (PW) is 80 per cent politics and 20 per cent warfare. The decisive factor in a war o f this genre is not guns but the mobilisation of people for seizing power through protracted war. This is not to underplay the significance of armed struggle in Maoist politics or to delink one from the other, but to stress that the mark of Maoist success lies in their emergence as the dominant political and ideological force in Nepal. The remarkable political consistency and dexterity displayed by them in sticking to their strategic goals and making their agenda (a democratic republic through an elected constituent assembly, interim government, under an interim constitution, etc) the basis, if not the rallying point, for ending the civil war, and attempting to win the mandate to constitutionally transform the state, are its articulation. In this paper we confine ourselves to the period 1990 onwards, leading up to PW – the period from February 1996 to the “12-point agreement” of November 2005. We highlight the elements of continuity in the salient features of the strategy of PW implemented by the Maoists.

Degenerate Parliamentary Politics
It is worth recalling that the armed struggle of the Nepalese people against feudal monarchy is as old as the kingdom itself. Thus struggle persisted even after the 1950 overthrow of Rana autocracy, which had wielded state power until then. The 1950 Indian intervention, which restored the king’s power, was soon followed by several anti-feudal struggles in 1952-53, primarily in western Nepal. In these struggles, government officials were removed, feudal landlords were eliminated and food grains looted and redistributed. Failing to subdue this rebellion, the king sought the help of Indian troops. In 1959 when the Nepali Congress, then led by B P Koirala, signed Gandak agreement with India it triggered off violent protests against it. The Nepali Congress which was thrown out by the king on December 16, 1960, then initiated in 1962 and again in 1971 an armed uprising. In 1972-73, inspired by Naxalbari, an armed struggle broke out in Jhapa. The introduction of the multiparty system in 1991, as a sequel to the protracted struggle against partyless Panchayat regime, spurred the people’s aspirations at various levels. In these 30 years, 1960-1990, the democratic forces went through lot of trials and tribulations. Since the Nepali Congress had at one time held the reins of power and had developed cordial foreign relations, particularly with the ruling classes of India, it did not bear the brunt of repression. Despite the fact that it took to arms in 1962 and 1971, its movement against the monarchical system remained qualitatively different from that launched by the left forces. Many communist formations were active during this time, the most powerful among them being the Communist Party of Nepal (Marxist-Leninist) (CPN(ML)). The party, inspired by the Naxalbari movement in India, had carried out a peasant led anti-feudal movement in Jhapa in eastern Nepal. …………