Walking With The Comrades

	Dateline Dantewada: Roy with the Maoists essay Walking With The Comrades Gandhians with a Gun? Arundhati Roy plunges into the sea of Gondi people to find some answers... Arundhati Roy http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?264738 PRINT SHARE COMMENTS The terse, typewritten note slipped under my door in a sealed envelope confirmed my appointment with India's Gravest Internal Security Threat. I'd been waiting for months to hear from them. I had to be at the Ma Danteshwari mandir in Dantewada, Chhattisgarh, at any of four given times on two given days. That was to take care of bad weather, punctures, blockades, transport strikes and sheer bad luck. The note said: "Writer should have camera, tika and coconut. Meeter will have cap, Hindi Outlook magazine and bananas. Password: Namashkar Guruji." Namashkar Guruji. I wondered whether the Meeter and Greeter would be expecting a man. And whether I should get myself a moustache.  There are many ways to describe Dantewada. It's an oxymoron. It's a border town smack in the heart of India. It's the epicentre of a war. It's an upside down, inside out town. Red Shadow: Centenary celebrations of the adivasi uprising in Bastar; Sten gun at hand In Dantewada, the police wear plain clothes and the rebels wear uniforms. The jail superintendent is in jail. The prisoners are free (three hundred of them escaped from the old town jail two years ago). Women who have been raped are in police custody. The rapists give speeches in the bazaar. Across the Indravati river, in the area controlled by the Maoists, is the place the police call 'Pakistan'. There the villages are empty, but the forest is full of people. Children who ought to be in school run wild. In the lovely forest villages, the concrete school buildings have either been blown up and lie in a heap, or they are full of policemen. The deadly war that is unfolding in the jungle is a war that the Government of India is both proud and shy of. Operation Green Hunt has been proclaimed as well as denied. P. Chidambaram, India's home minister (and CEO of the war), says it does not exist, that it's a media creation. And yet substantial funds have been allocated to it and tens of thousands of troops are being mobilised for it. Though the theatre of war is in the jungles of Central India, it will have serious consequences for us all. If ghosts are the lingering spirits of someone, or something, that has ceased to exist, then perhaps the new four-lane highway crashing through the forest is the opposite of a ghost. Perhaps it is the harbinger of what is still to come.     In Dantewada, the police wear plain clothes, the rebels wear uniforms. The jail superintendent is in jail; the prisoners are free.     The antagonists in the forest are disparate and unequal in almost every way. On one side is a massive paramilitary force armed with the money, the firepower, the media, and the hubris of an emerging Superpower. On the other, ordinary villagers armed with traditional weapons, backed by a superbly organised, hugely motivated Maoist guerrilla fighting force with an extraordinary and violent history of armed rebellion. The Maoists and the paramilitary are old adversaries and have fought older avatars of each other several times before: Telangana in the '50s; West Bengal, Bihar, Srikakulam in Andhra Pradesh in the late '60s and '70s; and then again in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and Maharashtra from the '80s all the way through to the present. They are familiar with each other's tactics, and have studied each other's combat manuals closely. Each time, it seemed as though the Maoists (or their previous avatars) had been not just defeated, but literally, physically exterminated. Each time, they have re-emerged, more organised, more determined and more influential than ever. Today once again the insurrection has spread through the mineral-rich forests of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa and West Bengal—homeland to millions of India's tribal people, dreamland to the corporate world. It's easier on the liberal conscience to believe that the war in the forests is a war between the Government of India and the Maoists, who call elections a sham, Parliament a pigsty and have openly declared their intention to overthrow the Indian State. It's convenient to forget that tribal people in Central India have a history of resistance that predates Mao by centuries. (That's a truism of course. If they didn't, they wouldn't exist.) The Ho, the Oraon, the Kols, the Santhals, the Mundas and the Gonds have all rebelled several times, against the British, against zamindars and moneylenders. The rebellions were cruelly crushed, many thousands killed, but the people were never conquered. Even after Independence, tribal people were at the heart of the first uprising that could be described as Maoist, in Naxalbari village in West Bengal (where the word Naxalite—now used interchangeably with 'Maoist'—originates). Since then, Naxalite politics has been inextricably entwined with tribal uprisings, which says as much about the tribals as it does about the Naxalites. Staying Put: People of Kudur village protest the Bodhghat dam: 'It does not belong to the capitalists, Bastar is OUrs'y This legacy of rebellion has left behind a furious people who have been deliberately isolated and marginalised by the Indian government. The Indian Constitution, the moral underpinning of Indian democracy, was adopted by Parliament in 1950. It was a tragic day for tribal people. The Constitution ratified colonial policy and made the State custodian of tribal homelands. Overnight, it turned the entire tribal population into squatters on their own land. It denied them their traditional rights to forest produce, it criminalised a whole way of life. In exchange for the right to vote, it snatched away their right to livelihood and dignity. Having dispossessed them and pushed them into a downward spiral of indigence, in a cruel sleight of hand, the government began to use their own penury against them. Each time it needed to displace a large population—for dams, irrigation projects, mines—it talked of "bringing tribals into the mainstream" or of giving them "the fruits of modern development". Of the tens of millions of internally displaced people (more than 30 million by big dams alone), refugees of India's 'progress', the great majority are tribal people. When the government begins to talk of tribal welfare, it's time to worry. The most recent expression of concern has come from home minister P. Chidambaram who says he doesn't want tribal people living in "museum cultures". The well-being of tribal people didn't seem to be such a priority during his career as a corporate lawyer, representing the interests of several major mining companies. So it might be an idea to enquire into the basis for his new anxiety. The Day of the Bhumkal: Face to face with "India's greatest Security Threat". Over the past five years or so, the governments of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa and West Bengal have signed hundreds of MoUs with corporate houses, worth several billion dollars, all of them secret, for steel plants, sponge-iron factories, power plants, aluminium refineries, dams and mines. In order for the MoUs to translate into real money, tribal people must be moved. Therefore, this war. When a country that calls itself a democracy openly declares war within its borders, what does that war look like? Does the resistance stand a chance? Should it? Who are the Maoists? Are they just violent nihilists foisting an outdated ideology on tribal people, goading them into a hopeless insurrection? What lessons have they learned from their past experience? Is armed struggle intrinsically undemocratic? Is the Sandwich Theory—of 'ordinary' tribals being caught in the crossfire between the State and the Maoists—an accurate one? Are 'Maoists' and 'Tribals' two entirely discrete categories as is being made out? Do their interests converge? Have they learned anything from each other? Have they changed each other? The day before I left, my mother called, sounding sleepy. "I've been thinking," she said, with a mother's weird instinct, "what this country needs is revolution." An article on the internet says that Israel's Mossad is training 30 high-ranking Indian police officers in the techniques of targeted assassinations, to render the Maoist organisation "headless". There's talk in the press about the new hardware that has been bought from Israel: laser range-finders, thermal imaging equipment and unmanned drones, so popular with the US army. Perfect weapons to use against the poor. The drive from Raipur to Dantewada takes about 10 hours through areas known to be 'Maoist-infested'. These are not careless words. 'Infest/infestation' implies disease/pests. Diseases must be cured. Pests must be exterminated. Maoists must be wiped out. In these creeping, innocuous ways, the language of genocide has entered our vocabulary. To protect the highway, security forces have 'secured' a narrow bandwidth of forest on either side. Further in, it's the raj of the 'Dada log'. The Brothers. The Comrades. On the outskirts of Raipur, a massive billboard advertises Vedanta (the company our home minister once worked with) Cancer Hospital. In Orissa, where it is mining bauxite, Vedanta is financing a university. In these creeping, innocuous ways, mining corporations enter our imaginations: the Gentle Giants Who Really Care. It's called CSR, Corporate Social Responsibility. It allows mining companies to be like the legendary actor and former chief minister NTR, who liked to play all the parts in Telugu mythologicals—the good guys and the bad guys, all at once, in the same movie. This CSR masks the outrageous economics that underpins the mining sector in India. For example, according to the recent Lokayukta report for Karnataka, for every tonne of iron ore mined by a private company, the government gets a royalty of Rs 27 and the mining company makes Rs 5,000. In the bauxite and aluminium sector, the figures are even worse. We're talking about daylight robbery to the tune of billions of dollars. Enough to buy elections, governments, judges, newspapers, TV channels, NGOs and aid agencies. What's the occasional cancer hospital here or there? I don't remember seeing Vedanta's name on the long list of MoUs signed by the Chhattisgarh government. But I'm twisted enough to suspect that if there's a cancer hospital, there must be a flat-topped bauxite mountain somewhere.     Tribal people in central India have a history of resistance predating Mao. The rebellions were crushed, but the people were never conquered.     We pass Kanker, famous for its Counter Terrorism and Jungle Warfare College run by Brigadier B.K. Ponwar, Rumpelstiltskin of this war, charged with the task of turning corrupt, sloppy policemen (straw) into jungle commandos (gold). "Fight a guerrilla like a guerrilla", the motto of the warfare training school, is painted on the rocks. The men are taught to run, slither, jump on and off air-borne helicopters, ride horses (for some reason), eat snakes and live off the jungle. The brigadier takes great pride in training street dogs to fight 'terrorists'. Eight hundred policemen graduate from the warfare training school every six weeks. Twenty similar schools are being planned all over India. The police force is gradually being turned into an army. (In Kashmir, it's the other way around. The army is being turned into a bloated, administrative police force.) Upside down. Inside out. Either way, the Enemy is the People. It's late. Jagdalpur is asleep, except for the many hoardings of Rahul Gandhi asking people to join the Youth Congress. He's been to Bastar twice in recent months but hasn't said anything much about the war. It's probably too messy for the People's Prince to meddle in at this point. His media managers must have put their foot down. The fact that the Salwa Judum—the dreaded, government-sponsored vigilante group responsible for rapes, killings, for burning down villages and driving hundreds of thousands of people from their homes—is led by Mahendra Karma, a Congress MLA, does not get much play in the carefully orchestrated publicity around Rahul Gandhi. I arrived at the Ma Danteshwari mandir well in time for my appointment (first day, first show). I had my camera, my small coconut and a powdery red tika on my forehead. I wondered if someone was watching me and having a laugh. Within minutes a young boy approached me. He had a cap and a backpack schoolbag. Chipped red nail-polish on his fingernails. No Hindi Outlook, no bananas. "Are you the one who's going in?" he asked me. No Namashkar Guruji. I did not know what to say. He took out a soggy note from his pocket and handed it to me. It said, "Outlook nahin mila (couldn't find Outlook)." "And the bananas?" "I ate them," he said, "I got hungry." He really was a security threat. His backpack said Charlie Brown—Not your ordinary blockhead. He said his name was Mangtu. I soon learned that Dandakaranya, the forest I was about to enter, was full of people who had many names and fluid identities. It was like balm to me, that idea. How lovely not to be stuck with yourself, to become someone else for a while.     I'm surrounded by strange, beautiful children with their curious arsenal—all Maoists. Are they going to die? What for? To turn this into a mine?     We walked to the bus stand, only a few minutes away from the temple. It was already crowded. Things happened quickly. There were two men on motorbikes. There was no conversation—just a glance of acknowledgment, a shifting of body weight, the revving of engines. I had no idea where we were going. We passed the house of the Superintendent of Police (SP), which I recognised from my last visit. He was a candid man, the SP: "See Ma'am, frankly speaking this problem can't be solved by us police or military. The problem with these tribals is they don't understand greed. Unless they become greedy, there's no hope for us. I have told my boss, remove the force and instead put a TV in every home. Everything will be automatically sorted out." In no time at all we were riding out of town. No tail. It was a long ride, three hours by my watch. It ended abruptly in the middle of nowhere, on an empty road with forest on either side. Mangtu got off. I did too. The bikes left, and I picked up my backpack and followed the small internal security threat into the forest. It was a beautiful day. The forest floor was a carpet of gold. In a while we emerged on the white, sandy banks of a broad flat river. It was obviously monsoon-fed, so now it was more or less a sand flat, at the centre a stream, ankle deep, easy to wade across. Across was 'Pakistan'. "Out there, ma'am," the candid SP had said to me, "my boys shoot to kill." I remembered that as we began to cross. I saw us in a policeman's rifle-sights—tiny figures in a landscape, easy to pick off. But Mangtu seemed quite unconcerned, and I took my cue from him. Waiting for us on the other bank, in a lime-green shirt that said Horlicks!, was Chandu. A slightly older security threat. Maybe twenty. He had a lovely smile, a cycle, a jerry can with boiled water and many packets of glucose biscuits for me, from the Party. We caught our breath and began to walk again. The cycle, it turned out, was a red herring. The route was almost entirely non-cycleable. We climbed steep hills and clambered down rocky paths along some pretty precarious ledges. When he couldn't wheel it, Chandu lifted the cycle and carried it over his head as though it weighed nothing. I began to wonder about his bemused village boy air. I discovered (much later) that he could handle every kind of weapon, "except for an LMG", he informed me cheerfully.     CSR. It allows corporates to play good guys and bad guys all at once. If Vedanta has a cancer hospital somewhere, a bauxite mountain can't be far.     Three beautiful, sozzled men with flowers in their turbans walked with us for about half an hour, before our paths diverged. At sunset, their shoulder bags began to crow. They had roosters in them, which they had taken to market but hadn't managed to sell. Chandu seems to be able to see in the dark. I have to use my torch. The crickets start up and soon there's an orchestra, a dome of sound over us. I long to look up at the night sky, but I dare not. I have to keep my eyes on the ground. One step at a time. Concentrate. I hear dogs. But I can't tell how far away they are. The terrain flattens out. I steal a look at the sky. It makes me ecstatic. I hope we're going to stop soon. "Soon," Chandu says. It turns out to be more than an hour. I see silhouettes of enormous trees. We arrive. The village seems spacious, the houses far away from each other. The house we enter is beautiful. There's a fire, some people sitting around. More people outside, in the dark. I can't tell how many. I can just about make them out. A murmur goes around. Lal Salaam Kaamraid (Red Salute, Comrade). Lal Salaam, I say. I'm beyond tired. The lady of the house calls me inside and gives me chicken curry cooked in green beans and some red rice. Fabulous. Her baby is asleep next to me, her silver anklets gleam in the firelight. After dinner, I unzip my sleeping bag. It's a strange intrusive sound, the big zip. Someone puts on the radio. BBC Hindi service. The Church of England has withdrawn its funds from Vedanta's Niyamgiri project, citing environmental degradation and rights violations of the Dongria Kondh tribe. I can hear cowbells, snuffling, shuffling, cattle-farting. All's well with the world. My eyes close.                     (1 of 8) Single Page Format PRINT SHARE COMMENTS Filed In Topics: Maoists/Naxals, Chhattisgarh, Arundhati Roy More In: National, Cover Stories, Essays   Daily Mail COLLAPSE COMMENTS : Latest First Oldest First HAVE YOUR SAY Mar 25, 2010 07:25 PM 165 I think the ket argument Ms. Roy makes is this "The Indian Constitution, the moral underpinning of Indian democracy, was adopted by Parliament in 1950. It was a tragic day for tribal people. The Constitution ratified colonial policy and made the State custodian of tribal homelands. Overnight, it turned the entire tribal population into squatters on their own land. It denied them their traditional rights to forest produce, it criminalised a whole way of life. In exchange for the right to vote, it snatched away their right to livelihood and dignity." How can the Indian state sell of land as its own and ignore the millions that have lived on it for centuries. Its the corporate land grab in connivance with Manmohan, Chidambaram and Sonia that is the key issue. Girish delhi, india Mar 25, 2010 05:38 PM 164 The Maoists are a solution worse than the problen,people. Good governance is the only way out of this, we as middle class must make the government get the people out of poverty. I don't want India to do the same thing to the tribals, what the "Australians"(Peter, Author of comment #23) did to the Aborigines or what Americans did to the American Indians. But we must also make sure that we don't become like the Chinese civil war. Why can't we take the Scandinavian route, Becoming a developed country with Inclusive growth. Social Democracies like Sweden are the Solution, Not China and certainly not the license Raj. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 05:10 PM 163 http://bratgaba.sule...uicide-or-murder.htm In the context of the existing situation in our villages and tribal areas, I don't think Kanu Sanyal could have had any other end. Remember the film Rang De Basanti? I have had many an argument with friends (who incidentally call me 'jholawala') about the end being too pessimistic – all the boys die – it was largely opined that the writer and director erred in ending the story thus. My opinion differed – there could have been NO other rational ending to that story. The boys (in the film) were up against the full might of a determinedly corrupt govt which had skeletons to hide – they had to be killed, there was no other way out; there was no way they could have won the grossly unequal battle and suicide would have been a copout. Kanu Sanyal, likewise, had to be either killed, or he had to end it himself. There was no way he could win, and I guess, knowing that to be the only truth, knowing that the 'system' was too strong for mere mortals, he chose to end it himself. Maybe we'd have paid more attention to Kanu Sanyal and his cause if he was named Che Guevara – just a thought. It is fashionable to have Che's posters on the walls even though he had nothing to do with India, but a poster of Kanu Sanyal or any of his ilk would invite immediate arrest. Get this - there are more than 400 Facebook pages on Che Guevara – just one of those pages has a 'fan' list of 350,000 (many Indians) – Kanu Sanyal has just ONE page – with a rich picking of NINE fans. Bharatram Gaba Bombay, India Mar 25, 2010 04:27 PM 162 It is great effort, great journalism. The pain can be understood only by those who loose their land to deaf & dumb government which still implement 1894 Land acquisition Act enacted by Britishers to acquire Indian land as per their convenience. Indian Government is doing what Britishers did to us through it's politicians and bureaucrats. These politicians and bureaucrats forget that they are part of us. It is always easy to criticize by writing mails sitting in AC rooms and with fingers dancing on your laptop. Atleast somebody has tried to go to roots and analyze and address the problem which most of us are unaware of. Pankaj Yadav Gurgaon, India Mar 25, 2010 03:03 PM 161 I read a lot of middle class becoming 5 to 25 and the poor getting reduced from 70 to 30 sort of comedies.25 yrs back the city of delhi/mumbai/chennai were all affordable to all classes.the rental rates were within their limits and if they save properly they can get their own small house/apartment.it was the same in most towns/large villages who do cultivation thrice a yr the govt hospitals and schools were the only one for the rich and poor,politician and businessman and since the crowd was from top to bottom it helped the poor too(the standard of aiims is far better to the govt hospitals in lucknow or bangalore as the politicians and rich too get treated in aiims unlike the others).the govt schools produced many stalwarts which included many from the poor as they were the only source of schooling for all whether rich or poor/brahmin or dalit. by reforms the cost of land/rent has shoot up and now 95% of the population cannot afford to rent/own a house in cities/towns. the govt hospitals and schools have been mis managed as it is only the poor who visit them and noone who matters bothers about their state the lower middle class aspires to be rich and get into the trap of putting their children in pvt schools and getting treated in pvt hospitals making them descend to poor very fast.the number of homeless have increased post reforms as in old india there were places for refugees like tibetans/roaming communities like gypsies,vangujjars and any skilled worker/group and coming and camping in villagetown was not resisted now even biharis/north indians who work as labours/masons/drivers r not tolerated and reforms defenitely have a role in it.shivsena in 70s were against southindians who dominated the white collar govt jobs but now post reforms they are threatened even by unskilled labour.upper/middle/lower/poor class r all myths used by economists to cheat one and all.the cost of living has gone up several hundred times in the past 20 yrs and hence the suffereing of the poor and lower middle class has multiplied. the tribals have been living like these for 1000s of yrs and any modernisation should be on their terms and not forced by some with ulterior motives.they will defenitely not be against dams and development if they r a part of it but unfortunately its not so.punjabis running from pakistan during partition were given land in delhi/chandigarh etc which were quiet precious at that time too and now value in crores but the poor tribals r given pittance. why can they be given land in all main cities which r under the govt if they really want to help them. why cant they be trained and employed in railways/army/paramilitary forces etc which they r more than willing to join. why naxalite problem aroses in areas where there r mixed populations and reddys/kayasths/bhumihars own the lands and not in nagaland or mizoram (the govt goes for cease fire with those tribals as it has realised that the entire population is tribal and they dont have any caste/group over there to play to their tunes. ganapathi chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 02:41 PM 160 We waited for 60 years to even hear the voices of these tribals. It will take a long time to come up with a comprehensive solution to their problems because we have not really understood their problems that well in the first place. It cannot be decided overnight on the deadline/ultimatum set up by some MNC/corporate body/government-in-a-hurry. The Indian government needs to understand that we are not China that can implement "projects" overnight without a care of human rights. The human cost of a military campaign will be too high for us to handle in the future unless we become the next military China. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 02:37 PM 159 We don't want a large, massive offensive(the one that is going on). But at the same time the suggested compromise is not possible. But we could try moving in feet instead of running in miles. Instead of a bloodbath we can do this, Build more schools, hospitals and roads, feed the people. We take a slow and steady approach while dealing with these people, We bring in social infrastructure slowly,village by village,district by district. Instead of an all out offensive(Which will only sow seeds for future generations of maoists) we do it over a period of time, at the same time making sure that the Naxals don't get any stronger. If the Naxal kick in the pants gets the government to do just what they should have done decades ago,they are heroes not just for the tribals, but for the entire nation. The problem with Roy is that she does not have a single good thing to say about India. Is this really so? Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 02:31 PM 158 'Alfred Abdul' says: >> Lal Salam to Roy! Your courage is an inspiration to all. Revolution is inevitable. Nepal today, India tomorrow! Inquilab Jindabad! I have this feeling that the FBI would be interested to get to know you. You know, that thing we have about Revolutionary Commie nutters? To a 'lal' hell with the likes of you. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 25, 2010 02:03 PM 157 A quick read of the narrow-minded, vicious comments published here as a response to Roy's article convinces me of the need for a revolution in India. Roy is the only voice of conscience of an India that is blinded by corporate greed, political corruption, imperial hubris, and utter injustice to its common people. She may be a small person but her towering courage and boundless love for the downtrodden makes her a giant among Indians and the world. Lal Salam to Roy! Your courage is an inspiration to all. Revolution is inevitable. Nepal today, India tomorrow! Inquilab Jindabad! Alfred Abdul New York, United States Mar 25, 2010 01:53 PM 156 the reality is complicated. we know such a deal is unlikely. although desirable. i would still have reservations about environment as bauxite iron ore mines are highly polluting. but that is still far away from this discussion. the real problem is how to make these people feel they too have a voice. which right now i believe is coming through maoists. there is probably a tribal non tribal divide in representation of the maoist leadership that this article doesnot bring up. if that be the case, then they are not the true representatives of tribal interests. but right now they are the only voice we are hearing. so i think the state should stop such jingoism and try to talk. 60 years of injustice cannot be mitigated in a year. but at least we can start without always blaming each other. can we assure certain human rights and dignity to the tribals who we hae ignored for so long. convincing them they will be redressed is the biggest challenge facing us now. but given the track record of the state, i am not too hopeful. this will probably turn into another bloodbath while we keep arguing on the web. as for ms. roy, i commend her reporting but i do not agree with her views. having said that, in a democracy all views are acceptable and should be debated as long as they are explicitly hate speech. sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 01:29 PM 155 Proper liberalism is where each and every citizen is taught democratic values, this is not the case in India, this is why the Caste system still exists. Majority of the populace does not get proper education, this is the cause of poverty. Praying for the poor who were driven out of their homes by the pollicemen is fine, but what of the poor people whose village was burnt because they refused to join the Maoists? If the politics of development are to be condemned, then so are the tactics of the Maoists. Consider the following scenario, Chidambaram meets with Kishenji, they come up with an agreement that the Majority of the revenue from the mining will be used for development of the area and building civil infrastructure(Hospitals,schools) and that the Maoists Abjure violence and contest elections. If this is how things work out, Then Great. I'd even consider Kishenji a hero, but there are reasons to believe this is not what the Maoists want. You are absolutely right in saying that the civil society groups should resolve this situation, but I genuinely ask you what kind of a truce would you suggest, that will cause them to lay down their arms . I never said that the security forces are heroes bringing in order and prosperity. And trust me, her sponsorship do more harm than good to their cause. If any other journalist comes up with an article which actually highligts their plight, and does not romanticise and glorify the people who blow up a bus carrying civilians, then it's fine. I'm merely suggesting that the Tribals are caught between a rock and a hard place. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 12:35 PM 154 Meaningless! The first word that came to my mind about my own work! And I do what is we call "Peace Building". After reading Arundhati Roy's conversation with Maoist while walking with them and giving light to the hidden truth that no democratic government will ever allow to be seen! grateful for the insights for which she risked her life... And now it is important to remind myself that every bit, including my work is useful, yet it is important to realize that we are living in the midst of violence,and wee need to do every litle bit without giving up, In Peace. Agyatmitra Pune, India Mar 25, 2010 11:54 AM 153 Narendra, what is liberalism then. if expressing sympathy for the poor is called pseudo liberalism, what is then proper liberalism. This is a piece of subjecive journalism. a point of view which we do not ususally hear. you have to thank her for that. i do not think she is saying bombing of schools is right. question is what are those buildings used for. not for education but for housing paramilitary. this is a guerilla war and they are fighting it the way it is meant to be fought. we might not agree with their tactics but we are not in their position. Calling Ms. ROy a far left commentator does not take us anywhere. we should try to mobilize the civil society to act as a mediator between both sides. i believe such attempts have been tried. The maoists in lalgarh have said hey are willing to talk provided certain members of intellegentsia act as mediators. and what does chidambaram do. says everyone who does not toe govt line is a maooist sympathiser. are we living in Bushland or what. Its still Us Vs Them going on. we are all part of the same country, damm it. this piece just gives a glimpse into the history and oppression of these people. i do not think Ms. Roy is a far left rabble rouser or she would not have the credibility to write in this publication. we should stop and reflect quietly what is going on in our names. with our tax money. finishing off our own people. sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 11:49 AM 152 A pitiful propagandist you are Narendra. Have you read the Roy's article at all? Do you know in what fashion schools are built and for what they are used? You wouldn't let people live other way than yours, no? Everyone need to live according to your stupid model, for example: sipping Coke and watching stupid TV, going around with your pitiful Tata car. Or maybe you've grabbed enough to buy a Honda? Infrastructure and mainstream model of development brings only harm to these people, don't you understand. It brings stupidity you very mind is promoting. janez jalen Ljubljana, Slovenia Mar 25, 2010 11:24 AM 151 Okay maybe the personal attacks are a bit too far. But you have to admit, this is psuedo-liberalism at its worst, The relevant point is that this far-left maniac is siding with those who have burned down a village, just because the villagers refused to join them, what friend of the poor would do that? What of their rights? I'd like to make my stand clear, I DO NOT SUPPORT OPERATION GREENHUNT, The problems of the poor have to be addressed by bringing in the soft power of the democratically elected government, But you have to make sure that those building the Hospitals are not attacked. The State might be a terrorist, And I emphasize might, but that does make the Maoists freedom fighters. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 11:22 AM 150 Arundhaty. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you for the heart touching report. It made me cry so many times. How ignorant is Indian middle class about what is going on in the forests? How careless it is? Is this called development? Certainly not of the humanity of the mind. And what it came to me the most often when reading is the face and figure of the home minister, that swine. That pig is still working for monstrous corporations like Vedanta, not for the good of Indian people for sure...Is this India's great democracy? Shame, shame, shame...It's ruled by brahmins and the two blocks of Cong and BJP are just a farce to fool the people. Both are pressing for the same agenda, both are equally criminal... I can't tell how grateful I'm to Roy for the masterpiece she made and congratulation to Outlook as well. You have almost broke a taboo by publishing this story. janez jalen Ljubljana, Slovenia Mar 25, 2010 11:00 AM 149 Thanks Ashwat. It could be 1000 or just 100 MoUs but the first step the government can take is make all these MoUs public. Let the citizens of this nation know what the government plans to do in this tribal belt. And then let there be an independent hearing of each of these MoUs with experts from all fields (including tribal rights bodies) and the tribals themselves. Only then we can hear the true voices of the tribals without interference from either the government or the Maoists. