Maoist attacked a convoy of political workers in south
Chhattisgarh and killed 27 people including security personnel. There are no
reports of casualties on the other side. Newspaper reports give description of courageous
fight put up by personal security officers of various political leaders. They
fought till their ammunition lasted. And then some of them shot themselves with
the last bullet (before saying goodbye
to their masters). The prominent people killed in this incident were top
congress leaders of Chhattisgarh, one of them being Shri Mahendra Karma, the
architect of Salwa Judum, a state back vigilante group, which was recently
banned by Supreme Court. The state was suppose to disband Salwa Judum, but
reports suggest that instead they renamed it to ‘special police officers’ and
then to ‘Chhattisgarh auxiliary force’, just like Lashkar e Taiba was renamed
to Jamat ud Dawa. I am not comparing Chhattisgarh auxiliary force with LeT, but
comparing the disbanding exercise taken up by the Indian and Pakistani (and
probably other) states.
The incident no doubt was cruel and has been condemned
across the board. But an equally cruel event is happening in the form of
newsroom debates since then. Nobody seems to see the cruelty of these debates.
I am calling these debates cruel because that is how it would seem to the
tribal in Chhattisgarh or even the CRPF soldier who is posted there. The sheer
indifference towards the ground realities mixed with the intoxication of
arrogance make them cruel. But the real cruelty lies in the background of these
debates. The sheer pressure of advertisement slots which these prime time shows
face, forces the ‘poor’ anchor to interrupt, cut short and hastily paraphrase
the discussion because he has to give way to a company trying to sell its
product. In the end the one message which goes across is that to sell colas,
soaps, diapers, fairness creams etc is more important than your problem. This
is a cruel joke. This is cruelty at its glamorous best (which makes it of worst
kind).
Why can’t there be an uninterrupted television debate, where
the speakers are allowed to complete their point? I am sure, a debate of such
kind will not lead to bankruptcy of the channel. I am sure the channels have
enough scope to allow for uninterrupted debates occasionally.
This is not the only reason for which I am calling these
debates cruel. They are cruel for other reasons too. A clear message has been
sent out by the ‘beholders’ of Indian state who are part of the debate- the
politicians, the academicians and the retired police officers, that either you
are with the state or you are against it. If you are with the state, it will be
assumed that you are with democracy and its principles, otherwise you are
against them. It is much like George Bush declaring to the world after 9/11,
that either you are with us or against us. There is no other choice. I find
this choice (or the lack of it) as cruel and as a citizen I refuse to be part
of it. Why can’t I be for democratic principles yet critical of states’
structural violence on tribals? Or why can’t I be critical of Maoist violence,
yet endorse their cause?
The cruelty of the situation is that the tribal has been
forced to choose between the Indian state and the Maoist (they both outdo each
other from time to time on who can be more violent). It’s a similar situation
of the Indian voter who is left to choose between the either the Congress or
the BJP (and their likes), while they both outperform each other on corruption.
I refuse to be called a Congresi or RSSwala or a leftist or a
rightist, only because I voted for one of them. The lack of real choice in
front of the tribal and our refusal to acknowledge it, is cruel.
The issue in the Jungles of central India is not development
(or the lack of it). The real issue is Justice. The Maoist gained popularity
not because the tribals understood what Mao said and agreed with him. They
became popular not because the tribals were wanting the modern form of
development (roads, schools, hospitals etc), and the state could not provide it
to them in last 60-70 years. The Maoist got support because they could hold the
sarkari forest officer, the sarkari police officer by the collar
and ask them to get out of the village. The forest department and the police
department became synonymous with injustice and cruelty, which no one could do anything about. That vacuum
was filled by the Maoist (who were in fact Naxalites that time). Today both the
state and the Maoist have become symbols of injustice and cruelty, and so there
is an opportunity for some third entity to step in and fill the vacuum.
The state is now thinking of going all out after the Maoists,
but does the state know who the Maoists are? Can the state differentiate
between the Maoist and the tribal? Or will the state bulldoze everything and
everyone that comes its way and then call some of them as Maoists and rest as
collateral damage? To term innocent deaths as collateral damage is cruel, and
both the state as well as the Maoists are guilty of it. People are not
collateral. At best buildings and other structures can be. To term people as collateral is cruel.
The fear is that more troops will be sent in now (this will
be in addition to the already present 30000 odd troops). This will lead to
further violence (killing and displacement of people). A teacher once said, if you pitch violence
against violence, then the more violent one will be the winner. The debaters
have somehow missed this simple point. If the Indian state says it is going for
a military intervention to ensure peace, it essentially means a far greater violence
is about to be committed. The peace (if reached) that would come out of it
would be soaked in blood.
The challenge before talks
Are talks the way forward? I am afraid at this point even that
doesn’t appear to be the case. The talks face two fundamental roadblocks, and
unless they are first cleared the talks will lead nowhere. The academia has a
role to play in removal of these roadblocks. The first road block is that the
Maoists believe that in principal no real change is possible without violence.
This is a slight deviation from the Marxist view that just ends would justify
the unjust means. This theory needs to be challenged by the academicians of the
country. There are people who strongly believe that means and ends are
inter-twined and cannot be separated. These people can fill the vacuum.
The second roadblock is that the Indian state does not seem
to have any long term vision for the country. What should India ought to be say
50 years or 100 years from now? Is there any comprehensive vision towards which
we are moving? The current visions are not only short term, but also full of contradictions.
The state wants development on one hand, but on the other hand this development
model is a major cause injustice. India has world’s largest population of ‘internal
refugees’ or people who have been displaced from their lands in their own
country. This development model is the single most reason for pollution of our
rivers, destruction of our forests and ridiculing of our belief systems. Is there
a vision of a development which is socially just, environmentally sustainable and
culturally self believing? There seems no evidence of it. The India academia
have an important role to play. Our development and our revolutions cannot be
on the basis of borrowed theories.
Unless these roadblocks are cleared, the talks will not get
us anywhere. Or in other words, some theoretical homework is needed prior to
talks. For now the talks can’t even lead to a commitment of total abjuring of
violence. The talks at this stage can at best hope to suspension of violence,
where in both the Maoists and the state will prepare for future violence with
more sophisticated tactics and arms.
Harsh Satya
Centre for Exact Humanities
IIIT-H
29th May, 2013
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