EVENTS across our border indicate that despite continuous State action the Naxalite movement characterized by violence has expanded to new areas and has developed significant capacity for military action and striking power. It has been the considered view of many in India that the sharp inequities in society have contributed to the attraction of the Naxalite movement to the dispossessed and marginalized population.
The lessons learnt from the Indian experience are that the unfinished business of agrarian reforms and elementary livelihood problems of the millions remain to be addressed; that the massive transfer of forest and agricultural lands to corporate interests to develop industrial, mining and infrastructure projects and agribusiness is a serious cause of concern to the rural poor; that the brutal suppression of even peaceful articulation of demands by industrial and agricultural workers in the recent period has lent legitimacy to the use of violent methods by the aggrieved.
The methods used by the government to tackle Naxalite militancy inevitably leads the police to attack the entire rural poor community in the name of tackling the militancy of a section of the community and such methods are counter-productive.
The Naxalites have registered significant practical achievements in specific areas such as curbing feudal practices and social oppression; confiscating and redistributing ceiling surplus land; ensuring more equitable access to village commons; enforcing payment of higher agricultural wages; eliminating the stranglehold of landlords, money lenders and contractors; providing protection to the rural poor from harassment by forest and police officials.
The Naxalites, for the most part, are seen to have been involved not in overthrowing the State, but in practical struggles for land, wages, dignity, democratic rights and related goals that can be pursued effectively by open mass actions, which does not need violence. Their success and popularity have more to do with open mass movements than armed actions.
The lesson is thus clear; that brutal repression is no answer to the Naxalite movement; that the Naxalite ideology must be fought politically; that Naxalite criminal actions must be dealt with under the existing criminal and human rights laws; and that Naxalite social base, which springs from exploitation, inequality and injustice must be countered by purposeful political and administrative action to implement the promises made in the Preamble and the Directive Principles of State Policy of the Constitution.
Police repression is attractive and easy to adopt by a government armed to the teeth with paramilitary forces, arms, equipment, firepower and mobility. However, police repression only goes to strengthen the Maoist thesis on the class character of the State. It is counter-productive and helps to increase the mass base of the Naxalites, which arises out of the failure of the State to deliver the developmental goals as mandated by the Constitution.
The authorities viewed the Naxalite issue as a law and order problem, ignoring the fact that it is essentially an expression of the people's aspiration to a life of dignity and self-respect. This led to physical liquidation of people in so-called 'encounter', repression and harassment of people by illegal detention, torture and false cases, suppression of democratic activities, unlawful behaviour towards democratic organizations and encouragement of vigilante groups.
The political leadership of the state shifted its burden to the police, encouraging them to indulge in 'encounters' which are nothing but custodial and targeted killings. The extinguishing of human life and the right to life by the government itself constitutes violation of the provisions of the Constitution, which require the State to protect life and liberty.
The thrust of the Naxalite movement, on the other hand, has become 'military' action rather than people's action for social transformation. The policy of individual annihilation followed by it is as flawed as the government policy of trying to liquidate activists and leaders in the hope of liquidating the movement. The movement today connotes a confrontation between the police and the Naxalites, each with its own agenda of violence. The democratic space has shrunk fast; the State and the society are brutalized.
Naxalite violence is an outcome of the failures of the development policy to address the concerns of the weaker sections of society in tune with the imperatives of the Constitution embodied in the Preamble and the Directive Principles of State Policy. These failures have led to a crisis of legitimacy of the State.
Muhammad Nurul Huda is a columnist for The Daily Star.