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 10:26 AM 148 This is Journalism at its ultimate best. I'd urge most of the people who have commented to look at the story from the sorry-state of the tribals point of view rather than Arundhati-a-maoist-romanticist. While most of us continue to brand Naxals as the biggest internal threat, the government has already signed 1000 MoU's with multi-national companies to take over the Dandakaranya forests for which villages will be burnt, women will be raped, men and children be-headed. Thank you Arundhati for this and continue the good work. You are an inspiration. Ashwat Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 09:51 AM 147 Narendra, that is exactly what is wrong with most of us. what is point of stooping to ad hominem attacksÉ If you think you can write better than her, I am sure Oulook will be happy to publish you. Till then, it is for the sake of decency one should keep quiet if one does not have any relevant point to offer. this is a forum to discuss ideas not launch personal attacks sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 09:30 AM 146 Do the tribals have a right to fight injustice?, HELL YES Do Maoists have a right to destroy the little civil infrastructure that's left in that country?, HELL NO You're right, Reader Man and Sabu, Guns and bullets are not the are not the right way to go about it. It is through building schools,hospitals and solid social infrastructure which will lift them out of poverty. Our point is that the Maoists are not letting that happen. Even when the government does build a hospital, this far-left retard screams corruption. The Tribals being Indian citizens, have a right as much as any of us to lead a better life, but how is that possible when your schools are demolished. Protest against land acquisition, but also protest against the fact that they are not letting any doctors into those areas. In fact, this woman may have done more harm than good to the tribal's cause because of her sponsorship. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 08:59 AM 145 Sabu puts forth a valid argument. A crude analogy here - if I were cornered by an opponent closing in on me with a menacing sword, I would grab the next item (stone, stick, soil, whatever) lying besides me and try to counter the opponent. The tribals are in the same cornered situation. After having suffered neglect for more than 60 years, the government, instead of helping them, comes and says that they must vacate the land because mining will take place on their land or a dam will be built there. I am no fan of Maoism or Maoists but the tribals have no one to go to with their problems. In comes the Maoists. We cannot win this war by blasting out the Maoist-Tribals with military force. As long as our policies do not take into account the genuine benefit of the tribals, there will always be another round of uprising. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 07:34 AM 144 Pradeep, If you think ideology operates in a vaccum sadly you are mistaken. then it is a belief not an ideology. russian revolution did not take place because Lenin was dreaming about proletarian uprising. there are certain socio cultural conditions in which they operate and find acceptance. for 60 years these people have been neglected an shunned by those same democratic institutions that serve you and me well but turned them away. as i asked you who do they go to. you ask them to shun the maoists. i ask the same too. question is what is replacement in present scenario. have you ever been to bastar, manipur or kashmir to see what the state does there. why would they give up their land when it is their constitutionally protected right and the state refuses to rehablitate them if they do. look a what is ahppening in orissa. why SEZs. would you work in a place where you have no labor rights. i am sure you would not but you would want these people to work there because it suits and profits keep coming although they are being screwed. for too long people like you have asked them to shut up and listen to you becasue you think you know what is best for them. go work in SEZs in appaling conditions. dont you feel ashamed subjecting your fellow ciizens to such misery hat you would never wish for your own family. what is development. for whom. how much is the compensation paid to them. i would ask you to check this link www.otherindia.org and check the report the butterfly and the mahua flower. it is by swedish aid organization not some hack job. even these people know they cannot win against the state. but you cannot stop them because they have nothing more to loose after all these years. i asked you how much of manipur is focussed in national media, was it featured that NHRC said Lalmohan Tudu o PCPA was killed point blank at Lalgarh bysecurity forces. thhis is only of many such kilings. but one police officer gets killed and our middle class sentiments get titillated becasue he is one of us, rom middle class maybe knows english, looks like us. But they are tribals so we have a birth right to think we know what is right for them. what they should do. as i said violence on both sides is reprehensible. as the dominant party is the inidan state willing o engage them. no. look at the this forum, anyone who chooses to disagree with he majority is branded a sympathiser. human rights activists are decried as eltists even as enemies of the state. while some such activiss are rabble rouser a majority are freethinkers. why cant we be critical of both sides and listen to what the ribals have to say. how many tribal leaders themselves have been covered by he media. i have no time educated maoist leaders or their intellectual crap as i know what is feasible and what is not. dont create strawman by citing ganapathy and then assailing him. do we have anything democratic to offer to the tribals and listen to them or do we want to settle scores on our terms. his is a political battle than our police cannot solve. why did the state banish Himangshu Kumar. why did it imprison Binayak Sen. Why are we decrying Arundhai now. becasue we cannot handle what they have to say. we want our SEZs, minings and real estate. while the rest can go to hell. make no mistake this mindset is a recipe for disaster when we refuse o listen what the other side has to say or just cherypick words to suit our purpose. how can you believe that with a 1.3 million strong army and many more paramilitary they will overthrow the state. they cannot but they will make us feel uncomfortable just as Kashmiris have done. which is why we are so eager o exterminate them before they can talk sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 07:26 AM 143 Pradeep, the interview I wrote about is the Riz Khan one (in Part 1). It is on the YouTube on the Internet. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 07:25 AM 142 Hats off to Ms Arundhathi Roy. She is one of the rare Indian celebrity writers with conviction. Ms Arundhati Roy,thanks a lot for brining out in vivid details the lives Maoist's lead in Dandakaranya. Poor people's problems are real. State terrorism is also real. However, I am not convinced about the methods used and shallow rhetoric deployed by the Maoists to bring revolution. They still swear by Maoism, when China is violating all canons of justice vis-a-vis the rural poor in their country, in encouraging the corporates and SEZs. Ideologically Indian Maoists they are on a weak wicket. They cannot show one single country in the world where Maoism is sccessfully practised to alleviate people's problems. They are sacrificing their lives for a lost cause. G. Niranjan Rao Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India Mar 25, 2010 06:43 AM 141 Sabu - It doesnt matter if a banned Organization has the capability to overthrow the state or if we believe in such a prospect . What matters is what their ideology is and what they stand for . Just read what Ganapathy has to say about what his vision for the future below http://news.rediff.c...might.htm#contentTop Sample extract below " There is a new hope that national liberation struggles will hasten if the Maoist revolution advances. In this context, in accordance with MLM (Marxism Leninism and Maoism), the party always maintained the position of the right to self-determination, including secession of all oppressed nationalities. This has to be utilised to unite with them and form a united front." And you want me to believe they are struggling for tribal rights and we should not take their central threat seriously. Their primary objective is to undermine Indian union and they will take up whatever grievance that they find on their way , be it tribals , telengana , labor unrest , land acquisition for SEZ . Please dont justify Maoist terror tactics by shielding them behind Tribal plight . The day tribals stand for themselves and shun the Maoists is the day their struggle will gain legitimacy . pradeep chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 05:31 AM 140 An awesome article... More often than not the mainstream media chooses to ignore some of the worst cases of State atrocities... not because they are not aware of it... but because "We - the middle class" do not care what is happening to everyone else as long as our dinner and breakfasts are not affected... I am proud that we have people like Arundhati who take the trouble to get to the truth, instead of just skimming the surface and writing the State fed story. If only our so called "democratic" government worked towards fulfilling the promise of our independence - SWARAJ(self-rule) and the vision of Bapuji - Swanirvar samaj (self sufficient societies)... we would not be so easily swayed by the wills, wishes and fancies of some MNCs. I only hope and pray that we stop this destructive path to so called "development"... before it is too late... http://www.darjeelin...-and-The-Damned.html Jai Gorkhaland Upendra Winnipeg, Canada Mar 25, 2010 05:27 AM 139 pradeep, do you seriously believe the Maoists can take over India? Do you think most Indians would support that? No, and it is not going to happen. They happen to believe in something does not mean it is feasible. The real concern is not their ideology. the concern is how to wean the poor people away from them. the reign of terror unleashed by the state isn't helping it. when DGPs like Vishwaranjan talk about hunting them down like Mice you have to wonder where our discourse has descended. these are our own people we are talking abou. If the govt can talk to NSCN, AASU, do you want me to believe they cannot talk to the Maoists? When Chidambaram said sop violence for 72 hours, the Chattisgarh police was sill picking up villagers there. Why are academics like nandini Sunda of DSE stopped from going to Bastar if the gov has nothing to hide? How much coverage of Brualities of the Police and COBRA do you see on TImes Now while Arnab Goswami waxes eloquently about Maoist beheadings. Make no mistake what happned ti Francis Induwar was reprehensible. But how many Dalit beheadings by ranvir sena or Salwa Juddum has been so eloquently reported by our media. the real issue is not development. the real issue is that these tribals have been made aware by Maoists that they are also political subjects and they can articulate their demands instead of being pushed around by the state. for us it is uncomfortable because we have always been elitist in presumption, egalitarian in assumptions. now when they refuse o vacate the land which rightflly belongs to them under the consituion, we see them against dvelopment. why? becasue for so long we have thought what is good for them never presuming they can think for themselves other than casting a vote for every 5 years. so when a journalist like Ms. Roy paints a picture of their lives that does not fit with our narrative, we call her names. i do not like her glorification of Charu Mazumder et al. But the stories we get is true and it hits us hard because we are obssessed with GDP but not inequalities. what is the option for these people to seek recourse? go to a judge who wont listen to them? go to a leader like Madhu Koda? or to the Police? If the govt is serious about this issue it has to allow academics and development experts to engage them and focus on rural empowerment through accountable representatives from these people instead of raising more paramilitiaries with our tax money sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 04:53 AM 138 Sabu - do I hear since some forest officials raped lets assume every woman and lady in the tribal areas across 4 states they want to take over the country ? However I try I couldnt find a logical connection between the alleged grief and the stated objective of the movement . would be glad if you can explain why .. If my understanding is wrong , and If the Maoist objective is not to take over the state , then there will be room for other solutions instead of vilifying the mobile republic pradeep chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 04:20 AM 137 a question to you all who have been vilifying her? what solution do you propose instead of sending the army and police? how many of you had your mothers and sisters raped ? how many of you have been kicked out of your home? how many of you have bothered to visit Bastar? very easy to castigate her. what are we doing except sit on couches and passing snide remarks? you may disagree with her sympathies but there is no place for namecalling in this forum. sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 01:49 AM 136 Mazhar: >> What an eye-opener! This is arguably the most well-researched piece ever written on the Naxal movement. Are you joking? This is nothing but cheap propaganda, with the explicit goal of humanizing the Maoists. Well, you know what, I can go embedded with the Taliban for a few days, too, and get some "Boy, what a smile!" type pictures and a few moving tales of Talib courage. But it would be stupid and pointless. The Taliban are defined by their ideology. As should the Maoists be. Maoism killed more than 20 million people in Mao's China. Is that not more important than some Jungle Book-type picnics with Maoists? >>It's really difficult to distinguish between the Naxals and the Navis in James Cameroon's Avatar. Speak for yourself, brother. Did I tell you how I have trouble telling the difference between al-Qaeda and The Flintstones? Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 25, 2010 01:09 AM 135 Author found a hundred reasons like a seasoned lawyer ( with half baked findings ) why Afzal Guru should not be hanged and made it know in every forum , but surprisingly finds it is a viable alternate Justice system where 2 people were executed on spot where the crowd thought they cant be trusted anymore ? Ever heard about Coliseum and Gladiators ? pradeep chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 12:17 AM 134 Mazhar , One is not surprised that someone in Dubai is thinks this is the best piece ever - but can you explain which part of this 20000 word travelogue is "research" ? pradeep chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 12:05 AM 133 What an eye-opener! This is arguably the most well-researched piece ever written on the Naxal movement. It's really difficult to distinguish between the Naxals and the Navis in James Cameroon's Avatar. Mazhar Dubai, United Arab Emirates Mar 24, 2010 11:15 PM 132 Reader Man, I'm not against the tribals, The Indian political establishment has neglected the development of the poor,asserting their legitimacy by merely having voted in. In fact ,If this movement gives them a kick in the pants and gets them to work, then they may even be regarded as heroes. But how can you call them pro-poor when they destroy Railway tracks,roads, the little civil Administration that's left. The Maoists aren't pro-poor, they are like Roy herself pro-poverty, Instead of addressing their condition, they are using it for their support for power in order to overthrow the Indian state. They have popular support, but so did the Chinese communist party when they were fighting the Kuomintang. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 24, 2010 10:08 PM 131 Reader Man - Proof of Arundhati's "approval" of Indian constitution as valid is too important to give benefit of doubt it might exist somewhere .. you claimed she did - the onus is on you to prove ( If at all there was such an interview , I would be looking for the ifs and buts ) Yes Maoists are predominantly in the Tribal areas , that doesnt prove anything .. Why would the tribals want to take over India - they are harassed they want to throw away security forces , declare independence - that sounds coherant . Why a protracted war to claim the red-fort ? what do the tribals want to achive in New Delhi far away from DK ? Plant Trees ? pradeep chennai, India Mar 24, 2010 09:51 PM 130 Does Ms. Roy know that there was a non-violent movement in Chattisgad by Shankar Guha Niyogi. Strangely all the players in Chattisgad seem to have conveniently forgotten Niyogi. Selective memory or ignorance? An article on Niyogi http://otherindia.or...s/niyogihis_work.pdf abcde1101us bidar, india Mar 24, 2010 09:48 PM 129 Pradeep, it was an interview she gave to a foreign journalist. You may find it on YouTube. But who are the Maoists and why are they only on tribal land? The Maoists were supposed to be decimated several times in the past 60 years. But why do they always spring back every time? It is because we provide the "fodder" in the shape of these "harassed" tribals. And every time we try to wipe them out of the face of this nation by military force, we are sowing the seeds for the next round of maoist revolution. A classic example is the Vedanta mining in the Dongria Kondh tribal area of Orissa - as hinted by Arundhati in this article. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 24, 2010 09:25 PM 128 Reader Man - Can you point out to the article where Arundhati says being true to Indian Constitution is the solution - I would be surprised if she considers Indian constitution worth the paper it is written . If you read carefully the comments below you will notice none has fallen for the line what we seeing here is tribal revolution - this is protracted war by Maoists with the sole objective of wresting absolute power . nothing less. So we can have a separate discussion on the people on the sidelines but not in this context . Maoist terror is unacceptable and has no place . Fair and simple. pradeep chennai, India Mar 24, 2010 08:31 PM 127 Do you think the tribals have no other work but to raise a war against the state where they stand to lose everything for nothing in return? They are fighting because they are pushed to the edge of their survival. It is we who have pushed them to that war. And it is we who need to step back to give them some room to return to their normal life. If we keep pressurizing them with our supposedly developmental policies, it is we who are the real perpretators of war, not them. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 24, 2010 08:25 PM 126 Arundhati has spoken of a solution to these problems in one of her interviews: The solution is to do things the right way as scripted in our constitution. The problem has arisen because we have deviated from our constitution and the only logical solution is to go back to the constitution. For every man deprived of his rights, the law must restore his rights; to every woman raped by a policeman or any one else, the rapist must be punished; to every corporate body that manipulates the law and brings untold miseries to the innocent masses, the law must catch and regulate them; to every politician who uses his power to suppress and exploit people, the law must punish him/her; and so on. The solution is to restore the constitution as envisioned when it was incorporated in free India and not let it become a farce as it has become today. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 24, 2010 05:33 PM 125 And to comment #23 Pete,You Aussies have done a great job with the Aborigines and the White Australia policy. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 24, 2010 05:29 PM 124 And Anurag, please point out where she is right, when was the last time she actually suggested a solution to a problem Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 24, 2010 05:26 PM 123 Hey Anurag, You want us to point out where she is wrong? All right, let's start with her Anti-Development stand. 1.She continues her tirade against the middle class and neo-"liberal policies", when it is a fact that we didn't have a 25% middle class before these reforms, the 25% BPL population is disturbing, but it is utopia compared to the License Raj 70%. 2.The Psuedo-liberalism, Roy and her kind sound like a broken record, Rapes by soldiers in Kashmir,Iraq, FACT:Those Guilty are punished, unlike the Maoists who despite burnuing villages are more worthy of her sympathy, and what of the Kashmiri Pandits, the Tibetans, the ones who are really oppressed, If this woman was alive in 1943, she'd say that the worst war crime in the second world war was the bombing of Dresden, and not the Mass murder of jews. 3.Her Hypocritical stand on the environment, while building Mansions on illegal forest land. And Mr Vinod Mehta, You think this piece of trash is worthy of a cover story? If so, also write about the grievances in Pakistan and China. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 24, 2010 04:14 PM 122 Arundhati Roy is India's biggest security threat! Arnav Das Sharma Nagpur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:01 PM 121 Arundhati Roy doesn't surprise me. Her pretentious, self-righteous, highly hypocritical articles are the staple of the so-called 'intelligentsia', an intellectual cabal determined to send the Indian state back to the stone age. The target of Operation green Hunt is misplaced; it instead should have been directed towards these pseudo-intellectuals than the Maoists. P.S. I'm rather rather glad that the Mossad is assisting the Indian personnel to weed out these terrorists from the Indian soil. Arnav Das Sharma Nagpur, India Mar 24, 2010 03:57 PM 120 those ppl who can not counter the points raised by arundhati roy target her.if she is fake,her detractors should point out where she is instead of labeling her as communist,catholic and what not.its better to analyze her article than to analyse or abuse her angarag guwahatai, india Mar 24, 2010 03:45 PM 119 THIS IS ONLY EMOTIONS OF ROY... NOTHING. WHEN MAOVADI KILLED POLICEMEN OR INNOCENT THAT TIME WHY ROY NOT CRITICIZED THAT ATTACK.. SHE IS NOT A WRITER OR JOURNALIST... ONLY AGAINST FOR COUNTRY.. SOME TIME SHE TALK AGAINST SARDARSAROVAR. NOW SHE FAVOURS MAOIST.. DIPAK D. CHUDASAMA HYDERABAD, India Mar 24, 2010 03:36 PM 118 You find smile of certain 'mangtu' seductive and you don't find him security threat even though he can handle all kinds of weapon except LMG. You find police personal who are being trained to fight the Maoists are Mad dogs, rapists and oppressors, but you don't find anything wrong when Mangtu and his ilks burn and kill those willagers who don't want follow their dictates. A poor policemen who was beheaded by your comrades was most probably there because he had a family to feed back at home. Small kids who needed education. Your comrades took away that precious support from his family, made his wife widow and his children's future uncertain and yet they are revolutionary for you? And yet you have guts to talk of 'corrupt MINDS' of government. It's you and your comrades who are MAD DOGS. and they will be treated like a MAD DOGS. SHOOT TO KILL. Ravi Kant Asthana Portsmouth, United Kingdom Mar 24, 2010 03:27 PM 117 So you saw 'Vedanta Cancer Hospital' board and realised that there must be mineral or ore's mountain close by which this corrupt corporate want's to exploit. Is exploiting natural resources of the country for betterment of country infrastructure is corruption? You took journey by train, bus and motorbike to meet your comrades. Were these assets and whatever infrastructure you used were created my maigic wand of a tribal witch? Ravi Kant Asthana Portsmouth, United Kingdom Mar 24, 2010 03:14 PM 116 A.Roy, your 'GREED' for publicity and spotlight always get better of you. You are incorrigible, aren't you? You got a slap on your wrist from Supreme Court for putting your foot in your mouth, but you still can't stop doing that. You are shameless, aren't you? Ravi Kant Asthana Portsmouth, United Kingdom Mar 24, 2010 02:51 PM 115 A.Roy is a 'gifted lady' of India and an Angel for millions of deprived people who have been subjected to horrendous discrimination and human rights abuses for centuries by fellow country men. Her adventure to expose the level of injustice and deprivation of these unfortunate people will be remembered for ever. She is a shining gem in a billion. Rajesh Sydney, Australia Mar 24, 2010 01:54 PM 114 The attire of A.Roy seems familiar. Isn't that similar to what the Palestinian guerrillas don? May be she is revealing her inner unfulfilled commitments. This pest has found a matching company in those mindless terrorists with an ideological facade. Doubts having been raised about her source of funds to write all that thrash she has been writing, and if ever such source is identified and she is tried for treason and sentenced to death by hanging, I am too willing to be her hangman, my professional obligation notwithstanding. Such is my revulsion for this unforgivable idiot. sandilya Chennai, India Mar 24, 2010 01:09 PM 113 kumar they have other choices- missionaries could convert them. build churches,and get them to ba another force against modi. faruki,s mullahs could get them to be muslims. however this could be risky. it would be tough for the women stumbling in the dark wearing black burqas, gayatri devi delhi, India Mar 24, 2010 12:05 PM 112 Anandaswarup Gadde, >> It seems to me that tribals have real problems. I wonder whether they are using Maoists since they could not get much support from elsewhere. Something has to be done to address the problems/concerns of tribals, not letting them turn to/into Maoists. To that extent, Ms Roy or anyone taking up to tell their story is not bad (it is even required) - without jumping from this point towards a support for communist/maoist regime, overthrowing inclusive constitutional democracy etc. Kumar Bangalore, India Mar 24, 2010 10:54 AM 111 This is the only article by Arundhati Roy that I have read and some of the facts she mentioned ring true to me. For example, I have seen strategic hamleting in Mizoram around 1977 when I was working in the NEHU. A highway was built from one end of the state to another, villages were shifted near the highway,( and I was told) fenced off and needed identity cards to leave the fenced area to farm. And there is much similar material in Raul Banerjee's "Recovering the Lost Tongue: The Saga of Environmental Struggles in Central India", Rahul Banerjee worked for about 25 years with tribals in Central India. It seems to me that tribals have real problems. I wonder whether they are using Maoists since they could not get much support from elsewhere. Anandaswarup Gadde Melbourne, Australia Mar 24, 2010 10:05 AM 110 OUTLOOK henceforth must at least publish Arundhthi articles in fiction section. Tell her to add some of her mothers sexual escapades and may be she will get another "BOOKKER" Akil Bangalore, India Mar 24, 2010 09:57 AM 109 A well written piece from Ms. Roy. The last time I read something like this was about Robin Hood and his Merry Band! Ms. Roy has, as is her wont, demonstrated brilliantly how a combination of erudition and verbosity can camouflage the travesty of truth! I am sure this article will appeal to all those people who still think it is fashionable (is it coming back?) to be anti-establishment, non-conformist, anarchic an so on .. A M Diwakar Bangalore, India Mar 24, 2010 09:09 AM 108 Why does Outlook continue to publish her nonsense week after week ? Do they have too much money now to waste on garbage like hers or they do not find any better writers / articles ? So much for the intelligent english media in India. I am yet to read one article by Arundhati Roy where she has praised India or anything Indian. She won a Booker's price, so she thinks she is the smartie pant. Who cares about Booker except flag waving, west obsessed hypocrites like her. For a change, she needs to find something good in India or else move to Italy or somewhere else. By the wa, where does she get the money to travel and have such luxuries to roam and " write " at will ? Wake up India, see the real story. Arundhati Roy is no journalist or writer, she is a puppet in those invisible hands who are eating up India like a rat from inside. Only in India can people do this kind of backstabbing like Arundhati keeps doing to India and get away with name and money for it. Vipul Jani toronto, Canada Mar 24, 2010 08:31 AM 107 Gayatri Devi writes - "amaratya sen got a nobel prize in economics. the western industrialised world gave it to him because it is concerned about the poor. it was a gesture of solidarity. all most all of these poor live in countries like india, pakistan, nepal, burma, ethiopia." - I know that "Gayatri Devi" lives in one of the Scandinavian countries. But, it is good to know now that our "Gayatri Devi" is also a member of the Nobel Committee which sits in Sweden to be able to make such an outburst - or is that due to some "anti-Bongo" instinct ? But that will be surprising since the original "Gayatri Devi" was a Bongo herself ! Pinaki S Ray Adelaide, Australia Mar 24, 2010 04:32 AM 106 Just as Stalin was the only guy tough enough to crush Hitler, maybe Maoism is the only force to save India from Islam. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:29 AM 105 There is a lot to be said for Maoism - as a means of dealing with jehadis. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:26 AM 104 One aspect of the Maoists being virtuallty in power in Nepal is that this Hindu country is now safe from Muslim expansionism. The Maoists have armed the Hindu and Buddhist peasants of Nepal, who will crush ruthlessly any Muslim attempt at takeover. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:17 AM 103 Take a good look at these Maoists. They're tough guys. They can deal with jihadis, once in power. Their hands will not tremble. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:15 AM 102 The Muslims, in the LONG run, will pay a very heavy price for helping Maoism to power in India. History has shown that the bloody-Left-Islamist alliance only operates UNTIL the Bloody-Left are in power. It happened thus in Russia and China. Once the savage despots of vthe "Left" are in power, their attitude to Islam changes radically. They need to destroy every element in the society that might possibly be outside their totalitarian ideology. And the mosque is precisely such an institution. So they wage extremely brutal wars against Muslim clergy and believers to force them to submit to totalitarian "leftist" ideology. (I don't believe there is anything leftist in any real sense in this ideology, hence the quotation marks.) In India, my guess is that eventually, with arms in the hands of masses of Hindu peasants as a result of Maoism, Islam will take a terrific hit. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 03:36 AM 101 Yes, Murtuza, Maha, that is the pity of it. It is similar to the result of the methods of opposition adopted by Laloo and Mulayam Yadav to oppose the Women's reservation. The genuine arguments get drowned out because of people's revulsion. Ajit Tendulkar Seattle, United States Mar 24, 2010 03:02 AM 100 "Take all the "causes" Arundhati has espoused: nuclear weapons, Narmada, Afzal Guru, Kashmir... and in all of them, public opinion, even those who supported those causes, turned against only because of A. Roy's shrill, megalomaniacal and neverending rants." Interesting observation. Maha NJ, United States Mar 24, 2010 02:08 AM 99 What Arundhati really needs is a good, strong, hardball interview with a sensible, disinterested journalist and good interviewer. Her interview with Karan Thapar was an ultra-softball joke. Even Vir Sanghvi said so. Come to think of it, why not Vir? He could challenge her hypocrisy and black-and-white views very effectively. She'd be squirming. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 24, 2010 02:07 AM 98 I think compliments are due to Arundhati Roy and Outlook for achieving what P. Chidambaram could not have managed: turning public opinion against the Maoists. Take all the "causes" Arundhati has espoused: nuclear weapons, Narmada, Afzal Guru, Kashmir... and in all of them, public opinion, even those who supported those causes, turned against only because of A. Roy's shrill, megalomaniacal and neverending rants. I just hope that Kanu Sanyal did not decide to take his life because Arundhati Roy decided to support the movement he founded so many years ago. He meant well for the tribals and the underprivileged. Ms Roy is concerned only with her own ego. Ajit Tendulkar Seattle, United States Mar 24, 2010 01:58 AM 97 'Dev Raya'/'James': >> However, I'm still just not quite sure yet what it is about the aggressive tone, insulting language and eccentric typesetting that marks Martuza Polen out as the only troll in the village ... Back again? Still seething over the fact that the moderator deleted all your posts in that thread, but kept everyone else's? Don't think you can ever -- ever -- get away with your racist statements. And try to attack me and I'll see that your posts are all deleted once again. Savvy? Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 24, 2010 01:51 AM 96 Who's ready to take bets that "James" the troll is none other than the banished Dev Raya, Reddy, Old Mac...? Ajit Tendulkar Seattle, United States Mar 24, 2010 01:50 AM 95 I doubt who is funding all this nonsense of hers. A true journalist is one who is unbiased. But, here right the word go, she starts praising the naxals and screwing our brave soldiers and police. I dont know whats her problem with the middle class. Look at the following link. She has heavily criticized even our Nuclear tests. Doe she really mean this nonsense or is she taking sides just for gaining publicity. http://www.ratical.c...es/endOfImagine.html Lakshmikanth Bangalore, India Mar 24, 2010 12:57 AM 94 >>>it is amazeing that she can get her rubbish published. only in india. she would be laughed away as a nitwit in any informed company in the west Unfortunately this is not true. She is like our very own Noam Chomsky, Naomi Klein and Michael Moore, rolled into one. People like this are a curse on the productive and patriotic. SreekanthBoston Boston, United States Mar 24, 2010 12:57 AM 93 Fascinating reportage. And an excellent, thoughtful discussion. However, I'm still just not quite sure yet what it is about the aggressive tone, insulting language and eccentric typesetting that marks Martuza Polen out as the only troll in the village ... James London, United Kingdom Mar 23, 2010 11:44 PM 92 And this is really funny, When a far-left maniac takes a jab at Hinduism, she is termed progressive, but talk about the Kashmiri pandits, you're a Hindu Bigot. Mr Mehta, It's a good thing you covered the tribals, now the Kashmiri Pandits,How about the Pandits? Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 23, 2010 11:37 PM 91 harish amaratya sen got a nobel prize in economics. the western industrialised world gave it to him because it is concerned about the poor. it was a gesture of solidarity. all most all of these poor live in countries like india, pakistan, nepal, burma, ethiopia. its simple. roy blames the rich for all the misery.dont blame the poor, for haveing 5 to 6 children per family. dont blame mother india and nature because there is insufficient water, land and other resources for its increaing flock of children. dont blame corrupt politicians like lalloo,mayawati ,shibu soren, koda for stealing from their compatriots.these are children of the poor. whilst travelling through india i observed how every town and city had so many people. sitting, walking, lieing down. people,people and more.children without clothes. young people without jobs, and old helpless people without food. a friend of mine a doctor pointed out something to me. " it seems that the density of population in india is about 10 times greater than in danmark" prince phillips who is known for dropping bricks has said. " the population of the world has gone up from 2 billion to 6.7 billion in 60 years. this is the single greatest cause for environmental damage to our planet" imagine if india had not built damns ,irrigation canals, developed new rice and wheat seeds, and built fertiliser factories. roy is a nut- the only dispute is what kind of nut. it is amazeing that she can get her rubbish published. only in india. she would be laughed away as a nitwit in any informed company in the west.this happened once when a journalist from the economist dismissed all her opinions as being totally wrong. at her age its pathetic that she goes around playing the teenage girl with flowers in her hair, and pretending she is the indian evita peron. poverty in india is a sin,like everywhere else. it has to fought intelligently useing all the sciences and resources available to us. its contemptible to use it to win points with frivolous populism . gayatri devi delhi, India Mar 23, 2010 11:31 PM 90 Mr Chidambaram, Don't listen to what these "Human Right Activists" say, The people have elected you, do your job. Mr Garde, these "friends" of the poor are destroying schools, They don't serve meat in vegetarian restaurants, and they don't call you pro-poor when you destroy the very Institutions that lift people out of poverty, now would you be called pro-povery or not, that's a different matter. Roy hates the economic reforms because the population Below poverty line is 25%, but for a different reason than you might think,she hates these reforms because they have reduced it to 25% from 70% in 1991. I'd like to know what she has been smoking when she comes to the assesment that the system caters to only the upper caste Hindus, when you find that the non-muslim minorities such as Zoroastrians(Ratan Tata),Sikhs(the PM) and Christians are actually doing better than the Hindus. And don't even get me started on the Reservations. The government has made mistakes, but the Maoists are a solution worse than the problem. Still I'd have no problem if they create a separate state,provided Roy Migrates to this country and does not torture readers with such articles. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 23, 2010 09:08 PM 89 Varun Garde, you are an idiot. 25 years back the middle class in India accounted for just 5% of the population. Today it accounts for 25-30%. Where did this extra 25% come from ? They came from the poor, you nitwit. Poor need not remain poor. A country is not static. The reason there are so many poor people in India is because of Nehruvian socialism. Take that away, free the economy, and there will be more numbers added to the middle class. Few years of economic reforms have seen a phenomenal growth in the number of middle class. Imagine what can happen if India becomes a free market capitalist country... But then this is precisely what A. Roy's leftist comrades do not want. They want to keep India perpetually poor. They do not want the poor to lose their poverty and become rich. Because then, they would lose all their support. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 08:58 PM 88 I think many of us are missing few important points. 1> Roy is a brilliant story teller so when her pen starts she can take a fact and weave it brilliantly with imagination, color and empathy - present it to a mass audience. 2> She has the capacity influence and convince mainstream Indians (and many others) to justify Maoist violence. I admire that capacity 3> The issue has never been Indian govt, Maoist, lands or mountains. The fundamental issue has been the justice system in India. Remember that historically Indian people always sided or connected with someone whom they feel is just. They never cared about the ideology, politics or anything else. Since justice system is not delivering properly, all other avenues like corruption, nepotism, insurgents, Maoist, PWG etc come out. Other countries like China destroy these forces through brutality. Instead of focusing your energy to blast Ms Roy can you not ask : >> Justice system be revived, with time bound resolution Our people is our strength. Sarat kumar Banbarada, India Mar 23, 2010 08:57 PM 87 Those of us endowed with a voice who would rush to claim that we have made ourselves out of hard work, fought and won against our ailments and are rightfully middle class, forget to recognize that we were plainly reaping the harvest of caste superiority, of a system rigged to work towards our advantage, and towards the disadvantage of the poor. That the water that we drink was snatched from their basins, that the power that we consume was generated in a dam that displaced a thousand villages. That the Probably these are not petty crimes, but the worst crime which we did commit and continue to commit without remorse, without a thought is to deny a face, a voice and a hope to these tribals, deprived of money, opportunities and rights. By a "democratically elected" representative government, which we allowed to do our dirty work. Her essay makes me wonder if our democratically elected, representative government is more patriotic or those that are its children, and who resist its murderous agenda. Varun Garde Bengaluru, India Mar 23, 2010 08:57 PM 86 The greatest enemies of India are not Maoists or Muslim terrorists. They are just mad dogs that have to be shot dead and our Army and our Police are well capable of doing that job. The greatest threat to India comes from the passive supporters of Maoism and Islamic terrorism who call themselves human rights activists, intellectuals and what not. Their objective is to humiliate, demoralise and demonise the Indian Army and Police so that they are not able to fight with all their strength. Their goal is same as Maoists and Muslim terrorists - disintegration, annihilation, destruction of India. Because thats what they hate most -India. Arundhati Roy, Outlook editor and journalists are valued members of this club. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 08:45 PM 85 Harish Mumbai, sure rapes happen. Atrocities happen. But not at the scale at which the self-proclaimed human rights activists who you admire so much claim. Arundhati Roy and her kind exaggerate to a great extent. When they say hundreds of rapes by security forces, there are actually about one or two. When they talk about thousands of murders by police, there are actually around five or six. Its only self-loathing idiots like you who believe these pseudo human rights activists. Their agenda is clear. Disintegration and destruction of India. They are soft terrorists. They kill with their words, not with bullets. And people like you support them. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 08:40 PM 84 This is a trick too clever by half to equate Tribals and Maoists . If indeed they are the same lets just take a step back and try to understand what do Maoists really want ? What are their objectives ? To have tribal forests declared protected reserves and ensure their needs are met by special schemes , quotas ? Do they want a Tribal state with Autonomy (say Article 370) carved out of tribal areas so that the tribals can make their own decisions on resources and manage their own people - well that would make sense for a tribal revolution if there was one. But no they dont - they want to massacre the Bourgeoise class in India ( 100 million even if it was a conservative 10%) , overthrow democracy by arms , disband Indian security apparatus , justice system and economy - bring one party rule and set up their own party justice system - and grant independence to all ethnic groups from Indian union that choose ( I know they have promosed for Kashmir and North east , not sure if this is applicable for the hindu areas too - probably not - the evil hinduism should probably be eliminated to a post-religious society _ . The party would rein supreme. Party will charge , party will judge , party will sentence . With no elections ( there is no democracy see ) one just hopes you are on the good side of yout local communist boss ( you can send them your daughters you see , that will make them happy) and they can live the dream - and we the nightmare . Hypothetically , when they do overtake India there will atleast 50% ( short for 500 Million ) who wont accept the set-up ( Indian never agree on amything , do they) - what is to be done to the 50% as party tolerates no indiscipline - soaking hands in their blood as Charu Majumdar Prophetically suggested ? Maoist are very clear to state want absolute power and they want to achieve that in the next few decades and everybody exept the intellectual fools who are trying to fool others know what is in stake . pradeep chennai, India Mar 23, 2010 08:37 PM 83 Selvaraj, why would the 'majority of the poor of India' stand by Arundhati Roy ? They probably have no clue who she is. Most of them cannot afford the 25 rupees it takes to buy Outlook, and even if they could, they wouldn't understand her as English is not yet a poor man's language and Roy has no ability to communicate in any tongue other than English.To be honest, the poor couldn't care less about Roy and her kind. Its only the 'greedy' middle class that you hate so much who read her or give her importance. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 08:08 PM 82 Ms.Roy, the greedy Indian middle class both here and abroad will malign you. They are 'patriotic' in their own language of development. Please do not give even iota of importance to them. Go ahead. The majority of poor people living in this subcontinent (Indians?!) are here by your side. History remembers those who love mankind. The others are thrown into dustbin. A salute to your courage in the age of paid journalism. selvaraj chennai, India Mar 23, 2010 07:55 PM 81 Algebraic clarity, from Ms Roy: A protracted war by the State (Upper caste Hindu in your thesaurus) on the 'Others' should have been equal to 'A protracted war by the 'Others' against the State', except for the Sex, and Revolutions are Sexy. A perfect life, for the central character of Upamanyu Chatterjee's first novel, English August, required; apart from grass, music and books, a Woman who did not exist before and after the 'act'. Revolution, Ms Roy, takes longer than the 'Act' and the pills for the morning-after aren't sold over-the-counter and in any case; have side effects. Saurabh Kumar Srivastava Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 05:41 PM 80 Mr Saini. Lets say I agree with you on that. There is no escaping change. But is it a natural course of change that is being witnessed in India? For decades the tribals were completely bereft of the basics of modernity -- education, sanitary and health facilties etc -- and nobody really cared. (M J Akbar has recorded this well in his book Riot After Riot). The tribal was merely the subject of exploitation far from the eye of the mainstream society. And then suddenly the government smells booty underneath! And the tribal is herded into camps like domesticated animals. Their symbiotic existence is ripped apart. How fair is that? If mainstream India can see a social upheaval of the size of the Ramjamnabhoomi-Babri movement in the name of an old forgotten mosque and namesake religious icon, how fair is it to violently disrupt the millennia old animism -- which makes the mountains, the trees, the water bodies etc the gods of the tribals -- for the purpose of the ever-elusive "growth"? To patronise tribals and say that they "must" change, and that too by "our" standards, is fertile ground for more Maoism! As for the misogyny you talk about, I hope you know the tribal societies are some of the most gender-equal ones in India. The Todas of Nilgiris are a case in point. In anycase, if that all important "change" that you mentioned had indeed brought about positive developments for these people -- the tribals that I am talking about and the poor that you refer to -- then there wouldn't have been a better advocate for it than themselves. The fact seems to be quite contrary. We are prospering at their cost. And I don't see any logic behind the assertion "some lose some gain" that will be an answer to the tribals' plight. Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 05:23 PM 79 @Harish "All the more because, whether we accept it or not, the state is actually in the 'oust the tribal mode' in the name of development. And in any case, why should development be thrust on people in the Australian aborigine fashion? " lets face it, the tribal culture will not survive contact with modernity. Once you bring education and exposure to modern thinking there is little going back. Would you want your kids to live as a tribal? Its a credit to Ms Roy that she was also honest to point out the misogyny, and sometimes brutality of the tribal way of life. Its only in the West that this is glamourised and some of this western style thinking seeps over into India. India is not Australia, its not a large sparsely populated country to setup separate reservations for tribals. There are many poor people in the cities as well whose needs must be considered. This is becoming an urban country. We need electricity, we need hydropower. Its not gone out of fashion as Ms Roy seems to think, infact its the other way around. If everybody else's life has to change, whether they like it or not, so will the tribals. I know people who would like to live like their ancestors did, but many others are excited by "connectivity", a new buzzword in UP. MK Saini Delhi, India Mar 23, 2010 05:05 PM 78 @Prashant "Its merely spreading a canard. Telling a lie million times over does not make it true." --Well like I said, we love to live in our fake worlds. As for HR activists highlighting rapes and other atrocities, thank god they do. However, the fact is that hardly any are accepted by the state as a fact, we want the world to believe everything is hunky dory in the land of milk and honey. Until the victims say enough is enough -- like what happened in the Thyangam Manorama case in Manipur -- and do something that shocks us into shame. Well if your insinuation is that every time a rape happens, the victims' near and dear one's must protest naked in front of the mainstream media for us to take notice, then one can only say, "carry on Ms Roy". In anycase, one can say just that: "Carry on Ms Roy. Continue the good job but cut the rhetoric and romanticism." Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 04:51 PM 77 Harish Mumbai says : " How many reports have spoken about the rapes and mass murders perpetrated by the state forces in the tribal hinterlands " Actually you need to live in a vacuum if you haven't come across frequent claims by the so-called Intellectual class that also calls itself 'Human Rights Activists'. Thats all I hear about, rapes and murders committed by security forces in Maoist areas, rapes and murders perpetrated by Indian army in Kashmir, rapes and murders committed by Indian forces in North-East.... ....had they been true all male species in these regions would have been wiped out and all women would have been reduced to sexual slaves of the evil Indian forces.... No sir, balance does not mean calling Indian soldiers rapists and murderers. Its merely spreading a canard. Telling a lie million times over does not make it true. How about this for balance ? Brutal mass murder of innocent people by Maoists, use of young women as sex slaves by Maoists....rape, murder, pillage of innocent hindus by Kashmiri muslims in Kashmir.... hacking to death of hindus by Church sponsored Christian terroists in Nagaland....all very true and relevant. However I dont see such stories making news. I certainly do not see Ms. Roy giving voice to these stories. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 04:31 PM 76 Mr Saini "who beleives that everything is shining" My mistake: I meant "mainstream media". Not until Sainath came around did the media discover farmers' suicides. How many reports have spoken about the rapes and mass murders perpetrated by the state forces in the tribal hinterlands (at best the euphemism 'defensive firing' is used)? Hardly any and for obvious reasons. But the Maoist massacres are always highlighted. That is the deficiency I was talking about. And that is where I feel the likes of Roy and Sainath balance it out. But while the mainstream media will not be questioned, Roy will be lampooned -- because she hurts those very cosy middle class sentiments you were talking about, she exposes the guilt of the politician's darling middle and upper classes. As for this: "It does indicate the inablity of the state to govern, but whats new?" -- the mindset behind this kind of a cynically easy statement is precisely the reason we need the shrill rhetoric of a Roy. All the more because, whether we accept it or not, the state is actually in the 'oust the tribal mode' in the name of development. And in any case, why should development be thrust on people in the Australian aborigine fashion? As for Mayawati's land, I do not think the media has left any stone unturned to highlight mishaps called successive UP governments! Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 04:25 PM 75 I am sorry, but does nobody here have a problem with the way Arundhati Roy dehumanizes security forces ? She has no problem at all at the execution of informers, believes that is just and even praises the public courts of the Maoists as a better alternative to Indian judicial system. She paints all police officers are evil, nasty, cruel types. Soldiers are reduced to being common thugs, rapists and scoundrels. So much thought is given by her to the 'human' side of Maoists, their 'beautiful' smiles, their boyish handsomeness, their courage....worthy of hero worship and according to her, 'our last hope'..... Soldiers of the police, SPOs , BSF on the other hand are reduced to the status of anonymous extras in a Bollywood film without a shred of personality. Are they or are they not human beings ? Dont they smile ? Dont they come from poor families ? Dont they support aged parents ? Are they not tribals too ? What about their wives and girlfriends ? Who do they fight for ? They get killed and become a statistic, for what, a couple of thousand rupees a month ? Are they not worthy of our compassion ? According to Roy, only the 'beautiful' Maoists are worthy of our compassion. Indian security forces, in the world of Roy, are vermin that need to be crushed by the brave 'Gandhians with guns, Our Last Hope'.... Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 04:05 PM 74 Harish says "The point being that when 99% of the mainstream doesn't give a shit about the tribals and the dying farmers, and in fact are brainwashed into believing that everything is "shining", " who beleives that everything is shining, except for a few drunken types in Delhi? The types who gifted $5 million dollars to the USA in the aftermath of Katrina. This is silly lazy statement. This essay is revealing allright. It does indicate the inablity of the state to govern, but whats new?. Where there is the vacumm (i.e. illiterate tribals) the Maoist hyenas have moved in to direct the "struggle". But there is a problem with governance everywhere. The dust choked roads filled with trucks, lurching from side to side as they navigate the cratered lunar landscape called a road, layering the towns and villages with a thick film, is everywhere. Try Mayawati's paradise if you want to a good example. Its silly to set up these laxy narratives. So what can be done. Little but things do change in a dull managerial way. At somepoint yu realise no revolution is going to change things, as per Ms Roys mother's intution. Typical retarded middle class thinking MK Saini Delhi, India Mar 23, 2010 03:25 PM 73 Maybe what you are saying about Roy is right. I have no interest in that. It is her subject matter -- the tribals and their gradual annihilation -- that is more important. And she is doing her job well to that extent. So what if she doesn't provide solutions? Highlighting the blatant injustice perpetrated in my name is good enough for me. As for Sainath himself, for all my admiration for him, you think his tunnel vision doesn't have flaws? The point being that when 99% of the mainstream doesn't give a shit about the tribals and the dying farmers, and in fact are brainwashed into believing that everything is "shining", it does take the shocking version of a Roy or a Sainath to do at least a minor counter. To that extent I am ready to forgive Ms Roy her flaws. Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 03:09 PM 72 Harish- Please don't compare P Sainath with Arundhati Roy, Sainath is one of the best journalists India had ever seen. He systematically (single handedly) revealed the hunger and destitution of Indian farmers. He is partly responsible for UPA government's NERGA scheme. But Arundhati is a shrill Maoist supporter. She idolises violent terrorists like Maoists and thrives on demonising the state and romanticing Jihadis and Maoists. Sainath calls himself a proud Indian and Arundhati calls herself a walking republic (whatever does that mean). Arundhati offers no solution other than rooting for a Maoist dictatorship for India meanwhile Sainath offers a credible constitutionally sound alternative. Prasanth Melbourne, Australia Mar 23, 2010 02:36 PM 71 Shooting the messenger is an age old tactic. Particularly for the lot of us who hate hearing bad news. Roy has never been in my reading radar. I thought her God of Small Things was a boring piece of work. But what she stands for -- at least in this article's case -- is worth giving a thought. Let us rip away her romanticised version of the tribals' innocence, her one-night (make if one-week if you please) stand with Dandakaranya and the the perpetually heartless Indian state. Even then what we get is a multitude of people dehumanised and a mainstream mentaility completely sanitised of this dehumanised set. It is only when the Roys and Saintaths give us the alternative perspective that we in the mainstream sometimes get a glimpse of the real. And of course we hate them for that. Let us for a moment accept that Roy is a cynic who presents the unsavoury extreme version to us. The fact of the matter is that even that extreme version is not effective enough when pitted against the other end of the spectrum, the mainstream version of the story spouted by the likes of Arnab Goswami and Rahul Kanwal. Even if it is through her shrill rhetoric, if an Arundhati Roy or a P Sainath manage to give the sidelined section a voice, we should be welcoming that. But we wont. I know. Because for us, they exist only in the minds of the Roys and Sainaths. Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 01:14 PM 70 Arundhathi is a lousy literator who got an award for writing rubbish about her mother. Just fails to understand why Outlook publishes her stupid articles. Akil Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 12:20 PM 69 You know what, I read God Of Small Things as a teenager. I thought the book was boring for the most part, but I liked the last few pages. You know what I am talking about - the sex scene. Arundhati Roy is a wonderful writer of sex. Thats probably the only thing she's good at : writing about sex. Thats what she should ideally stick to. Write about sex Arundhati, hot steamy hardcore sex. Thats all you are good at. Just an advise. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 09:37 AM 68 Grow up guys. If Arundhati Roy tries to look deeper into the issue and tries to understand and make others understand how the Maoists have garnered support of the local people, she becomes a supporter of Maoists taking over teh country????!!!! Learn to respect views that are different from your own. Learn that there are two sides to every issue. Learn that when we are able to see both sides, it's only then that we can act judiciously. Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 23, 2010 09:29 AM 67 @Varun Garde- It is easy to sneer at middle class for all the evils facing the country. But did we have this "middle class" 15,20 years ago? No sir, all we had was 98% desperately poor people shackled by license raj and 2% rich politicians and selected business families. These 300 million strong middle class did not fall from the sky overnight,after economic liberalisation they worked hard, sacrificed many things and worked their way up to the middle class status. What do you propose? 300 million middle class Indians should go back to being poor? So that we can all share poverty "equally" like pre 1990s? Varun, you said "The anger seen here against Arundhati , is example of the middle class' intolerance to any opposition to its notions of "development", "progress" or nationhood." Not true, they(middle class)fully support uplifting tribals from their misery, they have absolutely no problem about spending for poor or someone writing about their problems. But what they(middle class) oppose is the imposition of an outdated retarded, failed violent ideology like Maoism as an all healing solution by so called intellectuals like Arundhati. Almost all the commentators here criticizing Arundhati did so not because she dared to give "voice" to the oppressed, but because she is working AGAINST The liberal constitution of India and she seems to support Maoism- a dreaded non democratic ideology. Our criticism is against Maoist supporters like Arundhati Roy, not poor hapless tribal people. Prasanth Melbourne, Australia Mar 23, 2010 08:43 AM 66 According to Roy When a Maoist speaks it becomes a "lovely Telugu accented Hindi", but when a police man speak that would naturally be in "crude, repulsive, accented Hindi"!! Ms Roy always support the "weak" side in a conflict, the notions of "who is correct/who is wrong" is absent from her black&white brain. The way Roy idolises Charu Mazdumdar- an extreme leftist leader who openly called for slaughtering "class enemies" - is extremely telling. Some commentators here say Roy doesn't provide any solution. Not right, Roy is very explicit in giving solutions. Isn't it clear that Roy supports a Maoist government? She is full of praise about "superbly organised" highly committed Maoist cadres. She wants Maoist to take over India!! That's her solution!! Now, I don't know how she will justify the "class killings" if and when Maoist come to power in India (God forbid!!). It is strange to see a Catholic Christian- Suzanne Arundhati Roy- denigrate Hinduism by her statement, "Hinduisms greatest gift to the world- Caste!! Really? Is Hinduism so evil? The only "gift" off Hinduism to the world is caste system? The mere fact that Roy can live in this country and still abuse the majority of Indian's religion(80%) and call openly for overthrowing the current democratically elected government proves that India is a liberal democracy(contrary to Arundhati's argument). She is exploiting India's liberal democracy and using the constitutionally guaranteed "freedom of speech" to undermine the very liberal constitution with a violent outdated failed Maoist dictatorship. Shame on Arundhati and other so called "human rights" activists who only sees the rights violation of Islamic terrorists and Moaists and always ignore the rights of a common man to live peacefully without being blasted in to oblivion by terror bombs. Prasanth Melbourne, Australia Mar 23, 2010 08:34 AM 65 The anger seen here against Arundhati , is exemplar of the middle class' intolerance to any opposition to its notions of "development", "progress" or nationhood. Varun Garde Bengaluru, India Mar 23, 2010 05:17 AM 64 roy loves herself and her own writeings. nothing she writes makes sense-but she gets it published. no one understands what she writes- its flowery language, and opinions designed to shock her audience. absolute balderdash. gayatri devi delhi, India Mar 23, 2010 01:20 AM 63 Kumar: You're missing the point. The 'Hindu state' was complicit in the Pandit ethnic cleansing. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 23, 2010 01:02 AM 62 >> >> It's hard not to see that the Indian State is an essentially upper-caste Hindu State (regardless of the party in power) which harbours a reflexive hostility towards the 'other'. >> And how does the fool Arundhati reconcile this black-and-white thesis with the '90 ethnic cleansing of the Kashmiri Pandits? That's like asking how do you reconcile the fact that a dalit is CM of UP and the fact that dalits are poor/backward/suffering. Kumar Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 12:46 AM 61 If any of Arundhati's pieces ever exposed her for the contemptible communist that she is, here's the choicest extracts from above -- >> Charu Mazumdar was a visionary in much of what he wrote and said. The party he founded (and its many splinter groups) has kept the dream of revolution real and present in India. Imagine a society without that dream. For that alone, we cannot judge him too harshly. Especially not while we swaddle ourselves with Gandhi's pious humbug about the superiority of "the non-violent way" and his notion of trusteeship: "The rich man will be left in possession of his wealth, of which he will use what he reasonably requires for his personal needs and will act as a trustee for the remainder to be used for the good of society." "The Dream of Revolution"? What is this dream? What is its goal? A communist state, a totalitarian state where everyone does as the party says, and individual wealth earned through honest hard work and self-improvement is useless. Some "revolution". Well, Arundhati, you and Charu can keep you precious Revolution. Better still, head to one of the revolutionized states -- Cuba or China or North Korea, and see how much free speech you enjoy there. The fact is that freedom is one whole entity. Economic, political and religious freedom all should be components of a truly free society. >> China's Path has changed. China has become an imperial power now, preying on other countries, other people's resources. But the Party is still right, only, the Party has changed its mind. So, as long as China simply killed tens of millions of its own people in Mao's Cultural Revolution and Great Leap Forward, things were ok? Only when it becomes externally aggressive is there a problem? >> When the Party is a suitor, wooing the people, attentive to their every need, then it genuinely is a People's Party, its army genuinely a People's Army. But after the Revolution how easily this love affair can turn into a bitter marriage. This is so perverse and so nonsensical -- the idea that you, as a free person, submit your individuality and your own control and personality to a 'party', of whom you become a cogwheel, and a grateful apparatchik. No individual freedom. All hail the Dear Leader, who 'woos' us, and who is 'attentive to our every need'. Am I the only one to see that theocracies and communist states have something eerily in common? And 'bitter marriage'? What do you expect when you kill private enterprise and set up a giant bureaucracy to run everyone's life and control the people? Fact: No communist state ever respected rights. >> It's hard not to see that the Indian State is an essentially upper-caste Hindu State (regardless of the party in power) which harbours a reflexive hostility towards the 'other'. And how does the fool Arundhati reconcile this black-and-white thesis with the '90 ethnic cleansing of the Kashmiri Pandits? Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 23, 2010 12:15 AM 60 Mass acquisition is actually not needed for rural roads. Two-laning hardly uses any of the space of huge farmlands -- the trick is to make sure that it is large farmers whose land is partially used, who can be compensated. When you are dealing with subsistence farmers, they have no means of using the meager compensation given to them when their entire tiny fields are acquired for the building of dams or of factories. For power generation there are new means every day. For water, 1000s of check dams work perfectly. The problem comes with large factories in rural areas, and, more recently, with SEZs. As far as possible, property rights must be fought for, against mass acquisitions. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 23, 2010 12:07 AM 59 Sanjay: >> you are wrong if you think the issue here is the Maoists. There are people who want you to believe that because they do not want to address the real issue. They know that the Maoists will disappear if they can take care of the real ground level issues. But even then they do not want to address the real issues. They are happy to keep the focus on the Maoists. Would you please explain to me what you are talking about? Who are 'the people who want me to believe...'? I have said that I oppose all land acquisition. That is one solution. I think it will solve the problem. None of this changes the fact that Arundhati Roy is a far-left maniac. And I'm sorry, but I kind of like to keep in mind authorship when I read stuff; helps with credibility. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 11:59 PM 58 You have your focus wrongly placed on the writer rather than on the message she is giving out. I am not here to defend the writer, you may be here to bash her though. As I mentioned in my last post, you are wrong if you think the issue here is the Maoists. There are people who want you to believe that because they do not want to address the real issue. They know that the Maoists will disappear if they can take care of the real ground level issues. But even then they do not want to address the real issues. They are happy to keep the focus on the Maoists. Open your mind and look at the real issues. Read the essay with an unbiased mind. Don't worry about who wrote it. Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 11:41 PM 57 Sanjay: >> Personal bashing of Roy is absolutely uncalled for. That's your view. When an arrogant, black-and-white hard-leftist publishes long, one- sided Maoist apologias, then surely I can call her out on her stupidity. >> The big point you miss here is this: You cannot solve problems if you overlook the very reason that caused the problem. Please elaborate. I have said that all mass land acquisition is just not acceptable -- not according to Mao's Red Book (ironically, in Mao's China probably more people were land-uprooted than at any other time in human history) -- but according to property rights. So, yes, tribal anger is justified. >> When the problem solvers are themselves the reason for the problem, they will never be able to solve it. You think America will solve Afghanistan and Al Qaeda? Never. I don't think the Afghan war can be won. I don't think the U.S. should ever waste its blood and treasure on nation-building. I support non-interventionism and Ron Paul. You have not defended your apparent hero Roy at all. You're just deflecting here. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 11:34 PM 56 [I doubt very much if you would be so generous when it came to the thugs and goons from the other end of the political spectrum -- the Bajrangis and the Shiv Sainiks.] Now you are being unfair - Of course he would support them - just as long as extremists try to destroy the Indian state or collaborate with enemy states/terror groups or perhaps attack Indian soldiers - he would certainly support them. lookout bug me not mumbai, India Mar 22, 2010 11:32 PM 55 'Anwaar': >> I was not talking of "root causes". I wasn't referring specifically to you. But you know very well that this is a big problem in the left-wing circles you inhabit. To a lesser degree, this is also reflected in the CAIR debate: you talked about 'supporting underdogs' as the reason for glossing over CAIR. The Left-Islamist alliance will bear no fruit. Are Muslims courted by the criminal but left-wing populist likes of George Galloway likely to adopt any traditional hard-left positions? Do they even support gay marriage, say? Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 11:28 PM 54 Murtaza, She did not write this piece to find a solution. She wrote it to bring a necessary perspective that has been missed completely by observers. Personal bashing of Roy is absolutely uncalled for. You say, we need to solve problems, not provoke clashes and backlashes. The big point you miss here is this: You cannot solve problems if you overlook the very reason that caused the problem. When the problem solvers are themselves the reason for the problem, they will never be able to solve it. You think America will solve Afghanistan and Al Qaeda? Never. And yes the Maoists exist because they have strong ground level support. They cannot exist otherwise. If you think that the issue here is the Maoists, you are missing the point completely. Take care of the ground level issues and the Maoists will disappear. But is anyone really interested to address the real issue? Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 10:57 PM 53 Murtuza, >> When one talks of 'legitimate root causes' or of 'grievances' why is it that only left-wing terrorists and Islamists are given so much compassion and understanding? I was not talking of "root causes". All I said was that if a group of people rise in militancy, we are interested to know what their issues are. Arundhati has given us perspectives on tribals that very few others can. That does not of course mean that I support armed insurrections. Anwaar Dallas, United States Mar 22, 2010 10:21 PM 52 I read the whole article in one sitting. I think the greatest service Roy has done to Tribals is not only that she has given them a voice but put a face on them. In any case of planned g-e-n-o-c-i-d-e/e-t-h-n-i-c c-l-e-a-n-s-i-n-g the first step is to dehumanise the population. She has reversed that process. She has given them names and faces. Now, the video-game generation can not simply demand the "e-x-t-e-r-m-i-n-a-t-i-o-n" of the "v-e-r-m-i-n-s". These are people like us. The point for contemplation is that what have Mangtu/Nirmala/Venu suffered in the last 50-60 years of Independent India that they are ready to fight one of biggest and most sophisticated army of the world with only knives/front loading rifles ? kishoredasmunshi Kolkatta, India Mar 22, 2010 09:55 PM 51 Umair: >>to not pander to her audience If anything, she knows how to pander to her audience of India-haters. Witness her rhetoric is no different from Hafiz Saeed. Take away the literary flair, and what is she saying? Apart from what you correctly identified, her comments about the Indian State being an essentially upper-caste Hindu State is nothing else but pandering. And as Murtuza Polen so correctly identifies, even Hindutva and Al Qaeda type ideologies could also be similarly romanticised humanised and presented with real or perceived grievances. Ajit Tendulkar Seattle, United States Mar 22, 2010 09:40 PM 50 'Anwaar': >> the people who take up arms and their issues are of interest to us. .... Over the past several years she has given voice to several groups whose voices were blocked from reaching us I doubt very much if you would be so generous when it came to the thugs and goons from the other end of the political spectrum -- the Bajrangis and the Shiv Sainiks. When one talks of 'legitimate root causes' or of 'grievances' why is it that only left-wing terrorists and Islamists are given so much compassion and understanding? Any fool could make a case that since Kashmiri Pandits were ethnically cleansed in 1990, this catalyzed Hindu anger for demolishing the Babri Masjid. Further, the fact that over 900 Hindu temples were destroyed in Pakistan in 1992 has escaped our attention entirely. A dominance of left-wing perspectives in the Indian media feeds a backlash. We need to solve problems, not provoke clashes and backlashes. >> She is a partisan polemicist She is worse than a polemicist. She lives in a world of her own, a black- and-white world where good and evil clash according to her predetermined communist leanings. Take 'literary flair' out of it and this piece could have been lifted from any commie rag. As for Maoists being 'real people', I was not aware that Al-Qaeda are anything except Homo Sapiens as well. Adults are responsible for their actions. This piece treats them like some real- world, innocent, childlike Mao's Na'avi. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 09:27 PM 49 Sanjay: Anyone who believes in freedom should denounce mass lands acquisition by the government or by private corporations. The point is simple: if you believe in property rights consistently -- which is a basic principle of free-market capitalism -- land acquisition is a no. The problem is that communist lunatics and fools like Arundhati Roy are good observers -- though she observes only selectively here -- but only very poor solution-providers. In no country on earth has communism given the regular citizen any more freedom or security. Left-wing ideologues are blind to this. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 07:25 PM 48 "hold, you may want to try and put yourself in the shoes of these people. What would you have done if you were a tribal.." You are making the assumption that these 'tribals' are the ones indulging in all the violence, and the reason is the one you are alluding to. But most of this violence is purely ideological, designed with the idea of overthrowing the state, at least in the countryside. And establishing a Maoist/Naxal dictatorship, which will be far, far worse than anything the Indian government is doing now. Think of the Khmer Rouge. Varun Shekhar Toronto, CANADA Mar 22, 2010 06:55 PM 47 Those bashing Arundhati Roy, She's recounting her experience of her visit. Since she interacted with the Maoists, she is presenting their side of the story. For me, it was an interesting read as it presented a side to these people that no one else presents. Instead of bashing Roy because she is presenting a different view than what you people hold, you may want to try and put yourself in the shoes of these people. What would you have done if you were a tribal doing the only thing you know how to do in the only place you know exists and the government drives you away from there because it has conceived up fancy plans to exploit that area? Who would you turn to? Surprisingly, it is more difficult in India to touch a tiger belt than a tribal belt. There seems to be greater urban sympathy towards animals in India than to the poor and deprived sections of our society. What arundhati has done is to present their story. I doubt if many would have read the complete story. Please read it and empathize with these people who are suffering and have no one to turn to because their enemy is the government. Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 05:51 PM 46 While Roy's writing is interesting, she fails to offer any viable alternative to solving the issues faced by these people. It is true that tribal explitation has been rampant in India and these regions are some of the most underdeveloped in the country. But the question that must be asked is whether by taking up an armed struggle, whose purpose is to topple the state, haven't these people ensured that doctors run away from clinics in these areas, government officals are scared to do their job and teachers are not prepared to attend school. Is it Roy's case that tribals do not need access to education and health and they are happy to live off the forest? A majority of India's popoluation, however distressed we might feel by the efforts our Government, is part of the mainstream because we know that it benefits us personally and as a society. Sadly the tribal people know nothing better and their leaders have vested interests in ensuring that developmental efforts do not reach these areas. Instead of romanticising the tribal dream, people like Roy should work with the tribals to develop a way of life for these people so that they can become a part of modern India, albeit by keeping close to their land and their way of life. And unless Roy can offer these solutions, I do not think it is right to crticise the Government. In any country there is no justification for waging a civil war and killing innocent people (including cops) because that by its very nature is undemocratic. Divya London, United Kingdom Mar 22, 2010 05:25 PM 45 The article is full of government and judiciary bashing and full of praise for the Maoists. She has every right to criticize the government policies which led to the ever increasing reach of Naxalism. What is most baffling is that she has not devoted a single line in condemning the killings of policemen and civilians. A massacre in which about 100 policemen were killed by the Maoists has full details of the events and planning of the massacre but she finds no wrongs in this heinous act of the Maoists. Jan adalats have been also praised and every move of the government, media, and judiciary has been lambasted. This is nothing but a complete glorification of the violence unleashed by the Maoists with innocent tribals merely being used as a shield. There is no denying the fact that naxalism is mainly a government created monster on account of the continuous neglect of the particular region. Now that the Maoists have taken control and have free access of cash and guns they will continue to make this problem continue to linger. If the brutal force of State is to be condemned then we must also condemn the violence and mindless killings executed by the Maoists. Unfortunately in India all the so called intellectuals love to express views which can be by swimming against the tide. It would be better if Arundhati Rou permanently shifts from Delhi to Dantewada jungles. Sanjeev Kumar Verma New Delhi, India Mar 22, 2010 04:08 PM 44 First and foremost, allow me to commend the tone and content of the various posters on this article. This is true democracy and considered debate in action. That said, I can add from my personal experience of having lived in the area now called Sonebhadra district of Uttar Pradesh in late 1980's-the land of Rihand dam, Singrauli coal fields, and the numerous thermal power plants- the experience of the local population of the outsider is colonial and every bit as tragic as portrayed by Arundhati. To my eyes, the 'development' going on through building of power plants and the 'colonies' for the those coming to work in the power plants was just the same as by British in India-they built Railways and other things to serve their needs, well provided colonies, clubs and 'cilvil lines'for themselves to live in, separated from the wretched lives of the locals just outside their colony gates. The women folk of the locals were sex toys for the 'contractors' and their workers from outside. The produce and earnings from them of coal, power etc. made by the 'contractors' all going to be utilised by them in their native towns. Very very colonial. But very very unavoidable. The path of joining the 'modern mainstream' is perforce through this trajectory and perhaps the most benign of the alternatives. As India has outgrown colonial rule, so has democracy and elections allowed these areas to grow their own political leadership and would (hopefully) reclaim their ownership of the land and it's produce for greater betterment of the 'locals'. Even the 'militants' provided their bit in the Indian experience of overthrrowing colonial rulers. But,the alternative model outlined with such farcically partisan polemics by Arundhati is dangerously sepia toning the cruel, abusive and vicious theory of Maoism and tarring the experience of India with her pet hates in blind strokes. Atul Chandra mUMBAI, INDIA Mar 22, 2010 03:43 PM 43 Comment 37 Shashank: "Yes definitely a great internal security threat, but I guess our Home Minister needs to also concentrate on how to deal with a bigger security threat - not the terrorists, not the maoists, not the naxals, not the politicians who talk of divisive politics - but the likes of arundhati roy & her likes of human rights activists... Save the country from such people" The greatest threat to India has been the CASTE CULTURE and ENDEMIC CORRUPTION that infects the political and democratic institutions that brought misery to the Tribal/Adivasis. Is it about 'national security" or about "mineral wealth" hidden under "tribal land"? Is the Government using "national security" as a ploy to deny the Tribals/Adivasis their "fair share" of mineral wealth and divert the benefits primarily to the middle class and large corporations. Rajesh Sydney, Australia Mar 22, 2010 03:23 PM 42 No other society in the world has done so much in a period of sixty years to ameliorate the condition of the weaker sections among them as the society in free India. It is also an ongoing process. There is bound to be still considerable disparities and it exists not because of a lack of will to set it off but because of the massive accumulated discrimination they had undergone during the last one thousand years when the entire Indian society was under alien rulers with different cultural and religious values. But the impression one gets from the views of some of the do-gooders is that these disparities have arisen because of the 'criminal' negligence of the so called upper crust of the society after independence. Such views as a matter of fact comes from the religious descendents of those who ruled this society and who did not so much as lift their little fingers to help them out except perhaps directing them to a different route for salvation in the upper air and as a result some of them have become a permanent nuisance to the rest. There is other wise no explanation for the relentless calumny that the ills of the Indian society is rooted in the cultural and religious ethos of this nation. We hear them comparing the condition of 'tribal' to the condition of the natives who suffered elsewhere under the white man. Leave alone the fact that it took more than 100 years for a full blooded black Christian slave to get recognized as 'non-slave ' and then more than another 100 years for him to get noticed as something 'resembling' a human being, and it happened not under any kingdom or theocracy but in a 'Christian' democracy , the condition of the natives in the U.S who were even denied the right to identify as American but designated as ' Indian' was even more miserable with endless indignities and cruelties heaped up on them in the name of a 'loving ' god. Here is a small sample of it: http://www.stumbleup...all_prefer_to_forget One need not doubt the credibility of it; it is same website which also prints articles by Arundhati Roy. Yet there is difference. It also publishes articles of the sort below: http://www.alternet....ning_war?page=entire It is about how the "tribal" in Burma fighting against their oppressors as they do in India. But they are honest people because they have no hesitation in claiming that they are fighting for the cause of Thy Kingdom. And for whose cause does Arundhati Roy fight? c p narendran nagpur, india Mar 22, 2010 03:11 PM 41 Democracy is not just the right to vote. It's the right to be heard. It's the right to not be exploited. If the babus up there in the government make laws during a posting that they never wanted, which do not take into account the ground level realities, why should those affected adversely comply? They must revolt. Revolt, they did. We all know of corrupt netas and babus in the country. If you think that the way to fight them is to join the government, you are living in a romantic world. In reality, you need people who can take the fight to them directly. On their turf. The people power has to become more prominent in this country if the government has to be made accountable. We need more uprisings like this one. We need more articles like this one to show how the governments have messed up. Of course, a shorter summary of the essay needs to be published because I doubt many would have read the whole thing. Most people commenting here must have arrived at an opinion on the first indication of the tilt the writer seemed to be taking. Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 02:44 PM 40 The article minus opinions is excellent journalism - to see journalists take the effort of humanizing and bringing into context people engaged with society (eitherways) is really refreshing. Its easy to paint things black and while, but the shades of grey that dominate the lives of the tribals are a really interesting read. The prose with which she is able to weave together the tale makes compelling reading. The pictures also provide an interesting angle to the story and brings the characters to life. Great effort and results. However, her interpretations are naive and superfluous. That this is a playout of another Avatar is really a gross simplification. The author romanticizes the lives of the villagers/ tribals/ adivasis/ (whatever labels) - however, the low hemoglobin counts, high TB rates, occurrence of malnutrition, low education, terrible access to health care/ education/ etc. are best experienced from the outside. While the Vedanta plant will degrade the environment for sure, the net improvement of human development in this area could balance out the evils. I really wouldve appreciated a more balanced story - including deeper questions like if they are truly this popular, why havent they gotten themselves elected? And change from within. Finally, distinguish the people from the purpose they sign onto. The govt. of india - am certain - has no reason to destroy any lives, if they are not inimical to general society. While they are interesting people (as against demonized inhumans that the rest of the press makes them out to be), the path they've chosen would ensure that they dont get taken seriously. People who live by the sword die by the sword, regardless of the issue they face. Yo Man gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 02:17 PM 39 If in the name of climate change, we say we want to conserve our environment, everybody rallies around. We rally around all concepts that are western. If the tribes want to conserve their heritage and refuse to let their home be exploited, why do we call them anti-national. Isn't democracy about listening to what the tribes, the original inhabitants of that place, want? Isn't their cause a green cause too? Of course, the tiff between the tribes and the government has taken an ugly turn. Who's to blame for that? Of course the government, for it is they who handled the issue callously at the start. The government failed here. They failed in Kashmir. They fail whenever someone refuses to fall in line. What kind of a democaracy are we when we cannot handle anyone who doesn't want to fall in line? Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 01:01 PM 38 Many of the readers who've sent their comments seem to be picking on the writer, and missing the larger point -- the poor, the tribal population, adivasis, the dalits and other marginalised people are ones who are bearing the entire brunt of the nation's economic march and development. Implicit in their criticism of Ms. Roy and her style of writing is the notion that our way of life is superior. All subsequent arguments stem from this belief. To dismiss Ms. Roy's writing accusing it of being romantic is being naïve – and dishonest. sajosam new delhi`, India Mar 22, 2010 12:41 PM 37 First & foremost, any maoist (naxal) sympathizer should also be treated as "them". If Arundhati Roy is given a choice, she can turn India around similar to how the Left turned around Bengal with their rule. She will criticize anything & everything. Just like corporates look for new business avenues, human rights & the likes of arundhati roy look for new support base. So if you plot new business / infrastructure development projects and roy's support/involvement, there will be very string correlation. Effectively, wherever, you find roy;s & the likes involvements, that area instead of showing any development, has till date never been developed. I agree, there would have been neglect by the govt towards the tribals, ths does not justify to go against the state.You cannot become a terrorist. Tomorrow, I lose my job, and I target my employer. Tomorrow, if the govt does not do anything for me, then it does not justify me to pick up the gun & go against the state. You need to have some foresight & rule of law. What the tribals are not realizing, once they go against the state, they are providing emplyment opportunities only to the human rights activists & the likes; they write articles, they criticize the govt, they file cases against the govt & in turn get huge donations from people who think they've just done a "Good Deed" for the day. Not realizing that the conditions of the tribals will only go from bad to worse.. Yes definitely a great internal security threat, but I guess our Home Minister needs to also concentrate on how to deal with a bigger security threat - not the terrorists, not the maoists, not the naxals, not the politicians who talk of divisive politics - but the likes of arundhati roy & her likes of human rights activists... Save the country from such people. shashank Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 04:58 AM 36 It is great to have somebody like Arundhati Roy. She gives voice to the voiceless, and always questions the government. We Indians need to be self-critical and inclusive of everyone when we shape our country's institutions. Every person should be able to voice freely what he feels, and especially report on the injustices around without fear. That said, I think Ms. Roy provides no alternatives. We simply cannot have a civil war in India. This is unthinkable, the Maoists cannot continue with their guns and goonda-raj. And it is equally improbable that the tribals shall continue with their medieval practices in 21st century, living in the forest and competing with endangered fauna and flora on nature's resources. India's population is exploding and the only way to provide decent health, education and living conditions for everyone is through common agreement and the rule of law. How can the tribals be protected in this affair ? How can we prevent outsiders (either Naxals / police / politicians) from taking advantage of their ignorance. We need fresh ideas. How about providing rich cellular access to all the forests and providing cellphones for every tribal person, so that they are digitally connected to the net at a high broadband speed. This is not impossible to achieve - it will take only a small portion of the money that the government is spending on the anti-naxal army operations. And it will achieve the objectives of our Indian constitution without spilling any blood uselessly !! Kiran grenoble, France Mar 21, 2010 11:48 PM 35 The Prime Minister's declaration that the Maoists/naxalites are the single most serious threat to internal security is simply condemnable. And on the same cue, India's Home Minister has gone miles ahead to say they are worse than the Talibans. Do they know the meaning of these descriptions? significance of these two descriptions of the Maoists and naxalites defies ordinary sense of the common man. The country has never heard such outlandish uttarences from the high pulpit when dalits and tribals were massacred in many parts of the country over decades in 70s, 80s, 90s and there has not been an end to it. The killers have gone scot free and the victims received no protection of law, not to speak of justice. So, Arundhati Roy is correct to say that rape victims are in jails and the rapists were giving lectures in the bazar. It's no imagination. The country's development has not benefited the lowest rung of the society. Nor were they the target of development. It only substantiates the old cliche: the rich and got richer and the poor poorer since independence, fuelling frustration, anger etc. Construction of road, mining, industrialization, technological revolution etc. are making the rich, powerful and privileged more invincible. The PM and HM, unmistakably have been speaking on their behalf only deploying the state forces for safeguarding their interests. The poor, mostly the tribal and dalit communities without education live in abyss of misfortunes. Peter Wignall from Bisbane, Australia has diagnosed Indian outlook appropriately, "You start from the most miserable level of any Nation that has attempted it, with your "CASTE' system. Most Indians are cursed with an instinct to 'look down' and speak that way to anyone whom they think is less qualified than them. That is one reason why we do not welcome many into Australia." The government of India could be blamed for all out war against the tribals arising out of the feelings of superiority that marks the supremacists. In any case, whether many agree or not the result will be ultimately too bloody to comprehend with equaminity of mind. A.K.B iswas Calcutta, India Mar 21, 2010 10:41 PM 34 After reading Peter Wignell's comment, I could not resist the urge to write a few lines on his views which are a 1950s view of the world by Australians. Australia was settled by British prisoners, mainly uneducated criminals from the lower strata of British society, those with cockney accent. Australian accent bears testimony to this fact. Australia in the main is a white Anglo Saxon Protestant population in the main, fearful of Catholics, Muslims and Hindus. Unlike democratic India which has had countless non Hindus as Presidents and Governor's, Australians are fearful of electing a Catholic let alone a Hindu or Muslim. It is a lazy population of 20 million people sitting on rich resources which were plundered from the aborigines and now they have the gall to talk down Indians and Hindus. India may not be rich, but people of all caste and creed live in peace. No doubt there are clashes due a billion people landlocked in a land a 4th the size of Australia. Ram Minneapolis, United States Mar 21, 2010 09:15 PM 33 >>>new hardware that has been bought from Israel: laser range-finders, thermal imaging equipment and unmanned drones, so popular with the US army. Of course India should buy weapons from Israel. Or should India buy rockets that don't even work from Palestinians ? India also buys weapons from the US, and from Russia. This is all as it should be. Any and all weapons are ok to deploy against Marxist rebels who have straightforwardly declared their intention to topple the state. Of course civilians, in this case the tribals who are caught in the conflict, should be protected as much as possible. SreekanthBoston Boston, United States Mar 21, 2010 06:34 PM 32 Since the time pre-historic man started to organise themselves in social units - possibly clans to begin with - force has always been one of the binders of socety in all it's organised phases culminating in modern sophisticated state in it's many ideological hues - communism , capitalism, dictatorship or crass monarchies. But the modern sophisticated Western state has fine-tuned the art of hiding the iron-fist with velvet gloves & they are humongous social success stories for that . But the Indian state - despite bragging about our coming of age with technology & high rate of GDP - has remained basically feudal in mind-set or rapacity of it's ruling elite. It's bereft any degree of sophistication in covering up the iron with velvet. It's inevitable that if there is bauxite or hematite or diamond to be found they will be exploited & rightly so. It's futile to try to stop exploiting national resouces to convert them into liquid wealth. Question to be asked is how to go about it & what resdistributive mechanism has been put in place for the wealth to benifit bottom layer of social strata. Ms. Arundahti Roy has failed in her duty as keeper of the soceital consciensce in as much as she blindly romanticised the Maoists even if we assume they are sincere about welfare of the tribals, which I believe they are not; they are in a way another set exploiters of primitive tribals who has not learned to fight for their rights as acknowledged by this same state itself. But Maoist's ways are sure prescription for the tribals to be annahilated for howsoever cunning & wily the Maoists are, the state will win fianlly. And without converting those hematite into iron or bauxite in to aluminium overall loosres are we Indians. True a handful will be disproportinately richer than the average. But that is the way it is. Look the Salwa Judum has been has been declared illegal by the Supreme Court - an arm of the same state. In that sense an Himangsu Kumar or Binayak Sen are more relevent in tribals to fight for their rights than atrophied ramanticism of Ms. Roy. The thing to do is to see to that tribals get fair share of the wealth that's hidden under their habitat & not to take up arm which in ultimate analysis will be counter-productive. It's not for nothing the ruling elite is railing against the civil soceity , becuase civil soceity has in some measure been successful in creating an atmosphere of restraint. I had been an admirer of Arundhati when she took on the dam-builders. Because dams are unscientific , wasteful, not serve the any purpose they are supposed to achieve & do not contribute to national wealth. By now it has been proved so. Her arguments against dams had been scientific, logical, factual which were put forth with unimpeachable argumants. On Kashmir or Maoists, Arundhati at best been hopelessly naive & impractcal romantist. What's more she is no help for the tribals. She is one notch down in intellectual prowess . That's a shame. MANISH BANERJEE KOLKATA, India Mar 21, 2010 05:27 PM 31 Peter Wignall, show some modesty.Yes many of us Indians have treated some fellow Indians horribly but unlike you fellows we have not exterminated a whole race and their culture and stolen their land like you fellows have almosted succedded in doing with the poor aborogines. There are many many admirable qualites about the Australians, but modesty is surely not one of them. Harish london, United Kingdom Mar 21, 2010 01:52 PM 30 Mind you she will not visit the Catholic state of Mizoram,from where Hindu trbals have been driven out.Why does she not write on the rampant sexuality and child abuse in the Catholic churches of Kerala?Every movement of the types of Arundhati,Teesta,Shabana and a host of others is against the Hindu soceity and surprisingly an intelligent man like Vinod Mehta cannot see that. S.S.Nagaraj Bangalore, India Mar 21, 2010 01:05 PM 29 Umair, >> "For the courage to talk about what.... is barely touched upon by other writers in English, and rarely without resort to the empty platitudes; and for the courage....to not pander to her audience..." I agree. While I am all for putting down an armed insurrection with force if necessary, the people who take up arms and their issues are of interest to us. Arundhati does not pretend to be an objective reporter. She is not a journalist or a historian. She is a partisan polemicist with a literary flair. Over the past several years she has given voice to several groups whose voices were blocked from reaching us. She may be annoying, but we are better off because of our Arundhatis. Anwaar Dallas, United States Mar 21, 2010 12:03 PM 28 By the way, A true picture of what Arundhati Roy's deeds can be found in this article - must read - http://www.fakingnew...-pifw-gets-underway/ Rahul Delhi, India Mar 21, 2010 11:59 AM 27 Very Strange . Paid News of India keep on carrying Roy's visit Mao area one day and Kashmir other day. Both cases she visits and justifies anti national and anti social elements. How come she never visits poor securityment/policemens family who die for the sake of our country? How come our paid news of India do not cover them? satish mayya dubai, United Arab Emirates Mar 21, 2010 09:35 AM 26 This is with regard to Post # 23 by a Peter wignall from oZ. It is true that the situation of the Adivasis bears close resemblance with that of the Aborigines of Australia. While Peter seems to think India has an imperfect democracy with poor ethics and morals, and his Australia is much superior to us as well as USA (!!), let us consider some facts. Aborigines have been decimated in Australia. At some points, they were actually hunted down like dogs. The Stolen Generations refers to hundreds of thousands of aborigine children taken forcibily away from their parents, in an attempt to destroy aborigine culture - they succeded largely. Most aborigines are not given employment and police brutality is common - deaths in lockups are often reported and no action is taken against the police. recently, an aborigine man was locked up in a police vehicle and left in the sun to cook to death. The UN Human rights commision has censured Australia and kept it on watchlist for atrocities against aborigines. Aborigines are not found in any position of power or decision making. This is how AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY solved the ABORIGINE " PROBLEM". We Indians do not have to learn anything from these rednecks.!!! ashok Melbourne, Australia Mar 21, 2010 07:39 AM 25 Arundhati Roy irritates me: her tone, her smugness, her careless use of history -- specifically, her stringing of disparate events/places/phenomena as if they all amounted to the same old same old (e.g. lumping together the Indian annexation of Hyderabad as part of the country's "colonialis[t]" course, bizarre given the old order displaced by the annexation was an absolute monarchy hijacked by religious revivalists in its twilight, an old order diametrically opposed to the sort of peasant insurgency one would expect Roy to be sympathetic to -- were the Indian state not on the "other" side of the argument, that is) -- her sloppy and oft-expressed views that the Indian polity is no more than an "upper caste Hindu state", are annoying not only in themselves, but because they mar the force of her arguments, on issues that are so crucial one can ill afford slips up. But. But. But. For the courage to talk about what (at least when it comes to what can only be called a civil war in Central India) is barely touched upon by other writers in English, and rarely without resort to the empty platitudes of those who use language not to think about the problem, but to avoid thinking about problems; and for the courage -- and this is perhaps hardest for a writer, even unknowns and aspiring writers, let alone famous ones -- to not pander to her audience, to be unafraid of being misunderstood; everything Roy writes on the plight of the Indian polity's ultimate expandables (far more so than any religious minorities, far more so than even Dalits), namely the "tribal" populations, cannot be missed. Umair Muhajir New York, United States Mar 21, 2010 07:03 AM 24 Re: "And why do left-leaning intellectuals and journalists never open their mouths to talk about the land acquisitions by the Government of India -- for its PSUs?" Murtuza: given what Roy says in this very piece about the Forest Department, given her oft-expressed views that the state is no more than an "upper caste Hindu state" (which, I must say, I disagree with; and which is the sort of sloppiness that mars much of her otherwise searing and essential work; including the lumping together of Hyderabad as part of India's "colonialis[t]" course as Roy does here), and given her years-long advocacy against big dams and the land appropriation/dispossession associated with them, is it believable to you that she backs forcible land acquisition for PSUs? I must say I have heard many charges against Roy, but this is the first time I've heard anyone say she has double standards (as between private corporations and the state) when it comes to land appropriation. The notion is absurd. Umair Muhajir New York, United States Mar 21, 2010 06:20 AM 23 Revolutions, extreme behaviour etc, is caused by frustration of not being heard. India is over excited with its new found flirtation with 'Democracy'. Democracy takes many forms and many years to achieve. American Democracy could be said to be: "The freedom to do anything, as long as you've got a good Lawyer". Many Australians do not respect American Democracy. We prefer our own following of British Democracy. India will take at least 100 years to show Democracy at an acceptable level. That is , acceptable to Western eyes. You start from the most miserable level of any Nation that has attempted it, with your "CASTE' system. Most Indians are cursed with an instinct to 'look down' and speak that way to anyone whom they think is less qualified than them. That is one reason why we do not welcome many into Australia. Your Ethics and Morals are different to any other people Worldwide. Peter Wignall Bisbane, Australia Mar 21, 2010 05:49 AM 22 Walking with the comrades is very apt heading for Arundhati Roy's essay. It is objectionable to call these misguided people and their murderous leaders as Gandhians. Mahatma Gandhi once said "I am prepared to die and not prepared to kill- the subtle message: he was prepared to die to get Mother India's freedom and not prepared to kill to get that freedom. Again, Arundhati's heading Walking with the comrades is very apt that she seems to be a comrade-in word and deeds- and walks with fellow comrades-birds of the same feathers flock together. As I have said in one of my previous postings, Indian government must separate the grain from the chaffs-take care of the aggrieved people- deprived, dispossessed and untouchables- who are the grains. The chaffs are the militant and murderous leaders who have to be obliterated. Their game plan is bringing anarchy in India and they are doing the bidding for their master-China. It is sad that the likes of Arundhati Roy are adding curry flavour to their militancy. Instead, Arundhati Roy should tell her comrades in arms to abjure violence and killing innocent people will only harm their cause. Scaria Varghese Melbourne, Australia Mar 21, 2010 02:27 AM 21 even after the secular rule of congress which apparantly works for aam admi the tribals are suffering. but then the seculars want to blame hinduism!! fact is the naxals are supported and funded by the christian missionaries. namo4 London, United Kingdom Mar 21, 2010 01:33 AM 20 I started reading this post with a mixture of hope and excitement, but ended with despair and disgust. It's so funny that a few weeks back, Arundhati wrote in this same publication about how some Indians deny and even celebrate Hindu violence (essay was titled "listening to the grasshoppers") and she has done the same (deny naxal violence, and in fact celebrate it now). Will she please listen to the grasshoppers? This is a classic case of double standards by Arundhati Roy. And she has written a hate speech against upper-caste Hindus. Rahul Delhi, India Mar 21, 2010 12:53 AM 19 Karma and ED The Hindu in Mr Mehta believes Editor is suffering for his bad karma. Arundhati's eight page sermon seems to be a desperate attempt at self flagellation, by Mr Mehta, to seek atonement for all his accumulated bad Karma since his Debanior days. It is baffling to note the evangelical fervor with which you have been lobbying for the Maoists, while bad mouthing the middle class and the corporate sector. Don't bite the hand that feeds you Mr Mehta, its bad bad karma. Arundathi and her ilk should be banished to the luxurious thousand star suites in Dandakaranya where they can collect tendu leaves along with the tribals and "live happily ever after". As for good karma and saving Editor, back to basics Mr Mehta, Feed some Brahmins and write some nice things about the BJP for a change. sudharshan madras, india Mar 21, 2010 12:10 AM 18 There is no point pillorying Arundhati Roy. Sh=e is a self-promoting, thoroughly trivial and malicioulsy anti-Hindu character, true. But so what? She is entitlked to sentimentalise Pol Pot-like murderous thugs if it serves her interest. The real culprit is the Indian ruling class and government which have so neglected the tribal areas that they have become the well-armed stronghold of a deadly threat to India. If the Indian middle class does not wake up and compel its regime to act seriously without delay to crush the rebels and bring government to these areas, the story of India is OVER. Period. No wonder an open admirer of jihadi cuththroats like ANWAAR is gloating. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 20, 2010 10:07 PM 17 Honestly this article is based on too much "mindless" belief in whatever they said to her..... Where is the prove all these statements are not "revised" and "prepared" by them to fool Ms Roy???? They know very well that Ms Roy is a good writer!! D. Ghosh Kolkata, India Mar 20, 2010 10:04 PM 16 An article Ms Roy MUST READ. http://www.dawn.com/...ibly-glory-710-hh-06 Social change through democracy is possible!!!! D. Ghosh Kolkata, India Mar 20, 2010 09:44 PM 15 Sign Of our Times "He was a candid man, the SP: "See Ma'am, frankly speaking this problem can't be solved by us police or military. The problem with these tribals is they don't understand greed. Unless they become greedy, there's no hope for us. I have told my boss, remove the force and instead put a TV in every home. Everything will be automatically sorted out." kishoredasmunshi Kolkatta, India Mar 20, 2010 07:36 PM 14 What will a directional dyslexic, capable of getting lost in life's objectives do? She answers it herself in article, 'Come hell or high water, I'm going to be holding on to Comrade Raju's pallu...' A S Raghunath Delhi, India Mar 20, 2010 05:54 PM 13 this is biggest joke i've ever read.. Is she trying to debate on whether maoist are terrorists ?? Well, global defination of terror says that they are, and it is so because of their actions and not reason of those actions. Now, is the entire planet is wrong and only the truth speaking lady is right??. These are not poor peasants downtrodded by mighty landlords but we are dealing with an outfit with an annual budget of 1000 crs (enough to feed poors of some villages, eh..) India wud've been another somalia or afghanistan if Indian Army wudnt have dealt with CI's and national threats with a heavy hand.. lets not sympthasize with these rebels and set an example here. Learn from countries like USA, Israel, Russia and China. They r always united against enemies of the state. My full support to out brave soldiers. Santosh Pandey Ahmedabad, India Mar 20, 2010 05:38 PM 12 A long story notable for little new except Ms Roy's story telling ability. Basically what she is saying is that the tribals of DK do not need to learn to count beyond 20 and are best off if left alone to live as they have been for thousands of years. The use of violence to protect their way of life is also completely justified. Ms Roy evidently suffers not only from directional but logic dyslexia too. If the world follows her foolishly romanticised path, change, the only constant, will become a bad idea, to be opposed at all costs. In short, she is effectively condemning the people whose cause she seeks to promote. She can't see the tyranny of it because she does not have to lead that life; for her the fruits of the development she condemns are available - including getting her article printed here. Roy can pick up any group of people resisting change for any reason and write what she has written with only minor changes. One cannot shake the feeling that somewhere deep down, Roy is filled with vicious hatred. A few months back, she had written a similar article here, "Mr Chidambaram's War". I had responded with a detailed article then. Nothing more really needs to be said now, this piece being a cleverly re-packaged version. Some might find going through what I had written then worth their while. http://vinodksharma....ndhati-roys-war.html Vinod Sharma New Delhi, India Mar 20, 2010 05:07 PM 11 Ms Roy says: "On the contrary, the violence will spread and intensify, and the government will have nobody to talk to..." only one entity can have monopoly on the means of violence. Its a simple uncomfortable fact. The present state has set up the mechanisms and countervailing institutions to manage state violence. If they don't work, they need to be made to work, because there is no other answer. This takes decades, the lessons of hard experience. Did anyone really think that things would be perfect once the British left in 1947? Supporting a Maoist revolution is stupid. In communist states there is no institutional check on violence - how can there be when the party is supreme. And there will be repression and violence because history always tells us revolutions turn on themselves. What is Ms Roy's ideal. An agrarian communal state? Does she think that will happen? MK Saini Delhi, India Mar 20, 2010 05:03 PM 10 These Poor illiterate isolated ethnic groups called Tribal(not Meenas of Rajasthan and the like off course) have similarities, be it of North West Pakistan or Santhals, Gonds or that of North East India. Some adventurous city lads showing utopian absurd ideology give guns to them. This weak people feels 'powered' by the guns in hand fight kill and get killed for causes not clear to them. Paki and NE-Indian tribes have started money-extortion business and soon this Maobadi(?) will be and already started joining. I can see into the future after few years a long faced Roy is repenting for supporting a mis-directed path in the name of 'just and reasonable cause'. In a democracy, a tribal heads these tribal, but they take away the most for themselves (go and visit interiors of North East and find out the fact - known to all but denied by the intellecticos like some interested politicos). If they are replaced by Party Rule(Communists in india or Talibans in pakistan - all the same), after the honeymoon period is over, the guards will just change the colour. What these intellectuals(not yet bankrupt) can do is thrive for spread of productive education, control of population(Why shy away from this most important fact), built well connected roads and rails, educate them about their rights and duties and impart respect of law(A Miao government also need that). Go ahead Roy, Without your ROMANTICISM and adventurism with the lives of uneducated(Psudo-educated also in pak) lovingly simple tribal, act for letting them take the benefit of modern developments keeping their identity and ethniciy intact. Forgive the sarcasm, for i am angry with the hypocrisy. Soumitra Dasgupta Kolkata, India Mar 20, 2010 02:13 PM 9 >> These people whom we know as Maoists or Naxals come across in this article as real people with hopes and fears and determination. Tell me: are 'these people who we know' as Al-Qaeda and as the Taliban not 'real people'? Do they, too, not have 'hopes', and 'fears' -- an Islamic 'determination'? All of what you say is utterly irrelevant to the main point: that Maoists believe in an ideology that's killed more than Nazism. Don't treat Maoists like children. Adults are responsible for the belief systems they decide to believe in. And if that belief system is violent Maoism, the place for them is prison. Safeguard property rights -- yes. But we are not a banana republic. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 20, 2010 01:45 PM 8 >>These people whom we know as Maoists or Naxals come across in this article as real people with hopes and fears and determination. What a distilled idiot ! killings of dozens of civilians , policemen & their public beheading by maoists should have told you long back that the maoists indeed are real people in a real fight against the indian state. What else can one expect from a namak haraam who funds an organisation, which in turn recruits for & pays LET to fire against Indian troops in Kashmir ? lookout bug me not mumbai, India Mar 20, 2010 01:40 PM 7 "Gandhians retorted with Guns because Gandhi taught them how to deal with 'Slaps' and not the 'Snipers'." Rajneesh Batra New Delhi, India Mar 20, 2010 12:57 PM 6 Would Outlook -- or Arundhati -- infiltrate the Bajrang Dal or the VHP, to probe and give a human face and personal touch to Hindu grievances about the Hindu Kashmiri Pandit ethnic cleansing, say? You tell me. What about the apparently casteless way in which the Bajrang Dal organize their cadres? What about the fact that Babu Bajrangi expresses distate for untouchability? And has the Vishwa Hindu Parishad not done commendable work during natural disasters? If you start, as Arundhati Roy does here, with a clear goal in mind: that the Maoists are to be humanized, to be given a human face and that we are to feel sympathy for them, then any group of people in the world, no matter how thuggish and how evil their ideology, can be humanized just as easily. Are you telling me that there are no tales of heroic sacrifice or touching comradeship among the fighters of the Al-Qaeda? And does that change the fact that their ideology is an evil, bigoted, religious fascist one? While these shameful, perverse sojourns with the Maoists are only to be expected from the extremist Left that Arundhati represents, she, and purveyors of this stuff should be asked point-blank to tell us what they know about Maoism and about Mao's famous Red Book. I'll wager they know nothing. But they are content to carry on this humanizing propaganda. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 20, 2010 12:40 PM 5 Communist fools like Ms. Arundhati Roy make a career out of their ignorance. What is Maoism? How many people did Maoism kill in China? The simple fact is this: a respect for property rights for everyone, not just for fatcats like Ratan Tata or the SEZ crowd, will solve the land acquisition issue. No one has any right to steal the property of someone unwilling to part with it. This applies to your flat in Bangalore, and to the farmer in Jharkhand and West Bengal as much. Where on the planet earth has Communism - or Maoism - worked? It is a pity that disrespect for property rights -- a fundamental principle of free markets -- is instead viewed as capitalism. And why do left-leaning intellectuals and journalists never open their mouths to talk about the land acquisitions by the Government of India -- for its PSUs? Hypocrisy and ignorance is bliss for half-baked crooners like Roy. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 20, 2010 12:03 PM 4 >> "We listen to a recording of Iqbal Bano singing Faiz Ahmad Faiz's Hum Dekhenge (We will Witness the Day) at the famous concert in Lahore at the height of the repression during the Zia-ul-Haq years." This is a powerful and arousing song sung by Iqbal Bano. I can imagine its effect when played to a group of Maoists. These people whom we know as Maoists or Naxals come across in this article as real people with hopes and fears and determination. The degree of access that Arundhati was given is remarkable. Anwaar Dallas, United States Mar 20, 2010 12:01 PM 3 Destruction of precious forest and arable land for the so called economic progress for the benefit middle class and large corporation by displacing thousands of tribal of their ancestral land and pushing them to the fringes is definitely not a progress. Taking away ancesteral land and forest away from the Tribals with out adequate compensation (which is often the case) is not only unjust and immoral, but also violates basic human rights. Land and forest provided sustainable life and livelihood for tribals for centuries is under threat from mining activities that benefits primarily for the middle class at a huge cost to tribal way of life is definitely not a progress. Destruction of their land is suicidal for these people as the last lifeline they have left with to sustain their livelihood is snatched away the very people who are going to be affected. Government to declare the groups fighting for a "just cause" are threat to national security is laughable. It defies all imagination and logic to claim the groups fighting the rights of "the most deprived citizens" as a threat to the security of a major military power. To claim its own citizens as a threat to national security is not only provocative but also insulting to many fair minded people. Such loose declaration is not only irresponsible but also damaging the reputation of the nation, provocative to Tribal/Adivasi leaders and insulting to many fair minded people. Such provocative declaration has not only enraged and resolved these groups taking their fight to a new level, further complicating the whole security scenario. Is this the quality of security advice the Government gets? How low can we get in our security assessment? It was a ploy to use "Security threat" reasons to deny the Adivasis/Tribal "just share" of the "mineral wealth" of their land. These people have "legal rights" under the "social justice" provisions enshrined in the Indian constitution to demand: 1. Recognition of their language and distinct culture, 2. Protection from human rights abuses from security forces of India, 3. exclusive "right to negotiate" and " right to share" on economic development and exploration of "mineral wealth" on "their land". 4. a separate state within India so as to manage their own affairs according to their cultural practice and customs. 5. protection from any law that is detrimental to their rights and cultural practices. 6. legal protection from forced dispossession and encroachment of their land and 7. protection from - "oppressive caste culture" and "corrupt departments/institutions" that brought misery to these people. It is the duty of the elected government of the day to fulfil their constitutional obligations to these "forgotten people" of India. These are the most effective ways to win the hearts and minds of these people and end the conflict once for all. Rajesh Sydney, Australia Mar 20, 2010 11:44 AM 2 >> "In Dantewada, the police wear plain clothes and the rebels wear uniforms. The jail superintendent is in jail. The prisoners are free (three hundred of them escaped from the old town jail two years ago). Women who have been raped are in police custody. The rapists give speeches in the bazaar." Lewis Carroll could have written this ! We are with Alice in Wonderland. But this time it is real ! Anwaar Dallas, United States Mar 20, 2010 11:37 AM 1 Tribals should be careful of the Catholic gang of Susanha(Arundhati)Roy and Raul(Rahul) Gandhi types.They have their own vested interests. S.S.Nagaraj Bangalore, India Mar 20, 2010 11:37 AM 1 Tribals should be careful of the Catholic gang of Susanha(Arundhati)Roy and Raul(Rahul) Gandhi types.They have their own vested interests. S.S.Nagaraj Bangalore, India Mar 20, 2010 11:44 AM 2 >> "In Dantewada, the police wear plain clothes and the rebels wear uniforms. The jail superintendent is in jail. The prisoners are free (three hundred of them escaped from the old town jail two years ago). Women who have been raped are in police custody. The rapists give speeches in the bazaar." Lewis Carroll could have written this ! We are with Alice in Wonderland. But this time it is real ! Anwaar Dallas, United States Mar 20, 2010 12:01 PM 3 Destruction of precious forest and arable land for the so called economic progress for the benefit middle class and large corporation by displacing thousands of tribal of their ancestral land and pushing them to the fringes is definitely not a progress. Taking away ancesteral land and forest away from the Tribals with out adequate compensation (which is often the case) is not only unjust and immoral, but also violates basic human rights. Land and forest provided sustainable life and livelihood for tribals for centuries is under threat from mining activities that benefits primarily for the middle class at a huge cost to tribal way of life is definitely not a progress. Destruction of their land is suicidal for these people as the last lifeline they have left with to sustain their livelihood is snatched away the very people who are going to be affected. Government to declare the groups fighting for a "just cause" are threat to national security is laughable. It defies all imagination and logic to claim the groups fighting the rights of "the most deprived citizens" as a threat to the security of a major military power. To claim its own citizens as a threat to national security is not only provocative but also insulting to many fair minded people. Such loose declaration is not only irresponsible but also damaging the reputation of the nation, provocative to Tribal/Adivasi leaders and insulting to many fair minded people. Such provocative declaration has not only enraged and resolved these groups taking their fight to a new level, further complicating the whole security scenario. Is this the quality of security advice the Government gets? How low can we get in our security assessment? It was a ploy to use "Security threat" reasons to deny the Adivasis/Tribal "just share" of the "mineral wealth" of their land. These people have "legal rights" under the "social justice" provisions enshrined in the Indian constitution to demand: 1. Recognition of their language and distinct culture, 2. Protection from human rights abuses from security forces of India, 3. exclusive "right to negotiate" and " right to share" on economic development and exploration of "mineral wealth" on "their land". 4. a separate state within India so as to manage their own affairs according to their cultural practice and customs. 5. protection from any law that is detrimental to their rights and cultural practices. 6. legal protection from forced dispossession and encroachment of their land and 7. protection from - "oppressive caste culture" and "corrupt departments/institutions" that brought misery to these people. It is the duty of the elected government of the day to fulfil their constitutional obligations to these "forgotten people" of India. These are the most effective ways to win the hearts and minds of these people and end the conflict once for all. Rajesh Sydney, Australia Mar 20, 2010 12:03 PM 4 >> "We listen to a recording of Iqbal Bano singing Faiz Ahmad Faiz's Hum Dekhenge (We will Witness the Day) at the famous concert in Lahore at the height of the repression during the Zia-ul-Haq years." This is a powerful and arousing song sung by Iqbal Bano. I can imagine its effect when played to a group of Maoists. These people whom we know as Maoists or Naxals come across in this article as real people with hopes and fears and determination. The degree of access that Arundhati was given is remarkable. Anwaar Dallas, United States Mar 20, 2010 12:40 PM 5 Communist fools like Ms. Arundhati Roy make a career out of their ignorance. What is Maoism? How many people did Maoism kill in China? The simple fact is this: a respect for property rights for everyone, not just for fatcats like Ratan Tata or the SEZ crowd, will solve the land acquisition issue. No one has any right to steal the property of someone unwilling to part with it. This applies to your flat in Bangalore, and to the farmer in Jharkhand and West Bengal as much. Where on the planet earth has Communism - or Maoism - worked? It is a pity that disrespect for property rights -- a fundamental principle of free markets -- is instead viewed as capitalism. And why do left-leaning intellectuals and journalists never open their mouths to talk about the land acquisitions by the Government of India -- for its PSUs? Hypocrisy and ignorance is bliss for half-baked crooners like Roy. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 20, 2010 12:57 PM 6 Would Outlook -- or Arundhati -- infiltrate the Bajrang Dal or the VHP, to probe and give a human face and personal touch to Hindu grievances about the Hindu Kashmiri Pandit ethnic cleansing, say? You tell me. What about the apparently casteless way in which the Bajrang Dal organize their cadres? What about the fact that Babu Bajrangi expresses distate for untouchability? And has the Vishwa Hindu Parishad not done commendable work during natural disasters? If you start, as Arundhati Roy does here, with a clear goal in mind: that the Maoists are to be humanized, to be given a human face and that we are to feel sympathy for them, then any group of people in the world, no matter how thuggish and how evil their ideology, can be humanized just as easily. Are you telling me that there are no tales of heroic sacrifice or touching comradeship among the fighters of the Al-Qaeda? And does that change the fact that their ideology is an evil, bigoted, religious fascist one? While these shameful, perverse sojourns with the Maoists are only to be expected from the extremist Left that Arundhati represents, she, and purveyors of this stuff should be asked point-blank to tell us what they know about Maoism and about Mao's famous Red Book. I'll wager they know nothing. But they are content to carry on this humanizing propaganda. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 20, 2010 01:40 PM 7 "Gandhians retorted with Guns because Gandhi taught them how to deal with 'Slaps' and not the 'Snipers'." Rajneesh Batra New Delhi, India Mar 20, 2010 01:45 PM 8 >>These people whom we know as Maoists or Naxals come across in this article as real people with hopes and fears and determination. What a distilled idiot ! killings of dozens of civilians , policemen & their public beheading by maoists should have told you long back that the maoists indeed are real people in a real fight against the indian state. What else can one expect from a namak haraam who funds an organisation, which in turn recruits for & pays LET to fire against Indian troops in Kashmir ? lookout bug me not mumbai, India Mar 20, 2010 02:13 PM 9 >> These people whom we know as Maoists or Naxals come across in this article as real people with hopes and fears and determination. Tell me: are 'these people who we know' as Al-Qaeda and as the Taliban not 'real people'? Do they, too, not have 'hopes', and 'fears' -- an Islamic 'determination'? All of what you say is utterly irrelevant to the main point: that Maoists believe in an ideology that's killed more than Nazism. Don't treat Maoists like children. Adults are responsible for the belief systems they decide to believe in. And if that belief system is violent Maoism, the place for them is prison. Safeguard property rights -- yes. But we are not a banana republic. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 20, 2010 05:03 PM 10 These Poor illiterate isolated ethnic groups called Tribal(not Meenas of Rajasthan and the like off course) have similarities, be it of North West Pakistan or Santhals, Gonds or that of North East India. Some adventurous city lads showing utopian absurd ideology give guns to them. This weak people feels 'powered' by the guns in hand fight kill and get killed for causes not clear to them. Paki and NE-Indian tribes have started money-extortion business and soon this Maobadi(?) will be and already started joining. I can see into the future after few years a long faced Roy is repenting for supporting a mis-directed path in the name of 'just and reasonable cause'. In a democracy, a tribal heads these tribal, but they take away the most for themselves (go and visit interiors of North East and find out the fact - known to all but denied by the intellecticos like some interested politicos). If they are replaced by Party Rule(Communists in india or Talibans in pakistan - all the same), after the honeymoon period is over, the guards will just change the colour. What these intellectuals(not yet bankrupt) can do is thrive for spread of productive education, control of population(Why shy away from this most important fact), built well connected roads and rails, educate them about their rights and duties and impart respect of law(A Miao government also need that). Go ahead Roy, Without your ROMANTICISM and adventurism with the lives of uneducated(Psudo-educated also in pak) lovingly simple tribal, act for letting them take the benefit of modern developments keeping their identity and ethniciy intact. Forgive the sarcasm, for i am angry with the hypocrisy. Soumitra Dasgupta Kolkata, India Mar 20, 2010 05:07 PM 11 Ms Roy says: "On the contrary, the violence will spread and intensify, and the government will have nobody to talk to..." only one entity can have monopoly on the means of violence. Its a simple uncomfortable fact. The present state has set up the mechanisms and countervailing institutions to manage state violence. If they don't work, they need to be made to work, because there is no other answer. This takes decades, the lessons of hard experience. Did anyone really think that things would be perfect once the British left in 1947? Supporting a Maoist revolution is stupid. In communist states there is no institutional check on violence - how can there be when the party is supreme. And there will be repression and violence because history always tells us revolutions turn on themselves. What is Ms Roy's ideal. An agrarian communal state? Does she think that will happen? MK Saini Delhi, India Mar 20, 2010 05:38 PM 12 A long story notable for little new except Ms Roy's story telling ability. Basically what she is saying is that the tribals of DK do not need to learn to count beyond 20 and are best off if left alone to live as they have been for thousands of years. The use of violence to protect their way of life is also completely justified. Ms Roy evidently suffers not only from directional but logic dyslexia too. If the world follows her foolishly romanticised path, change, the only constant, will become a bad idea, to be opposed at all costs. In short, she is effectively condemning the people whose cause she seeks to promote. She can't see the tyranny of it because she does not have to lead that life; for her the fruits of the development she condemns are available - including getting her article printed here. Roy can pick up any group of people resisting change for any reason and write what she has written with only minor changes. One cannot shake the feeling that somewhere deep down, Roy is filled with vicious hatred. A few months back, she had written a similar article here, "Mr Chidambaram's War". I had responded with a detailed article then. Nothing more really needs to be said now, this piece being a cleverly re-packaged version. Some might find going through what I had written then worth their while. http://vinodksharma....ndhati-roys-war.html Vinod Sharma New Delhi, India Mar 20, 2010 05:54 PM 13 this is biggest joke i've ever read.. Is she trying to debate on whether maoist are terrorists ?? Well, global defination of terror says that they are, and it is so because of their actions and not reason of those actions. Now, is the entire planet is wrong and only the truth speaking lady is right??. These are not poor peasants downtrodded by mighty landlords but we are dealing with an outfit with an annual budget of 1000 crs (enough to feed poors of some villages, eh..) India wud've been another somalia or afghanistan if Indian Army wudnt have dealt with CI's and national threats with a heavy hand.. lets not sympthasize with these rebels and set an example here. Learn from countries like USA, Israel, Russia and China. They r always united against enemies of the state. My full support to out brave soldiers. Santosh Pandey Ahmedabad, India Mar 20, 2010 07:36 PM 14 What will a directional dyslexic, capable of getting lost in life's objectives do? She answers it herself in article, 'Come hell or high water, I'm going to be holding on to Comrade Raju's pallu...' A S Raghunath Delhi, India Mar 20, 2010 09:44 PM 15 Sign Of our Times "He was a candid man, the SP: "See Ma'am, frankly speaking this problem can't be solved by us police or military. The problem with these tribals is they don't understand greed. Unless they become greedy, there's no hope for us. I have told my boss, remove the force and instead put a TV in every home. Everything will be automatically sorted out." kishoredasmunshi Kolkatta, India Mar 20, 2010 10:04 PM 16 An article Ms Roy MUST READ. http://www.dawn.com/...ibly-glory-710-hh-06 Social change through democracy is possible!!!! D. Ghosh Kolkata, India Mar 20, 2010 10:07 PM 17 Honestly this article is based on too much "mindless" belief in whatever they said to her..... Where is the prove all these statements are not "revised" and "prepared" by them to fool Ms Roy???? They know very well that Ms Roy is a good writer!! D. Ghosh Kolkata, India Mar 21, 2010 12:10 AM 18 There is no point pillorying Arundhati Roy. Sh=e is a self-promoting, thoroughly trivial and malicioulsy anti-Hindu character, true. But so what? She is entitlked to sentimentalise Pol Pot-like murderous thugs if it serves her interest. The real culprit is the Indian ruling class and government which have so neglected the tribal areas that they have become the well-armed stronghold of a deadly threat to India. If the Indian middle class does not wake up and compel its regime to act seriously without delay to crush the rebels and bring government to these areas, the story of India is OVER. Period. No wonder an open admirer of jihadi cuththroats like ANWAAR is gloating. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 21, 2010 12:53 AM 19 Karma and ED The Hindu in Mr Mehta believes Editor is suffering for his bad karma. Arundhati's eight page sermon seems to be a desperate attempt at self flagellation, by Mr Mehta, to seek atonement for all his accumulated bad Karma since his Debanior days. It is baffling to note the evangelical fervor with which you have been lobbying for the Maoists, while bad mouthing the middle class and the corporate sector. Don't bite the hand that feeds you Mr Mehta, its bad bad karma. Arundathi and her ilk should be banished to the luxurious thousand star suites in Dandakaranya where they can collect tendu leaves along with the tribals and "live happily ever after". As for good karma and saving Editor, back to basics Mr Mehta, Feed some Brahmins and write some nice things about the BJP for a change. sudharshan madras, india Mar 21, 2010 01:33 AM 20 I started reading this post with a mixture of hope and excitement, but ended with despair and disgust. It's so funny that a few weeks back, Arundhati wrote in this same publication about how some Indians deny and even celebrate Hindu violence (essay was titled "listening to the grasshoppers") and she has done the same (deny naxal violence, and in fact celebrate it now). Will she please listen to the grasshoppers? This is a classic case of double standards by Arundhati Roy. And she has written a hate speech against upper-caste Hindus. Rahul Delhi, India Mar 21, 2010 02:27 AM 21 even after the secular rule of congress which apparantly works for aam admi the tribals are suffering. but then the seculars want to blame hinduism!! fact is the naxals are supported and funded by the christian missionaries. namo4 London, United Kingdom Mar 21, 2010 05:49 AM 22 Walking with the comrades is very apt heading for Arundhati Roy's essay. It is objectionable to call these misguided people and their murderous leaders as Gandhians. Mahatma Gandhi once said "I am prepared to die and not prepared to kill- the subtle message: he was prepared to die to get Mother India's freedom and not prepared to kill to get that freedom. Again, Arundhati's heading Walking with the comrades is very apt that she seems to be a comrade-in word and deeds- and walks with fellow comrades-birds of the same feathers flock together. As I have said in one of my previous postings, Indian government must separate the grain from the chaffs-take care of the aggrieved people- deprived, dispossessed and untouchables- who are the grains. The chaffs are the militant and murderous leaders who have to be obliterated. Their game plan is bringing anarchy in India and they are doing the bidding for their master-China. It is sad that the likes of Arundhati Roy are adding curry flavour to their militancy. Instead, Arundhati Roy should tell her comrades in arms to abjure violence and killing innocent people will only harm their cause. Scaria Varghese Melbourne, Australia Mar 21, 2010 06:20 AM 23 Revolutions, extreme behaviour etc, is caused by frustration of not being heard. India is over excited with its new found flirtation with 'Democracy'. Democracy takes many forms and many years to achieve. American Democracy could be said to be: "The freedom to do anything, as long as you've got a good Lawyer". Many Australians do not respect American Democracy. We prefer our own following of British Democracy. India will take at least 100 years to show Democracy at an acceptable level. That is , acceptable to Western eyes. You start from the most miserable level of any Nation that has attempted it, with your "CASTE' system. Most Indians are cursed with an instinct to 'look down' and speak that way to anyone whom they think is less qualified than them. That is one reason why we do not welcome many into Australia. Your Ethics and Morals are different to any other people Worldwide. Peter Wignall Bisbane, Australia Mar 21, 2010 07:03 AM 24 Re: "And why do left-leaning intellectuals and journalists never open their mouths to talk about the land acquisitions by the Government of India -- for its PSUs?" Murtuza: given what Roy says in this very piece about the Forest Department, given her oft-expressed views that the state is no more than an "upper caste Hindu state" (which, I must say, I disagree with; and which is the sort of sloppiness that mars much of her otherwise searing and essential work; including the lumping together of Hyderabad as part of India's "colonialis[t]" course as Roy does here), and given her years-long advocacy against big dams and the land appropriation/dispossession associated with them, is it believable to you that she backs forcible land acquisition for PSUs? I must say I have heard many charges against Roy, but this is the first time I've heard anyone say she has double standards (as between private corporations and the state) when it comes to land appropriation. The notion is absurd. Umair Muhajir New York, United States Mar 21, 2010 07:39 AM 25 Arundhati Roy irritates me: her tone, her smugness, her careless use of history -- specifically, her stringing of disparate events/places/phenomena as if they all amounted to the same old same old (e.g. lumping together the Indian annexation of Hyderabad as part of the country's "colonialis[t]" course, bizarre given the old order displaced by the annexation was an absolute monarchy hijacked by religious revivalists in its twilight, an old order diametrically opposed to the sort of peasant insurgency one would expect Roy to be sympathetic to -- were the Indian state not on the "other" side of the argument, that is) -- her sloppy and oft-expressed views that the Indian polity is no more than an "upper caste Hindu state", are annoying not only in themselves, but because they mar the force of her arguments, on issues that are so crucial one can ill afford slips up. But. But. But. For the courage to talk about what (at least when it comes to what can only be called a civil war in Central India) is barely touched upon by other writers in English, and rarely without resort to the empty platitudes of those who use language not to think about the problem, but to avoid thinking about problems; and for the courage -- and this is perhaps hardest for a writer, even unknowns and aspiring writers, let alone famous ones -- to not pander to her audience, to be unafraid of being misunderstood; everything Roy writes on the plight of the Indian polity's ultimate expandables (far more so than any religious minorities, far more so than even Dalits), namely the "tribal" populations, cannot be missed. Umair Muhajir New York, United States Mar 21, 2010 09:35 AM 26 This is with regard to Post # 23 by a Peter wignall from oZ. It is true that the situation of the Adivasis bears close resemblance with that of the Aborigines of Australia. While Peter seems to think India has an imperfect democracy with poor ethics and morals, and his Australia is much superior to us as well as USA (!!), let us consider some facts. Aborigines have been decimated in Australia. At some points, they were actually hunted down like dogs. The Stolen Generations refers to hundreds of thousands of aborigine children taken forcibily away from their parents, in an attempt to destroy aborigine culture - they succeded largely. Most aborigines are not given employment and police brutality is common - deaths in lockups are often reported and no action is taken against the police. recently, an aborigine man was locked up in a police vehicle and left in the sun to cook to death. The UN Human rights commision has censured Australia and kept it on watchlist for atrocities against aborigines. Aborigines are not found in any position of power or decision making. This is how AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY solved the ABORIGINE " PROBLEM". We Indians do not have to learn anything from these rednecks.!!! ashok Melbourne, Australia Mar 21, 2010 11:59 AM 27 Very Strange . Paid News of India keep on carrying Roy's visit Mao area one day and Kashmir other day. Both cases she visits and justifies anti national and anti social elements. How come she never visits poor securityment/policemens family who die for the sake of our country? How come our paid news of India do not cover them? satish mayya dubai, United Arab Emirates Mar 21, 2010 12:03 PM 28 By the way, A true picture of what Arundhati Roy's deeds can be found in this article - must read - http://www.fakingnew...-pifw-gets-underway/ Rahul Delhi, India Mar 21, 2010 01:05 PM 29 Umair, >> "For the courage to talk about what.... is barely touched upon by other writers in English, and rarely without resort to the empty platitudes; and for the courage....to not pander to her audience..." I agree. While I am all for putting down an armed insurrection with force if necessary, the people who take up arms and their issues are of interest to us. Arundhati does not pretend to be an objective reporter. She is not a journalist or a historian. She is a partisan polemicist with a literary flair. Over the past several years she has given voice to several groups whose voices were blocked from reaching us. She may be annoying, but we are better off because of our Arundhatis. Anwaar Dallas, United States Mar 21, 2010 01:52 PM 30 Mind you she will not visit the Catholic state of Mizoram,from where Hindu trbals have been driven out.Why does she not write on the rampant sexuality and child abuse in the Catholic churches of Kerala?Every movement of the types of Arundhati,Teesta,Shabana and a host of others is against the Hindu soceity and surprisingly an intelligent man like Vinod Mehta cannot see that. S.S.Nagaraj Bangalore, India Mar 21, 2010 05:27 PM 31 Peter Wignall, show some modesty.Yes many of us Indians have treated some fellow Indians horribly but unlike you fellows we have not exterminated a whole race and their culture and stolen their land like you fellows have almosted succedded in doing with the poor aborogines. There are many many admirable qualites about the Australians, but modesty is surely not one of them. Harish london, United Kingdom Mar 21, 2010 06:34 PM 32 Since the time pre-historic man started to organise themselves in social units - possibly clans to begin with - force has always been one of the binders of socety in all it's organised phases culminating in modern sophisticated state in it's many ideological hues - communism , capitalism, dictatorship or crass monarchies. But the modern sophisticated Western state has fine-tuned the art of hiding the iron-fist with velvet gloves & they are humongous social success stories for that . But the Indian state - despite bragging about our coming of age with technology & high rate of GDP - has remained basically feudal in mind-set or rapacity of it's ruling elite. It's bereft any degree of sophistication in covering up the iron with velvet. It's inevitable that if there is bauxite or hematite or diamond to be found they will be exploited & rightly so. It's futile to try to stop exploiting national resouces to convert them into liquid wealth. Question to be asked is how to go about it & what resdistributive mechanism has been put in place for the wealth to benifit bottom layer of social strata. Ms. Arundahti Roy has failed in her duty as keeper of the soceital consciensce in as much as she blindly romanticised the Maoists even if we assume they are sincere about welfare of the tribals, which I believe they are not; they are in a way another set exploiters of primitive tribals who has not learned to fight for their rights as acknowledged by this same state itself. But Maoist's ways are sure prescription for the tribals to be annahilated for howsoever cunning & wily the Maoists are, the state will win fianlly. And without converting those hematite into iron or bauxite in to aluminium overall loosres are we Indians. True a handful will be disproportinately richer than the average. But that is the way it is. Look the Salwa Judum has been has been declared illegal by the Supreme Court - an arm of the same state. In that sense an Himangsu Kumar or Binayak Sen are more relevent in tribals to fight for their rights than atrophied ramanticism of Ms. Roy. The thing to do is to see to that tribals get fair share of the wealth that's hidden under their habitat & not to take up arm which in ultimate analysis will be counter-productive. It's not for nothing the ruling elite is railing against the civil soceity , becuase civil soceity has in some measure been successful in creating an atmosphere of restraint. I had been an admirer of Arundhati when she took on the dam-builders. Because dams are unscientific , wasteful, not serve the any purpose they are supposed to achieve & do not contribute to national wealth. By now it has been proved so. Her arguments against dams had been scientific, logical, factual which were put forth with unimpeachable argumants. On Kashmir or Maoists, Arundhati at best been hopelessly naive & impractcal romantist. What's more she is no help for the tribals. She is one notch down in intellectual prowess . That's a shame. MANISH BANERJEE KOLKATA, India Mar 21, 2010 09:15 PM 33 >>>new hardware that has been bought from Israel: laser range-finders, thermal imaging equipment and unmanned drones, so popular with the US army. Of course India should buy weapons from Israel. Or should India buy rockets that don't even work from Palestinians ? India also buys weapons from the US, and from Russia. This is all as it should be. Any and all weapons are ok to deploy against Marxist rebels who have straightforwardly declared their intention to topple the state. Of course civilians, in this case the tribals who are caught in the conflict, should be protected as much as possible. SreekanthBoston Boston, United States Mar 21, 2010 10:41 PM 34 After reading Peter Wignell's comment, I could not resist the urge to write a few lines on his views which are a 1950s view of the world by Australians. Australia was settled by British prisoners, mainly uneducated criminals from the lower strata of British society, those with cockney accent. Australian accent bears testimony to this fact. Australia in the main is a white Anglo Saxon Protestant population in the main, fearful of Catholics, Muslims and Hindus. Unlike democratic India which has had countless non Hindus as Presidents and Governor's, Australians are fearful of electing a Catholic let alone a Hindu or Muslim. It is a lazy population of 20 million people sitting on rich resources which were plundered from the aborigines and now they have the gall to talk down Indians and Hindus. India may not be rich, but people of all caste and creed live in peace. No doubt there are clashes due a billion people landlocked in a land a 4th the size of Australia. Ram Minneapolis, United States Mar 21, 2010 11:48 PM 35 The Prime Minister's declaration that the Maoists/naxalites are the single most serious threat to internal security is simply condemnable. And on the same cue, India's Home Minister has gone miles ahead to say they are worse than the Talibans. Do they know the meaning of these descriptions? significance of these two descriptions of the Maoists and naxalites defies ordinary sense of the common man. The country has never heard such outlandish uttarences from the high pulpit when dalits and tribals were massacred in many parts of the country over decades in 70s, 80s, 90s and there has not been an end to it. The killers have gone scot free and the victims received no protection of law, not to speak of justice. So, Arundhati Roy is correct to say that rape victims are in jails and the rapists were giving lectures in the bazar. It's no imagination. The country's development has not benefited the lowest rung of the society. Nor were they the target of development. It only substantiates the old cliche: the rich and got richer and the poor poorer since independence, fuelling frustration, anger etc. Construction of road, mining, industrialization, technological revolution etc. are making the rich, powerful and privileged more invincible. The PM and HM, unmistakably have been speaking on their behalf only deploying the state forces for safeguarding their interests. The poor, mostly the tribal and dalit communities without education live in abyss of misfortunes. Peter Wignall from Bisbane, Australia has diagnosed Indian outlook appropriately, "You start from the most miserable level of any Nation that has attempted it, with your "CASTE' system. Most Indians are cursed with an instinct to 'look down' and speak that way to anyone whom they think is less qualified than them. That is one reason why we do not welcome many into Australia." The government of India could be blamed for all out war against the tribals arising out of the feelings of superiority that marks the supremacists. In any case, whether many agree or not the result will be ultimately too bloody to comprehend with equaminity of mind. A.K.B iswas Calcutta, India Mar 22, 2010 04:58 AM 36 It is great to have somebody like Arundhati Roy. She gives voice to the voiceless, and always questions the government. We Indians need to be self-critical and inclusive of everyone when we shape our country's institutions. Every person should be able to voice freely what he feels, and especially report on the injustices around without fear. That said, I think Ms. Roy provides no alternatives. We simply cannot have a civil war in India. This is unthinkable, the Maoists cannot continue with their guns and goonda-raj. And it is equally improbable that the tribals shall continue with their medieval practices in 21st century, living in the forest and competing with endangered fauna and flora on nature's resources. India's population is exploding and the only way to provide decent health, education and living conditions for everyone is through common agreement and the rule of law. How can the tribals be protected in this affair ? How can we prevent outsiders (either Naxals / police / politicians) from taking advantage of their ignorance. We need fresh ideas. How about providing rich cellular access to all the forests and providing cellphones for every tribal person, so that they are digitally connected to the net at a high broadband speed. This is not impossible to achieve - it will take only a small portion of the money that the government is spending on the anti-naxal army operations. And it will achieve the objectives of our Indian constitution without spilling any blood uselessly !! Kiran grenoble, France Mar 22, 2010 12:41 PM 37 First & foremost, any maoist (naxal) sympathizer should also be treated as "them". If Arundhati Roy is given a choice, she can turn India around similar to how the Left turned around Bengal with their rule. She will criticize anything & everything. Just like corporates look for new business avenues, human rights & the likes of arundhati roy look for new support base. So if you plot new business / infrastructure development projects and roy's support/involvement, there will be very string correlation. Effectively, wherever, you find roy;s & the likes involvements, that area instead of showing any development, has till date never been developed. I agree, there would have been neglect by the govt towards the tribals, ths does not justify to go against the state.You cannot become a terrorist. Tomorrow, I lose my job, and I target my employer. Tomorrow, if the govt does not do anything for me, then it does not justify me to pick up the gun & go against the state. You need to have some foresight & rule of law. What the tribals are not realizing, once they go against the state, they are providing emplyment opportunities only to the human rights activists & the likes; they write articles, they criticize the govt, they file cases against the govt & in turn get huge donations from people who think they've just done a "Good Deed" for the day. Not realizing that the conditions of the tribals will only go from bad to worse.. Yes definitely a great internal security threat, but I guess our Home Minister needs to also concentrate on how to deal with a bigger security threat - not the terrorists, not the maoists, not the naxals, not the politicians who talk of divisive politics - but the likes of arundhati roy & her likes of human rights activists... Save the country from such people. shashank Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 01:01 PM 38 Many of the readers who've sent their comments seem to be picking on the writer, and missing the larger point -- the poor, the tribal population, adivasis, the dalits and other marginalised people are ones who are bearing the entire brunt of the nation's economic march and development. Implicit in their criticism of Ms. Roy and her style of writing is the notion that our way of life is superior. All subsequent arguments stem from this belief. To dismiss Ms. Roy's writing accusing it of being romantic is being naïve – and dishonest. sajosam new delhi`, India Mar 22, 2010 02:17 PM 39 If in the name of climate change, we say we want to conserve our environment, everybody rallies around. We rally around all concepts that are western. If the tribes want to conserve their heritage and refuse to let their home be exploited, why do we call them anti-national. Isn't democracy about listening to what the tribes, the original inhabitants of that place, want? Isn't their cause a green cause too? Of course, the tiff between the tribes and the government has taken an ugly turn. Who's to blame for that? Of course the government, for it is they who handled the issue callously at the start. The government failed here. They failed in Kashmir. They fail whenever someone refuses to fall in line. What kind of a democaracy are we when we cannot handle anyone who doesn't want to fall in line? Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 02:44 PM 40 The article minus opinions is excellent journalism - to see journalists take the effort of humanizing and bringing into context people engaged with society (eitherways) is really refreshing. Its easy to paint things black and while, but the shades of grey that dominate the lives of the tribals are a really interesting read. The prose with which she is able to weave together the tale makes compelling reading. The pictures also provide an interesting angle to the story and brings the characters to life. Great effort and results. However, her interpretations are naive and superfluous. That this is a playout of another Avatar is really a gross simplification. The author romanticizes the lives of the villagers/ tribals/ adivasis/ (whatever labels) - however, the low hemoglobin counts, high TB rates, occurrence of malnutrition, low education, terrible access to health care/ education/ etc. are best experienced from the outside. While the Vedanta plant will degrade the environment for sure, the net improvement of human development in this area could balance out the evils. I really wouldve appreciated a more balanced story - including deeper questions like if they are truly this popular, why havent they gotten themselves elected? And change from within. Finally, distinguish the people from the purpose they sign onto. The govt. of india - am certain - has no reason to destroy any lives, if they are not inimical to general society. While they are interesting people (as against demonized inhumans that the rest of the press makes them out to be), the path they've chosen would ensure that they dont get taken seriously. People who live by the sword die by the sword, regardless of the issue they face. Yo Man gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 03:11 PM 41 Democracy is not just the right to vote. It's the right to be heard. It's the right to not be exploited. If the babus up there in the government make laws during a posting that they never wanted, which do not take into account the ground level realities, why should those affected adversely comply? They must revolt. Revolt, they did. We all know of corrupt netas and babus in the country. If you think that the way to fight them is to join the government, you are living in a romantic world. In reality, you need people who can take the fight to them directly. On their turf. The people power has to become more prominent in this country if the government has to be made accountable. We need more uprisings like this one. We need more articles like this one to show how the governments have messed up. Of course, a shorter summary of the essay needs to be published because I doubt many would have read the whole thing. Most people commenting here must have arrived at an opinion on the first indication of the tilt the writer seemed to be taking. Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 03:23 PM 42 No other society in the world has done so much in a period of sixty years to ameliorate the condition of the weaker sections among them as the society in free India. It is also an ongoing process. There is bound to be still considerable disparities and it exists not because of a lack of will to set it off but because of the massive accumulated discrimination they had undergone during the last one thousand years when the entire Indian society was under alien rulers with different cultural and religious values. But the impression one gets from the views of some of the do-gooders is that these disparities have arisen because of the 'criminal' negligence of the so called upper crust of the society after independence. Such views as a matter of fact comes from the religious descendents of those who ruled this society and who did not so much as lift their little fingers to help them out except perhaps directing them to a different route for salvation in the upper air and as a result some of them have become a permanent nuisance to the rest. There is other wise no explanation for the relentless calumny that the ills of the Indian society is rooted in the cultural and religious ethos of this nation. We hear them comparing the condition of 'tribal' to the condition of the natives who suffered elsewhere under the white man. Leave alone the fact that it took more than 100 years for a full blooded black Christian slave to get recognized as 'non-slave ' and then more than another 100 years for him to get noticed as something 'resembling' a human being, and it happened not under any kingdom or theocracy but in a 'Christian' democracy , the condition of the natives in the U.S who were even denied the right to identify as American but designated as ' Indian' was even more miserable with endless indignities and cruelties heaped up on them in the name of a 'loving ' god. Here is a small sample of it: http://www.stumbleup...all_prefer_to_forget One need not doubt the credibility of it; it is same website which also prints articles by Arundhati Roy. Yet there is difference. It also publishes articles of the sort below: http://www.alternet....ning_war?page=entire It is about how the "tribal" in Burma fighting against their oppressors as they do in India. But they are honest people because they have no hesitation in claiming that they are fighting for the cause of Thy Kingdom. And for whose cause does Arundhati Roy fight? c p narendran nagpur, india Mar 22, 2010 03:43 PM 43 Comment 37 Shashank: "Yes definitely a great internal security threat, but I guess our Home Minister needs to also concentrate on how to deal with a bigger security threat - not the terrorists, not the maoists, not the naxals, not the politicians who talk of divisive politics - but the likes of arundhati roy & her likes of human rights activists... Save the country from such people" The greatest threat to India has been the CASTE CULTURE and ENDEMIC CORRUPTION that infects the political and democratic institutions that brought misery to the Tribal/Adivasis. Is it about 'national security" or about "mineral wealth" hidden under "tribal land"? Is the Government using "national security" as a ploy to deny the Tribals/Adivasis their "fair share" of mineral wealth and divert the benefits primarily to the middle class and large corporations. Rajesh Sydney, Australia Mar 22, 2010 04:08 PM 44 First and foremost, allow me to commend the tone and content of the various posters on this article. This is true democracy and considered debate in action. That said, I can add from my personal experience of having lived in the area now called Sonebhadra district of Uttar Pradesh in late 1980's-the land of Rihand dam, Singrauli coal fields, and the numerous thermal power plants- the experience of the local population of the outsider is colonial and every bit as tragic as portrayed by Arundhati. To my eyes, the 'development' going on through building of power plants and the 'colonies' for the those coming to work in the power plants was just the same as by British in India-they built Railways and other things to serve their needs, well provided colonies, clubs and 'cilvil lines'for themselves to live in, separated from the wretched lives of the locals just outside their colony gates. The women folk of the locals were sex toys for the 'contractors' and their workers from outside. The produce and earnings from them of coal, power etc. made by the 'contractors' all going to be utilised by them in their native towns. Very very colonial. But very very unavoidable. The path of joining the 'modern mainstream' is perforce through this trajectory and perhaps the most benign of the alternatives. As India has outgrown colonial rule, so has democracy and elections allowed these areas to grow their own political leadership and would (hopefully) reclaim their ownership of the land and it's produce for greater betterment of the 'locals'. Even the 'militants' provided their bit in the Indian experience of overthrrowing colonial rulers. But,the alternative model outlined with such farcically partisan polemics by Arundhati is dangerously sepia toning the cruel, abusive and vicious theory of Maoism and tarring the experience of India with her pet hates in blind strokes. Atul Chandra mUMBAI, INDIA Mar 22, 2010 05:25 PM 45 The article is full of government and judiciary bashing and full of praise for the Maoists. She has every right to criticize the government policies which led to the ever increasing reach of Naxalism. What is most baffling is that she has not devoted a single line in condemning the killings of policemen and civilians. A massacre in which about 100 policemen were killed by the Maoists has full details of the events and planning of the massacre but she finds no wrongs in this heinous act of the Maoists. Jan adalats have been also praised and every move of the government, media, and judiciary has been lambasted. This is nothing but a complete glorification of the violence unleashed by the Maoists with innocent tribals merely being used as a shield. There is no denying the fact that naxalism is mainly a government created monster on account of the continuous neglect of the particular region. Now that the Maoists have taken control and have free access of cash and guns they will continue to make this problem continue to linger. If the brutal force of State is to be condemned then we must also condemn the violence and mindless killings executed by the Maoists. Unfortunately in India all the so called intellectuals love to express views which can be by swimming against the tide. It would be better if Arundhati Rou permanently shifts from Delhi to Dantewada jungles. Sanjeev Kumar Verma New Delhi, India Mar 22, 2010 05:51 PM 46 While Roy's writing is interesting, she fails to offer any viable alternative to solving the issues faced by these people. It is true that tribal explitation has been rampant in India and these regions are some of the most underdeveloped in the country. But the question that must be asked is whether by taking up an armed struggle, whose purpose is to topple the state, haven't these people ensured that doctors run away from clinics in these areas, government officals are scared to do their job and teachers are not prepared to attend school. Is it Roy's case that tribals do not need access to education and health and they are happy to live off the forest? A majority of India's popoluation, however distressed we might feel by the efforts our Government, is part of the mainstream because we know that it benefits us personally and as a society. Sadly the tribal people know nothing better and their leaders have vested interests in ensuring that developmental efforts do not reach these areas. Instead of romanticising the tribal dream, people like Roy should work with the tribals to develop a way of life for these people so that they can become a part of modern India, albeit by keeping close to their land and their way of life. And unless Roy can offer these solutions, I do not think it is right to crticise the Government. In any country there is no justification for waging a civil war and killing innocent people (including cops) because that by its very nature is undemocratic. Divya London, United Kingdom Mar 22, 2010 06:55 PM 47 Those bashing Arundhati Roy, She's recounting her experience of her visit. Since she interacted with the Maoists, she is presenting their side of the story. For me, it was an interesting read as it presented a side to these people that no one else presents. Instead of bashing Roy because she is presenting a different view than what you people hold, you may want to try and put yourself in the shoes of these people. What would you have done if you were a tribal doing the only thing you know how to do in the only place you know exists and the government drives you away from there because it has conceived up fancy plans to exploit that area? Who would you turn to? Surprisingly, it is more difficult in India to touch a tiger belt than a tribal belt. There seems to be greater urban sympathy towards animals in India than to the poor and deprived sections of our society. What arundhati has done is to present their story. I doubt if many would have read the complete story. Please read it and empathize with these people who are suffering and have no one to turn to because their enemy is the government. Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 07:25 PM 48 "hold, you may want to try and put yourself in the shoes of these people. What would you have done if you were a tribal.." You are making the assumption that these 'tribals' are the ones indulging in all the violence, and the reason is the one you are alluding to. But most of this violence is purely ideological, designed with the idea of overthrowing the state, at least in the countryside. And establishing a Maoist/Naxal dictatorship, which will be far, far worse than anything the Indian government is doing now. Think of the Khmer Rouge. Varun Shekhar Toronto, CANADA Mar 22, 2010 09:27 PM 49 Sanjay: Anyone who believes in freedom should denounce mass lands acquisition by the government or by private corporations. The point is simple: if you believe in property rights consistently -- which is a basic principle of free-market capitalism -- land acquisition is a no. The problem is that communist lunatics and fools like Arundhati Roy are good observers -- though she observes only selectively here -- but only very poor solution-providers. In no country on earth has communism given the regular citizen any more freedom or security. Left-wing ideologues are blind to this. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 09:40 PM 50 'Anwaar': >> the people who take up arms and their issues are of interest to us. .... Over the past several years she has given voice to several groups whose voices were blocked from reaching us I doubt very much if you would be so generous when it came to the thugs and goons from the other end of the political spectrum -- the Bajrangis and the Shiv Sainiks. When one talks of 'legitimate root causes' or of 'grievances' why is it that only left-wing terrorists and Islamists are given so much compassion and understanding? Any fool could make a case that since Kashmiri Pandits were ethnically cleansed in 1990, this catalyzed Hindu anger for demolishing the Babri Masjid. Further, the fact that over 900 Hindu temples were destroyed in Pakistan in 1992 has escaped our attention entirely. A dominance of left-wing perspectives in the Indian media feeds a backlash. We need to solve problems, not provoke clashes and backlashes. >> She is a partisan polemicist She is worse than a polemicist. She lives in a world of her own, a black- and-white world where good and evil clash according to her predetermined communist leanings. Take 'literary flair' out of it and this piece could have been lifted from any commie rag. As for Maoists being 'real people', I was not aware that Al-Qaeda are anything except Homo Sapiens as well. Adults are responsible for their actions. This piece treats them like some real- world, innocent, childlike Mao's Na'avi. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 09:55 PM 51 Umair: >>to not pander to her audience If anything, she knows how to pander to her audience of India-haters. Witness her rhetoric is no different from Hafiz Saeed. Take away the literary flair, and what is she saying? Apart from what you correctly identified, her comments about the Indian State being an essentially upper-caste Hindu State is nothing else but pandering. And as Murtuza Polen so correctly identifies, even Hindutva and Al Qaeda type ideologies could also be similarly romanticised humanised and presented with real or perceived grievances. Ajit Tendulkar Seattle, United States Mar 22, 2010 10:21 PM 52 I read the whole article in one sitting. I think the greatest service Roy has done to Tribals is not only that she has given them a voice but put a face on them. In any case of planned g-e-n-o-c-i-d-e/e-t-h-n-i-c c-l-e-a-n-s-i-n-g the first step is to dehumanise the population. She has reversed that process. She has given them names and faces. Now, the video-game generation can not simply demand the "e-x-t-e-r-m-i-n-a-t-i-o-n" of the "v-e-r-m-i-n-s". These are people like us. The point for contemplation is that what have Mangtu/Nirmala/Venu suffered in the last 50-60 years of Independent India that they are ready to fight one of biggest and most sophisticated army of the world with only knives/front loading rifles ? kishoredasmunshi Kolkatta, India Mar 22, 2010 10:57 PM 53 Murtuza, >> When one talks of 'legitimate root causes' or of 'grievances' why is it that only left-wing terrorists and Islamists are given so much compassion and understanding? I was not talking of "root causes". All I said was that if a group of people rise in militancy, we are interested to know what their issues are. Arundhati has given us perspectives on tribals that very few others can. That does not of course mean that I support armed insurrections. Anwaar Dallas, United States Mar 22, 2010 11:28 PM 54 Murtaza, She did not write this piece to find a solution. She wrote it to bring a necessary perspective that has been missed completely by observers. Personal bashing of Roy is absolutely uncalled for. You say, we need to solve problems, not provoke clashes and backlashes. The big point you miss here is this: You cannot solve problems if you overlook the very reason that caused the problem. When the problem solvers are themselves the reason for the problem, they will never be able to solve it. You think America will solve Afghanistan and Al Qaeda? Never. And yes the Maoists exist because they have strong ground level support. They cannot exist otherwise. If you think that the issue here is the Maoists, you are missing the point completely. Take care of the ground level issues and the Maoists will disappear. But is anyone really interested to address the real issue? Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 22, 2010 11:32 PM 55 'Anwaar': >> I was not talking of "root causes". I wasn't referring specifically to you. But you know very well that this is a big problem in the left-wing circles you inhabit. To a lesser degree, this is also reflected in the CAIR debate: you talked about 'supporting underdogs' as the reason for glossing over CAIR. The Left-Islamist alliance will bear no fruit. Are Muslims courted by the criminal but left-wing populist likes of George Galloway likely to adopt any traditional hard-left positions? Do they even support gay marriage, say? Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 11:34 PM 56 [I doubt very much if you would be so generous when it came to the thugs and goons from the other end of the political spectrum -- the Bajrangis and the Shiv Sainiks.] Now you are being unfair - Of course he would support them - just as long as extremists try to destroy the Indian state or collaborate with enemy states/terror groups or perhaps attack Indian soldiers - he would certainly support them. lookout bug me not mumbai, India Mar 22, 2010 11:41 PM 57 Sanjay: >> Personal bashing of Roy is absolutely uncalled for. That's your view. When an arrogant, black-and-white hard-leftist publishes long, one- sided Maoist apologias, then surely I can call her out on her stupidity. >> The big point you miss here is this: You cannot solve problems if you overlook the very reason that caused the problem. Please elaborate. I have said that all mass land acquisition is just not acceptable -- not according to Mao's Red Book (ironically, in Mao's China probably more people were land-uprooted than at any other time in human history) -- but according to property rights. So, yes, tribal anger is justified. >> When the problem solvers are themselves the reason for the problem, they will never be able to solve it. You think America will solve Afghanistan and Al Qaeda? Never. I don't think the Afghan war can be won. I don't think the U.S. should ever waste its blood and treasure on nation-building. I support non-interventionism and Ron Paul. You have not defended your apparent hero Roy at all. You're just deflecting here. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 22, 2010 11:59 PM 58 You have your focus wrongly placed on the writer rather than on the message she is giving out. I am not here to defend the writer, you may be here to bash her though. As I mentioned in my last post, you are wrong if you think the issue here is the Maoists. There are people who want you to believe that because they do not want to address the real issue. They know that the Maoists will disappear if they can take care of the real ground level issues. But even then they do not want to address the real issues. They are happy to keep the focus on the Maoists. Open your mind and look at the real issues. Read the essay with an unbiased mind. Don't worry about who wrote it. Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 23, 2010 12:07 AM 59 Sanjay: >> you are wrong if you think the issue here is the Maoists. There are people who want you to believe that because they do not want to address the real issue. They know that the Maoists will disappear if they can take care of the real ground level issues. But even then they do not want to address the real issues. They are happy to keep the focus on the Maoists. Would you please explain to me what you are talking about? Who are 'the people who want me to believe...'? I have said that I oppose all land acquisition. That is one solution. I think it will solve the problem. None of this changes the fact that Arundhati Roy is a far-left maniac. And I'm sorry, but I kind of like to keep in mind authorship when I read stuff; helps with credibility. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 23, 2010 12:15 AM 60 Mass acquisition is actually not needed for rural roads. Two-laning hardly uses any of the space of huge farmlands -- the trick is to make sure that it is large farmers whose land is partially used, who can be compensated. When you are dealing with subsistence farmers, they have no means of using the meager compensation given to them when their entire tiny fields are acquired for the building of dams or of factories. For power generation there are new means every day. For water, 1000s of check dams work perfectly. The problem comes with large factories in rural areas, and, more recently, with SEZs. As far as possible, property rights must be fought for, against mass acquisitions. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 23, 2010 12:46 AM 61 If any of Arundhati's pieces ever exposed her for the contemptible communist that she is, here's the choicest extracts from above -- >> Charu Mazumdar was a visionary in much of what he wrote and said. The party he founded (and its many splinter groups) has kept the dream of revolution real and present in India. Imagine a society without that dream. For that alone, we cannot judge him too harshly. Especially not while we swaddle ourselves with Gandhi's pious humbug about the superiority of "the non-violent way" and his notion of trusteeship: "The rich man will be left in possession of his wealth, of which he will use what he reasonably requires for his personal needs and will act as a trustee for the remainder to be used for the good of society." "The Dream of Revolution"? What is this dream? What is its goal? A communist state, a totalitarian state where everyone does as the party says, and individual wealth earned through honest hard work and self-improvement is useless. Some "revolution". Well, Arundhati, you and Charu can keep you precious Revolution. Better still, head to one of the revolutionized states -- Cuba or China or North Korea, and see how much free speech you enjoy there. The fact is that freedom is one whole entity. Economic, political and religious freedom all should be components of a truly free society. >> China's Path has changed. China has become an imperial power now, preying on other countries, other people's resources. But the Party is still right, only, the Party has changed its mind. So, as long as China simply killed tens of millions of its own people in Mao's Cultural Revolution and Great Leap Forward, things were ok? Only when it becomes externally aggressive is there a problem? >> When the Party is a suitor, wooing the people, attentive to their every need, then it genuinely is a People's Party, its army genuinely a People's Army. But after the Revolution how easily this love affair can turn into a bitter marriage. This is so perverse and so nonsensical -- the idea that you, as a free person, submit your individuality and your own control and personality to a 'party', of whom you become a cogwheel, and a grateful apparatchik. No individual freedom. All hail the Dear Leader, who 'woos' us, and who is 'attentive to our every need'. Am I the only one to see that theocracies and communist states have something eerily in common? And 'bitter marriage'? What do you expect when you kill private enterprise and set up a giant bureaucracy to run everyone's life and control the people? Fact: No communist state ever respected rights. >> It's hard not to see that the Indian State is an essentially upper-caste Hindu State (regardless of the party in power) which harbours a reflexive hostility towards the 'other'. And how does the fool Arundhati reconcile this black-and-white thesis with the '90 ethnic cleansing of the Kashmiri Pandits? Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 23, 2010 01:02 AM 62 >> >> It's hard not to see that the Indian State is an essentially upper-caste Hindu State (regardless of the party in power) which harbours a reflexive hostility towards the 'other'. >> And how does the fool Arundhati reconcile this black-and-white thesis with the '90 ethnic cleansing of the Kashmiri Pandits? That's like asking how do you reconcile the fact that a dalit is CM of UP and the fact that dalits are poor/backward/suffering. Kumar Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 01:20 AM 63 Kumar: You're missing the point. The 'Hindu state' was complicit in the Pandit ethnic cleansing. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 23, 2010 05:17 AM 64 roy loves herself and her own writeings. nothing she writes makes sense-but she gets it published. no one understands what she writes- its flowery language, and opinions designed to shock her audience. absolute balderdash. gayatri devi delhi, India Mar 23, 2010 08:34 AM 65 The anger seen here against Arundhati , is exemplar of the middle class' intolerance to any opposition to its notions of "development", "progress" or nationhood. Varun Garde Bengaluru, India Mar 23, 2010 08:43 AM 66 According to Roy When a Maoist speaks it becomes a "lovely Telugu accented Hindi", but when a police man speak that would naturally be in "crude, repulsive, accented Hindi"!! Ms Roy always support the "weak" side in a conflict, the notions of "who is correct/who is wrong" is absent from her black&white brain. The way Roy idolises Charu Mazdumdar- an extreme leftist leader who openly called for slaughtering "class enemies" - is extremely telling. Some commentators here say Roy doesn't provide any solution. Not right, Roy is very explicit in giving solutions. Isn't it clear that Roy supports a Maoist government? She is full of praise about "superbly organised" highly committed Maoist cadres. She wants Maoist to take over India!! That's her solution!! Now, I don't know how she will justify the "class killings" if and when Maoist come to power in India (God forbid!!). It is strange to see a Catholic Christian- Suzanne Arundhati Roy- denigrate Hinduism by her statement, "Hinduisms greatest gift to the world- Caste!! Really? Is Hinduism so evil? The only "gift" off Hinduism to the world is caste system? The mere fact that Roy can live in this country and still abuse the majority of Indian's religion(80%) and call openly for overthrowing the current democratically elected government proves that India is a liberal democracy(contrary to Arundhati's argument). She is exploiting India's liberal democracy and using the constitutionally guaranteed "freedom of speech" to undermine the very liberal constitution with a violent outdated failed Maoist dictatorship. Shame on Arundhati and other so called "human rights" activists who only sees the rights violation of Islamic terrorists and Moaists and always ignore the rights of a common man to live peacefully without being blasted in to oblivion by terror bombs. Prasanth Melbourne, Australia Mar 23, 2010 09:29 AM 67 @Varun Garde- It is easy to sneer at middle class for all the evils facing the country. But did we have this "middle class" 15,20 years ago? No sir, all we had was 98% desperately poor people shackled by license raj and 2% rich politicians and selected business families. These 300 million strong middle class did not fall from the sky overnight,after economic liberalisation they worked hard, sacrificed many things and worked their way up to the middle class status. What do you propose? 300 million middle class Indians should go back to being poor? So that we can all share poverty "equally" like pre 1990s? Varun, you said "The anger seen here against Arundhati , is example of the middle class' intolerance to any opposition to its notions of "development", "progress" or nationhood." Not true, they(middle class)fully support uplifting tribals from their misery, they have absolutely no problem about spending for poor or someone writing about their problems. But what they(middle class) oppose is the imposition of an outdated retarded, failed violent ideology like Maoism as an all healing solution by so called intellectuals like Arundhati. Almost all the commentators here criticizing Arundhati did so not because she dared to give "voice" to the oppressed, but because she is working AGAINST The liberal constitution of India and she seems to support Maoism- a dreaded non democratic ideology. Our criticism is against Maoist supporters like Arundhati Roy, not poor hapless tribal people. Prasanth Melbourne, Australia Mar 23, 2010 09:37 AM 68 Grow up guys. If Arundhati Roy tries to look deeper into the issue and tries to understand and make others understand how the Maoists have garnered support of the local people, she becomes a supporter of Maoists taking over teh country????!!!! Learn to respect views that are different from your own. Learn that there are two sides to every issue. Learn that when we are able to see both sides, it's only then that we can act judiciously. Sanjay Gurgaon, India Mar 23, 2010 12:20 PM 69 You know what, I read God Of Small Things as a teenager. I thought the book was boring for the most part, but I liked the last few pages. You know what I am talking about - the sex scene. Arundhati Roy is a wonderful writer of sex. Thats probably the only thing she's good at : writing about sex. Thats what she should ideally stick to. Write about sex Arundhati, hot steamy hardcore sex. Thats all you are good at. Just an advise. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 01:14 PM 70 Arundhathi is a lousy literator who got an award for writing rubbish about her mother. Just fails to understand why Outlook publishes her stupid articles. Akil Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 02:36 PM 71 Shooting the messenger is an age old tactic. Particularly for the lot of us who hate hearing bad news. Roy has never been in my reading radar. I thought her God of Small Things was a boring piece of work. But what she stands for -- at least in this article's case -- is worth giving a thought. Let us rip away her romanticised version of the tribals' innocence, her one-night (make if one-week if you please) stand with Dandakaranya and the the perpetually heartless Indian state. Even then what we get is a multitude of people dehumanised and a mainstream mentaility completely sanitised of this dehumanised set. It is only when the Roys and Saintaths give us the alternative perspective that we in the mainstream sometimes get a glimpse of the real. And of course we hate them for that. Let us for a moment accept that Roy is a cynic who presents the unsavoury extreme version to us. The fact of the matter is that even that extreme version is not effective enough when pitted against the other end of the spectrum, the mainstream version of the story spouted by the likes of Arnab Goswami and Rahul Kanwal. Even if it is through her shrill rhetoric, if an Arundhati Roy or a P Sainath manage to give the sidelined section a voice, we should be welcoming that. But we wont. I know. Because for us, they exist only in the minds of the Roys and Sainaths. Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 03:09 PM 72 Harish- Please don't compare P Sainath with Arundhati Roy, Sainath is one of the best journalists India had ever seen. He systematically (single handedly) revealed the hunger and destitution of Indian farmers. He is partly responsible for UPA government's NERGA scheme. But Arundhati is a shrill Maoist supporter. She idolises violent terrorists like Maoists and thrives on demonising the state and romanticing Jihadis and Maoists. Sainath calls himself a proud Indian and Arundhati calls herself a walking republic (whatever does that mean). Arundhati offers no solution other than rooting for a Maoist dictatorship for India meanwhile Sainath offers a credible constitutionally sound alternative. Prasanth Melbourne, Australia Mar 23, 2010 03:25 PM 73 Maybe what you are saying about Roy is right. I have no interest in that. It is her subject matter -- the tribals and their gradual annihilation -- that is more important. And she is doing her job well to that extent. So what if she doesn't provide solutions? Highlighting the blatant injustice perpetrated in my name is good enough for me. As for Sainath himself, for all my admiration for him, you think his tunnel vision doesn't have flaws? The point being that when 99% of the mainstream doesn't give a shit about the tribals and the dying farmers, and in fact are brainwashed into believing that everything is "shining", it does take the shocking version of a Roy or a Sainath to do at least a minor counter. To that extent I am ready to forgive Ms Roy her flaws. Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 04:05 PM 74 Harish says "The point being that when 99% of the mainstream doesn't give a shit about the tribals and the dying farmers, and in fact are brainwashed into believing that everything is "shining", " who beleives that everything is shining, except for a few drunken types in Delhi? The types who gifted $5 million dollars to the USA in the aftermath of Katrina. This is silly lazy statement. This essay is revealing allright. It does indicate the inablity of the state to govern, but whats new?. Where there is the vacumm (i.e. illiterate tribals) the Maoist hyenas have moved in to direct the "struggle". But there is a problem with governance everywhere. The dust choked roads filled with trucks, lurching from side to side as they navigate the cratered lunar landscape called a road, layering the towns and villages with a thick film, is everywhere. Try Mayawati's paradise if you want to a good example. Its silly to set up these laxy narratives. So what can be done. Little but things do change in a dull managerial way. At somepoint yu realise no revolution is going to change things, as per Ms Roys mother's intution. Typical retarded middle class thinking MK Saini Delhi, India Mar 23, 2010 04:25 PM 75 I am sorry, but does nobody here have a problem with the way Arundhati Roy dehumanizes security forces ? She has no problem at all at the execution of informers, believes that is just and even praises the public courts of the Maoists as a better alternative to Indian judicial system. She paints all police officers are evil, nasty, cruel types. Soldiers are reduced to being common thugs, rapists and scoundrels. So much thought is given by her to the 'human' side of Maoists, their 'beautiful' smiles, their boyish handsomeness, their courage....worthy of hero worship and according to her, 'our last hope'..... Soldiers of the police, SPOs , BSF on the other hand are reduced to the status of anonymous extras in a Bollywood film without a shred of personality. Are they or are they not human beings ? Dont they smile ? Dont they come from poor families ? Dont they support aged parents ? Are they not tribals too ? What about their wives and girlfriends ? Who do they fight for ? They get killed and become a statistic, for what, a couple of thousand rupees a month ? Are they not worthy of our compassion ? According to Roy, only the 'beautiful' Maoists are worthy of our compassion. Indian security forces, in the world of Roy, are vermin that need to be crushed by the brave 'Gandhians with guns, Our Last Hope'.... Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 04:31 PM 76 Mr Saini "who beleives that everything is shining" My mistake: I meant "mainstream media". Not until Sainath came around did the media discover farmers' suicides. How many reports have spoken about the rapes and mass murders perpetrated by the state forces in the tribal hinterlands (at best the euphemism 'defensive firing' is used)? Hardly any and for obvious reasons. But the Maoist massacres are always highlighted. That is the deficiency I was talking about. And that is where I feel the likes of Roy and Sainath balance it out. But while the mainstream media will not be questioned, Roy will be lampooned -- because she hurts those very cosy middle class sentiments you were talking about, she exposes the guilt of the politician's darling middle and upper classes. As for this: "It does indicate the inablity of the state to govern, but whats new?" -- the mindset behind this kind of a cynically easy statement is precisely the reason we need the shrill rhetoric of a Roy. All the more because, whether we accept it or not, the state is actually in the 'oust the tribal mode' in the name of development. And in any case, why should development be thrust on people in the Australian aborigine fashion? As for Mayawati's land, I do not think the media has left any stone unturned to highlight mishaps called successive UP governments! Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 04:51 PM 77 Harish Mumbai says : " How many reports have spoken about the rapes and mass murders perpetrated by the state forces in the tribal hinterlands " Actually you need to live in a vacuum if you haven't come across frequent claims by the so-called Intellectual class that also calls itself 'Human Rights Activists'. Thats all I hear about, rapes and murders committed by security forces in Maoist areas, rapes and murders perpetrated by Indian army in Kashmir, rapes and murders committed by Indian forces in North-East.... ....had they been true all male species in these regions would have been wiped out and all women would have been reduced to sexual slaves of the evil Indian forces.... No sir, balance does not mean calling Indian soldiers rapists and murderers. Its merely spreading a canard. Telling a lie million times over does not make it true. How about this for balance ? Brutal mass murder of innocent people by Maoists, use of young women as sex slaves by Maoists....rape, murder, pillage of innocent hindus by Kashmiri muslims in Kashmir.... hacking to death of hindus by Church sponsored Christian terroists in Nagaland....all very true and relevant. However I dont see such stories making news. I certainly do not see Ms. Roy giving voice to these stories. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 05:05 PM 78 @Prashant "Its merely spreading a canard. Telling a lie million times over does not make it true." --Well like I said, we love to live in our fake worlds. As for HR activists highlighting rapes and other atrocities, thank god they do. However, the fact is that hardly any are accepted by the state as a fact, we want the world to believe everything is hunky dory in the land of milk and honey. Until the victims say enough is enough -- like what happened in the Thyangam Manorama case in Manipur -- and do something that shocks us into shame. Well if your insinuation is that every time a rape happens, the victims' near and dear one's must protest naked in front of the mainstream media for us to take notice, then one can only say, "carry on Ms Roy". In anycase, one can say just that: "Carry on Ms Roy. Continue the good job but cut the rhetoric and romanticism." Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 05:23 PM 79 @Harish "All the more because, whether we accept it or not, the state is actually in the 'oust the tribal mode' in the name of development. And in any case, why should development be thrust on people in the Australian aborigine fashion? " lets face it, the tribal culture will not survive contact with modernity. Once you bring education and exposure to modern thinking there is little going back. Would you want your kids to live as a tribal? Its a credit to Ms Roy that she was also honest to point out the misogyny, and sometimes brutality of the tribal way of life. Its only in the West that this is glamourised and some of this western style thinking seeps over into India. India is not Australia, its not a large sparsely populated country to setup separate reservations for tribals. There are many poor people in the cities as well whose needs must be considered. This is becoming an urban country. We need electricity, we need hydropower. Its not gone out of fashion as Ms Roy seems to think, infact its the other way around. If everybody else's life has to change, whether they like it or not, so will the tribals. I know people who would like to live like their ancestors did, but many others are excited by "connectivity", a new buzzword in UP. MK Saini Delhi, India Mar 23, 2010 05:41 PM 80 Mr Saini. Lets say I agree with you on that. There is no escaping change. But is it a natural course of change that is being witnessed in India? For decades the tribals were completely bereft of the basics of modernity -- education, sanitary and health facilties etc -- and nobody really cared. (M J Akbar has recorded this well in his book Riot After Riot). The tribal was merely the subject of exploitation far from the eye of the mainstream society. And then suddenly the government smells booty underneath! And the tribal is herded into camps like domesticated animals. Their symbiotic existence is ripped apart. How fair is that? If mainstream India can see a social upheaval of the size of the Ramjamnabhoomi-Babri movement in the name of an old forgotten mosque and namesake religious icon, how fair is it to violently disrupt the millennia old animism -- which makes the mountains, the trees, the water bodies etc the gods of the tribals -- for the purpose of the ever-elusive "growth"? To patronise tribals and say that they "must" change, and that too by "our" standards, is fertile ground for more Maoism! As for the misogyny you talk about, I hope you know the tribal societies are some of the most gender-equal ones in India. The Todas of Nilgiris are a case in point. In anycase, if that all important "change" that you mentioned had indeed brought about positive developments for these people -- the tribals that I am talking about and the poor that you refer to -- then there wouldn't have been a better advocate for it than themselves. The fact seems to be quite contrary. We are prospering at their cost. And I don't see any logic behind the assertion "some lose some gain" that will be an answer to the tribals' plight. Harish Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 07:55 PM 81 Algebraic clarity, from Ms Roy: A protracted war by the State (Upper caste Hindu in your thesaurus) on the 'Others' should have been equal to 'A protracted war by the 'Others' against the State', except for the Sex, and Revolutions are Sexy. A perfect life, for the central character of Upamanyu Chatterjee's first novel, English August, required; apart from grass, music and books, a Woman who did not exist before and after the 'act'. Revolution, Ms Roy, takes longer than the 'Act' and the pills for the morning-after aren't sold over-the-counter and in any case; have side effects. Saurabh Kumar Srivastava Mumbai, India Mar 23, 2010 08:08 PM 82 Ms.Roy, the greedy Indian middle class both here and abroad will malign you. They are 'patriotic' in their own language of development. Please do not give even iota of importance to them. Go ahead. The majority of poor people living in this subcontinent (Indians?!) are here by your side. History remembers those who love mankind. The others are thrown into dustbin. A salute to your courage in the age of paid journalism. selvaraj chennai, India Mar 23, 2010 08:37 PM 83 Selvaraj, why would the 'majority of the poor of India' stand by Arundhati Roy ? They probably have no clue who she is. Most of them cannot afford the 25 rupees it takes to buy Outlook, and even if they could, they wouldn't understand her as English is not yet a poor man's language and Roy has no ability to communicate in any tongue other than English.To be honest, the poor couldn't care less about Roy and her kind. Its only the 'greedy' middle class that you hate so much who read her or give her importance. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 08:40 PM 84 This is a trick too clever by half to equate Tribals and Maoists . If indeed they are the same lets just take a step back and try to understand what do Maoists really want ? What are their objectives ? To have tribal forests declared protected reserves and ensure their needs are met by special schemes , quotas ? Do they want a Tribal state with Autonomy (say Article 370) carved out of tribal areas so that the tribals can make their own decisions on resources and manage their own people - well that would make sense for a tribal revolution if there was one. But no they dont - they want to massacre the Bourgeoise class in India ( 100 million even if it was a conservative 10%) , overthrow democracy by arms , disband Indian security apparatus , justice system and economy - bring one party rule and set up their own party justice system - and grant independence to all ethnic groups from Indian union that choose ( I know they have promosed for Kashmir and North east , not sure if this is applicable for the hindu areas too - probably not - the evil hinduism should probably be eliminated to a post-religious society _ . The party would rein supreme. Party will charge , party will judge , party will sentence . With no elections ( there is no democracy see ) one just hopes you are on the good side of yout local communist boss ( you can send them your daughters you see , that will make them happy) and they can live the dream - and we the nightmare . Hypothetically , when they do overtake India there will atleast 50% ( short for 500 Million ) who wont accept the set-up ( Indian never agree on amything , do they) - what is to be done to the 50% as party tolerates no indiscipline - soaking hands in their blood as Charu Majumdar Prophetically suggested ? Maoist are very clear to state want absolute power and they want to achieve that in the next few decades and everybody exept the intellectual fools who are trying to fool others know what is in stake . pradeep chennai, India Mar 23, 2010 08:45 PM 85 Harish Mumbai, sure rapes happen. Atrocities happen. But not at the scale at which the self-proclaimed human rights activists who you admire so much claim. Arundhati Roy and her kind exaggerate to a great extent. When they say hundreds of rapes by security forces, there are actually about one or two. When they talk about thousands of murders by police, there are actually around five or six. Its only self-loathing idiots like you who believe these pseudo human rights activists. Their agenda is clear. Disintegration and destruction of India. They are soft terrorists. They kill with their words, not with bullets. And people like you support them. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 08:57 PM 86 The greatest enemies of India are not Maoists or Muslim terrorists. They are just mad dogs that have to be shot dead and our Army and our Police are well capable of doing that job. The greatest threat to India comes from the passive supporters of Maoism and Islamic terrorism who call themselves human rights activists, intellectuals and what not. Their objective is to humiliate, demoralise and demonise the Indian Army and Police so that they are not able to fight with all their strength. Their goal is same as Maoists and Muslim terrorists - disintegration, annihilation, destruction of India. Because thats what they hate most -India. Arundhati Roy, Outlook editor and journalists are valued members of this club. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 08:57 PM 87 Those of us endowed with a voice who would rush to claim that we have made ourselves out of hard work, fought and won against our ailments and are rightfully middle class, forget to recognize that we were plainly reaping the harvest of caste superiority, of a system rigged to work towards our advantage, and towards the disadvantage of the poor. That the water that we drink was snatched from their basins, that the power that we consume was generated in a dam that displaced a thousand villages. That the Probably these are not petty crimes, but the worst crime which we did commit and continue to commit without remorse, without a thought is to deny a face, a voice and a hope to these tribals, deprived of money, opportunities and rights. By a "democratically elected" representative government, which we allowed to do our dirty work. Her essay makes me wonder if our democratically elected, representative government is more patriotic or those that are its children, and who resist its murderous agenda. Varun Garde Bengaluru, India Mar 23, 2010 08:58 PM 88 I think many of us are missing few important points. 1> Roy is a brilliant story teller so when her pen starts she can take a fact and weave it brilliantly with imagination, color and empathy - present it to a mass audience. 2> She has the capacity influence and convince mainstream Indians (and many others) to justify Maoist violence. I admire that capacity 3> The issue has never been Indian govt, Maoist, lands or mountains. The fundamental issue has been the justice system in India. Remember that historically Indian people always sided or connected with someone whom they feel is just. They never cared about the ideology, politics or anything else. Since justice system is not delivering properly, all other avenues like corruption, nepotism, insurgents, Maoist, PWG etc come out. Other countries like China destroy these forces through brutality. Instead of focusing your energy to blast Ms Roy can you not ask : >> Justice system be revived, with time bound resolution Our people is our strength. Sarat kumar Banbarada, India Mar 23, 2010 09:08 PM 89 Varun Garde, you are an idiot. 25 years back the middle class in India accounted for just 5% of the population. Today it accounts for 25-30%. Where did this extra 25% come from ? They came from the poor, you nitwit. Poor need not remain poor. A country is not static. The reason there are so many poor people in India is because of Nehruvian socialism. Take that away, free the economy, and there will be more numbers added to the middle class. Few years of economic reforms have seen a phenomenal growth in the number of middle class. Imagine what can happen if India becomes a free market capitalist country... But then this is precisely what A. Roy's leftist comrades do not want. They want to keep India perpetually poor. They do not want the poor to lose their poverty and become rich. Because then, they would lose all their support. Prashant Bangalore, India Mar 23, 2010 11:31 PM 90 Mr Chidambaram, Don't listen to what these "Human Right Activists" say, The people have elected you, do your job. Mr Garde, these "friends" of the poor are destroying schools, They don't serve meat in vegetarian restaurants, and they don't call you pro-poor when you destroy the very Institutions that lift people out of poverty, now would you be called pro-povery or not, that's a different matter. Roy hates the economic reforms because the population Below poverty line is 25%, but for a different reason than you might think,she hates these reforms because they have reduced it to 25% from 70% in 1991. I'd like to know what she has been smoking when she comes to the assesment that the system caters to only the upper caste Hindus, when you find that the non-muslim minorities such as Zoroastrians(Ratan Tata),Sikhs(the PM) and Christians are actually doing better than the Hindus. And don't even get me started on the Reservations. The government has made mistakes, but the Maoists are a solution worse than the problem. Still I'd have no problem if they create a separate state,provided Roy Migrates to this country and does not torture readers with such articles. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 23, 2010 11:37 PM 91 harish amaratya sen got a nobel prize in economics. the western industrialised world gave it to him because it is concerned about the poor. it was a gesture of solidarity. all most all of these poor live in countries like india, pakistan, nepal, burma, ethiopia. its simple. roy blames the rich for all the misery.dont blame the poor, for haveing 5 to 6 children per family. dont blame mother india and nature because there is insufficient water, land and other resources for its increaing flock of children. dont blame corrupt politicians like lalloo,mayawati ,shibu soren, koda for stealing from their compatriots.these are children of the poor. whilst travelling through india i observed how every town and city had so many people. sitting, walking, lieing down. people,people and more.children without clothes. young people without jobs, and old helpless people without food. a friend of mine a doctor pointed out something to me. " it seems that the density of population in india is about 10 times greater than in danmark" prince phillips who is known for dropping bricks has said. " the population of the world has gone up from 2 billion to 6.7 billion in 60 years. this is the single greatest cause for environmental damage to our planet" imagine if india had not built damns ,irrigation canals, developed new rice and wheat seeds, and built fertiliser factories. roy is a nut- the only dispute is what kind of nut. it is amazeing that she can get her rubbish published. only in india. she would be laughed away as a nitwit in any informed company in the west.this happened once when a journalist from the economist dismissed all her opinions as being totally wrong. at her age its pathetic that she goes around playing the teenage girl with flowers in her hair, and pretending she is the indian evita peron. poverty in india is a sin,like everywhere else. it has to fought intelligently useing all the sciences and resources available to us. its contemptible to use it to win points with frivolous populism . gayatri devi delhi, India Mar 23, 2010 11:44 PM 92 And this is really funny, When a far-left maniac takes a jab at Hinduism, she is termed progressive, but talk about the Kashmiri pandits, you're a Hindu Bigot. Mr Mehta, It's a good thing you covered the tribals, now the Kashmiri Pandits,How about the Pandits? Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 24, 2010 12:57 AM 93 Fascinating reportage. And an excellent, thoughtful discussion. However, I'm still just not quite sure yet what it is about the aggressive tone, insulting language and eccentric typesetting that marks Martuza Polen out as the only troll in the village ... James London, United Kingdom Mar 24, 2010 12:57 AM 94 >>>it is amazeing that she can get her rubbish published. only in india. she would be laughed away as a nitwit in any informed company in the west Unfortunately this is not true. She is like our very own Noam Chomsky, Naomi Klein and Michael Moore, rolled into one. People like this are a curse on the productive and patriotic. SreekanthBoston Boston, United States Mar 24, 2010 01:50 AM 95 I doubt who is funding all this nonsense of hers. A true journalist is one who is unbiased. But, here right the word go, she starts praising the naxals and screwing our brave soldiers and police. I dont know whats her problem with the middle class. Look at the following link. She has heavily criticized even our Nuclear tests. Doe she really mean this nonsense or is she taking sides just for gaining publicity. http://www.ratical.c...es/endOfImagine.html Lakshmikanth Bangalore, India Mar 24, 2010 01:51 AM 96 Who's ready to take bets that "James" the troll is none other than the banished Dev Raya, Reddy, Old Mac...? Ajit Tendulkar Seattle, United States Mar 24, 2010 01:58 AM 97 'Dev Raya'/'James': >> However, I'm still just not quite sure yet what it is about the aggressive tone, insulting language and eccentric typesetting that marks Martuza Polen out as the only troll in the village ... Back again? Still seething over the fact that the moderator deleted all your posts in that thread, but kept everyone else's? Don't think you can ever -- ever -- get away with your racist statements. And try to attack me and I'll see that your posts are all deleted once again. Savvy? Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 24, 2010 02:07 AM 98 I think compliments are due to Arundhati Roy and Outlook for achieving what P. Chidambaram could not have managed: turning public opinion against the Maoists. Take all the "causes" Arundhati has espoused: nuclear weapons, Narmada, Afzal Guru, Kashmir... and in all of them, public opinion, even those who supported those causes, turned against only because of A. Roy's shrill, megalomaniacal and neverending rants. I just hope that Kanu Sanyal did not decide to take his life because Arundhati Roy decided to support the movement he founded so many years ago. He meant well for the tribals and the underprivileged. Ms Roy is concerned only with her own ego. Ajit Tendulkar Seattle, United States Mar 24, 2010 02:08 AM 99 What Arundhati really needs is a good, strong, hardball interview with a sensible, disinterested journalist and good interviewer. Her interview with Karan Thapar was an ultra-softball joke. Even Vir Sanghvi said so. Come to think of it, why not Vir? He could challenge her hypocrisy and black-and-white views very effectively. She'd be squirming. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 24, 2010 03:02 AM 100 "Take all the "causes" Arundhati has espoused: nuclear weapons, Narmada, Afzal Guru, Kashmir... and in all of them, public opinion, even those who supported those causes, turned against only because of A. Roy's shrill, megalomaniacal and neverending rants." Interesting observation. Maha NJ, United States Mar 24, 2010 03:36 AM 101 Yes, Murtuza, Maha, that is the pity of it. It is similar to the result of the methods of opposition adopted by Laloo and Mulayam Yadav to oppose the Women's reservation. The genuine arguments get drowned out because of people's revulsion. Ajit Tendulkar Seattle, United States Mar 24, 2010 04:15 AM 102 The Muslims, in the LONG run, will pay a very heavy price for helping Maoism to power in India. History has shown that the bloody-Left-Islamist alliance only operates UNTIL the Bloody-Left are in power. It happened thus in Russia and China. Once the savage despots of vthe "Left" are in power, their attitude to Islam changes radically. They need to destroy every element in the society that might possibly be outside their totalitarian ideology. And the mosque is precisely such an institution. So they wage extremely brutal wars against Muslim clergy and believers to force them to submit to totalitarian "leftist" ideology. (I don't believe there is anything leftist in any real sense in this ideology, hence the quotation marks.) In India, my guess is that eventually, with arms in the hands of masses of Hindu peasants as a result of Maoism, Islam will take a terrific hit. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:17 AM 103 Take a good look at these Maoists. They're tough guys. They can deal with jihadis, once in power. Their hands will not tremble. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:26 AM 104 One aspect of the Maoists being virtuallty in power in Nepal is that this Hindu country is now safe from Muslim expansionism. The Maoists have armed the Hindu and Buddhist peasants of Nepal, who will crush ruthlessly any Muslim attempt at takeover. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:29 AM 105 There is a lot to be said for Maoism - as a means of dealing with jehadis. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:32 AM 106 Just as Stalin was the only guy tough enough to crush Hitler, maybe Maoism is the only force to save India from Islam. Iqram Jahaz Jaipur, India Mar 24, 2010 08:31 AM 107 Gayatri Devi writes - "amaratya sen got a nobel prize in economics. the western industrialised world gave it to him because it is concerned about the poor. it was a gesture of solidarity. all most all of these poor live in countries like india, pakistan, nepal, burma, ethiopia." - I know that "Gayatri Devi" lives in one of the Scandinavian countries. But, it is good to know now that our "Gayatri Devi" is also a member of the Nobel Committee which sits in Sweden to be able to make such an outburst - or is that due to some "anti-Bongo" instinct ? But that will be surprising since the original "Gayatri Devi" was a Bongo herself ! Pinaki S Ray Adelaide, Australia Mar 24, 2010 09:09 AM 108 Why does Outlook continue to publish her nonsense week after week ? Do they have too much money now to waste on garbage like hers or they do not find any better writers / articles ? So much for the intelligent english media in India. I am yet to read one article by Arundhati Roy where she has praised India or anything Indian. She won a Booker's price, so she thinks she is the smartie pant. Who cares about Booker except flag waving, west obsessed hypocrites like her. For a change, she needs to find something good in India or else move to Italy or somewhere else. By the wa, where does she get the money to travel and have such luxuries to roam and " write " at will ? Wake up India, see the real story. Arundhati Roy is no journalist or writer, she is a puppet in those invisible hands who are eating up India like a rat from inside. Only in India can people do this kind of backstabbing like Arundhati keeps doing to India and get away with name and money for it. Vipul Jani toronto, Canada Mar 24, 2010 09:57 AM 109 A well written piece from Ms. Roy. The last time I read something like this was about Robin Hood and his Merry Band! Ms. Roy has, as is her wont, demonstrated brilliantly how a combination of erudition and verbosity can camouflage the travesty of truth! I am sure this article will appeal to all those people who still think it is fashionable (is it coming back?) to be anti-establishment, non-conformist, anarchic an so on .. A M Diwakar Bangalore, India Mar 24, 2010 10:05 AM 110 OUTLOOK henceforth must at least publish Arundhthi articles in fiction section. Tell her to add some of her mothers sexual escapades and may be she will get another "BOOKKER" Akil Bangalore, India Mar 24, 2010 10:54 AM 111 This is the only article by Arundhati Roy that I have read and some of the facts she mentioned ring true to me. For example, I have seen strategic hamleting in Mizoram around 1977 when I was working in the NEHU. A highway was built from one end of the state to another, villages were shifted near the highway,( and I was told) fenced off and needed identity cards to leave the fenced area to farm. And there is much similar material in Raul Banerjee's "Recovering the Lost Tongue: The Saga of Environmental Struggles in Central India", Rahul Banerjee worked for about 25 years with tribals in Central India. It seems to me that tribals have real problems. I wonder whether they are using Maoists since they could not get much support from elsewhere. Anandaswarup Gadde Melbourne, Australia Mar 24, 2010 12:05 PM 112 Anandaswarup Gadde, >> It seems to me that tribals have real problems. I wonder whether they are using Maoists since they could not get much support from elsewhere. Something has to be done to address the problems/concerns of tribals, not letting them turn to/into Maoists. To that extent, Ms Roy or anyone taking up to tell their story is not bad (it is even required) - without jumping from this point towards a support for communist/maoist regime, overthrowing inclusive constitutional democracy etc. Kumar Bangalore, India Mar 24, 2010 01:09 PM 113 kumar they have other choices- missionaries could convert them. build churches,and get them to ba another force against modi. faruki,s mullahs could get them to be muslims. however this could be risky. it would be tough for the women stumbling in the dark wearing black burqas, gayatri devi delhi, India Mar 24, 2010 01:54 PM 114 The attire of A.Roy seems familiar. Isn't that similar to what the Palestinian guerrillas don? May be she is revealing her inner unfulfilled commitments. This pest has found a matching company in those mindless terrorists with an ideological facade. Doubts having been raised about her source of funds to write all that thrash she has been writing, and if ever such source is identified and she is tried for treason and sentenced to death by hanging, I am too willing to be her hangman, my professional obligation notwithstanding. Such is my revulsion for this unforgivable idiot. sandilya Chennai, India Mar 24, 2010 02:51 PM 115 A.Roy is a 'gifted lady' of India and an Angel for millions of deprived people who have been subjected to horrendous discrimination and human rights abuses for centuries by fellow country men. Her adventure to expose the level of injustice and deprivation of these unfortunate people will be remembered for ever. She is a shining gem in a billion. Rajesh Sydney, Australia Mar 24, 2010 03:14 PM 116 A.Roy, your 'GREED' for publicity and spotlight always get better of you. You are incorrigible, aren't you? You got a slap on your wrist from Supreme Court for putting your foot in your mouth, but you still can't stop doing that. You are shameless, aren't you? Ravi Kant Asthana Portsmouth, United Kingdom Mar 24, 2010 03:27 PM 117 So you saw 'Vedanta Cancer Hospital' board and realised that there must be mineral or ore's mountain close by which this corrupt corporate want's to exploit. Is exploiting natural resources of the country for betterment of country infrastructure is corruption? You took journey by train, bus and motorbike to meet your comrades. Were these assets and whatever infrastructure you used were created my maigic wand of a tribal witch? Ravi Kant Asthana Portsmouth, United Kingdom Mar 24, 2010 03:36 PM 118 You find smile of certain 'mangtu' seductive and you don't find him security threat even though he can handle all kinds of weapon except LMG. You find police personal who are being trained to fight the Maoists are Mad dogs, rapists and oppressors, but you don't find anything wrong when Mangtu and his ilks burn and kill those willagers who don't want follow their dictates. A poor policemen who was beheaded by your comrades was most probably there because he had a family to feed back at home. Small kids who needed education. Your comrades took away that precious support from his family, made his wife widow and his children's future uncertain and yet they are revolutionary for you? And yet you have guts to talk of 'corrupt MINDS' of government. It's you and your comrades who are MAD DOGS. and they will be treated like a MAD DOGS. SHOOT TO KILL. Ravi Kant Asthana Portsmouth, United Kingdom Mar 24, 2010 03:45 PM 119 THIS IS ONLY EMOTIONS OF ROY... NOTHING. WHEN MAOVADI KILLED POLICEMEN OR INNOCENT THAT TIME WHY ROY NOT CRITICIZED THAT ATTACK.. SHE IS NOT A WRITER OR JOURNALIST... ONLY AGAINST FOR COUNTRY.. SOME TIME SHE TALK AGAINST SARDARSAROVAR. NOW SHE FAVOURS MAOIST.. DIPAK D. CHUDASAMA HYDERABAD, India Mar 24, 2010 03:57 PM 120 those ppl who can not counter the points raised by arundhati roy target her.if she is fake,her detractors should point out where she is instead of labeling her as communist,catholic and what not.its better to analyze her article than to analyse or abuse her angarag guwahatai, india Mar 24, 2010 04:01 PM 121 Arundhati Roy doesn't surprise me. Her pretentious, self-righteous, highly hypocritical articles are the staple of the so-called 'intelligentsia', an intellectual cabal determined to send the Indian state back to the stone age. The target of Operation green Hunt is misplaced; it instead should have been directed towards these pseudo-intellectuals than the Maoists. P.S. I'm rather rather glad that the Mossad is assisting the Indian personnel to weed out these terrorists from the Indian soil. Arnav Das Sharma Nagpur, India Mar 24, 2010 04:14 PM 122 Arundhati Roy is India's biggest security threat! Arnav Das Sharma Nagpur, India Mar 24, 2010 05:26 PM 123 Hey Anurag, You want us to point out where she is wrong? All right, let's start with her Anti-Development stand. 1.She continues her tirade against the middle class and neo-"liberal policies", when it is a fact that we didn't have a 25% middle class before these reforms, the 25% BPL population is disturbing, but it is utopia compared to the License Raj 70%. 2.The Psuedo-liberalism, Roy and her kind sound like a broken record, Rapes by soldiers in Kashmir,Iraq, FACT:Those Guilty are punished, unlike the Maoists who despite burnuing villages are more worthy of her sympathy, and what of the Kashmiri Pandits, the Tibetans, the ones who are really oppressed, If this woman was alive in 1943, she'd say that the worst war crime in the second world war was the bombing of Dresden, and not the Mass murder of jews. 3.Her Hypocritical stand on the environment, while building Mansions on illegal forest land. And Mr Vinod Mehta, You think this piece of trash is worthy of a cover story? If so, also write about the grievances in Pakistan and China. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 24, 2010 05:29 PM 124 And Anurag, please point out where she is right, when was the last time she actually suggested a solution to a problem Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 24, 2010 05:33 PM 125 And to comment #23 Pete,You Aussies have done a great job with the Aborigines and the White Australia policy. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 24, 2010 08:25 PM 126 Arundhati has spoken of a solution to these problems in one of her interviews: The solution is to do things the right way as scripted in our constitution. The problem has arisen because we have deviated from our constitution and the only logical solution is to go back to the constitution. For every man deprived of his rights, the law must restore his rights; to every woman raped by a policeman or any one else, the rapist must be punished; to every corporate body that manipulates the law and brings untold miseries to the innocent masses, the law must catch and regulate them; to every politician who uses his power to suppress and exploit people, the law must punish him/her; and so on. The solution is to restore the constitution as envisioned when it was incorporated in free India and not let it become a farce as it has become today. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 24, 2010 08:31 PM 127 Do you think the tribals have no other work but to raise a war against the state where they stand to lose everything for nothing in return? They are fighting because they are pushed to the edge of their survival. It is we who have pushed them to that war. And it is we who need to step back to give them some room to return to their normal life. If we keep pressurizing them with our supposedly developmental policies, it is we who are the real perpretators of war, not them. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 24, 2010 09:25 PM 128 Reader Man - Can you point out to the article where Arundhati says being true to Indian Constitution is the solution - I would be surprised if she considers Indian constitution worth the paper it is written . If you read carefully the comments below you will notice none has fallen for the line what we seeing here is tribal revolution - this is protracted war by Maoists with the sole objective of wresting absolute power . nothing less. So we can have a separate discussion on the people on the sidelines but not in this context . Maoist terror is unacceptable and has no place . Fair and simple. pradeep chennai, India Mar 24, 2010 09:48 PM 129 Pradeep, it was an interview she gave to a foreign journalist. You may find it on YouTube. But who are the Maoists and why are they only on tribal land? The Maoists were supposed to be decimated several times in the past 60 years. But why do they always spring back every time? It is because we provide the "fodder" in the shape of these "harassed" tribals. And every time we try to wipe them out of the face of this nation by military force, we are sowing the seeds for the next round of maoist revolution. A classic example is the Vedanta mining in the Dongria Kondh tribal area of Orissa - as hinted by Arundhati in this article. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 24, 2010 09:51 PM 130 Does Ms. Roy know that there was a non-violent movement in Chattisgad by Shankar Guha Niyogi. Strangely all the players in Chattisgad seem to have conveniently forgotten Niyogi. Selective memory or ignorance? An article on Niyogi http://otherindia.or...s/niyogihis_work.pdf abcde1101us bidar, india Mar 24, 2010 10:08 PM 131 Reader Man - Proof of Arundhati's "approval" of Indian constitution as valid is too important to give benefit of doubt it might exist somewhere .. you claimed she did - the onus is on you to prove ( If at all there was such an interview , I would be looking for the ifs and buts ) Yes Maoists are predominantly in the Tribal areas , that doesnt prove anything .. Why would the tribals want to take over India - they are harassed they want to throw away security forces , declare independence - that sounds coherant . Why a protracted war to claim the red-fort ? what do the tribals want to achive in New Delhi far away from DK ? Plant Trees ? pradeep chennai, India Mar 24, 2010 11:15 PM 132 Reader Man, I'm not against the tribals, The Indian political establishment has neglected the development of the poor,asserting their legitimacy by merely having voted in. In fact ,If this movement gives them a kick in the pants and gets them to work, then they may even be regarded as heroes. But how can you call them pro-poor when they destroy Railway tracks,roads, the little civil Administration that's left. The Maoists aren't pro-poor, they are like Roy herself pro-poverty, Instead of addressing their condition, they are using it for their support for power in order to overthrow the Indian state. They have popular support, but so did the Chinese communist party when they were fighting the Kuomintang. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 12:05 AM 133 What an eye-opener! This is arguably the most well-researched piece ever written on the Naxal movement. It's really difficult to distinguish between the Naxals and the Navis in James Cameroon's Avatar. Mazhar Dubai, United Arab Emirates Mar 25, 2010 12:17 AM 134 Mazhar , One is not surprised that someone in Dubai is thinks this is the best piece ever - but can you explain which part of this 20000 word travelogue is "research" ? pradeep chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 01:09 AM 135 Author found a hundred reasons like a seasoned lawyer ( with half baked findings ) why Afzal Guru should not be hanged and made it know in every forum , but surprisingly finds it is a viable alternate Justice system where 2 people were executed on spot where the crowd thought they cant be trusted anymore ? Ever heard about Coliseum and Gladiators ? pradeep chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 01:49 AM 136 Mazhar: >> What an eye-opener! This is arguably the most well-researched piece ever written on the Naxal movement. Are you joking? This is nothing but cheap propaganda, with the explicit goal of humanizing the Maoists. Well, you know what, I can go embedded with the Taliban for a few days, too, and get some "Boy, what a smile!" type pictures and a few moving tales of Talib courage. But it would be stupid and pointless. The Taliban are defined by their ideology. As should the Maoists be. Maoism killed more than 20 million people in Mao's China. Is that not more important than some Jungle Book-type picnics with Maoists? >>It's really difficult to distinguish between the Naxals and the Navis in James Cameroon's Avatar. Speak for yourself, brother. Did I tell you how I have trouble telling the difference between al-Qaeda and The Flintstones? Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 25, 2010 04:20 AM 137 a question to you all who have been vilifying her? what solution do you propose instead of sending the army and police? how many of you had your mothers and sisters raped ? how many of you have been kicked out of your home? how many of you have bothered to visit Bastar? very easy to castigate her. what are we doing except sit on couches and passing snide remarks? you may disagree with her sympathies but there is no place for namecalling in this forum. sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 04:53 AM 138 Sabu - do I hear since some forest officials raped lets assume every woman and lady in the tribal areas across 4 states they want to take over the country ? However I try I couldnt find a logical connection between the alleged grief and the stated objective of the movement . would be glad if you can explain why .. If my understanding is wrong , and If the Maoist objective is not to take over the state , then there will be room for other solutions instead of vilifying the mobile republic pradeep chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 05:27 AM 139 pradeep, do you seriously believe the Maoists can take over India? Do you think most Indians would support that? No, and it is not going to happen. They happen to believe in something does not mean it is feasible. The real concern is not their ideology. the concern is how to wean the poor people away from them. the reign of terror unleashed by the state isn't helping it. when DGPs like Vishwaranjan talk about hunting them down like Mice you have to wonder where our discourse has descended. these are our own people we are talking abou. If the govt can talk to NSCN, AASU, do you want me to believe they cannot talk to the Maoists? When Chidambaram said sop violence for 72 hours, the Chattisgarh police was sill picking up villagers there. Why are academics like nandini Sunda of DSE stopped from going to Bastar if the gov has nothing to hide? How much coverage of Brualities of the Police and COBRA do you see on TImes Now while Arnab Goswami waxes eloquently about Maoist beheadings. Make no mistake what happned ti Francis Induwar was reprehensible. But how many Dalit beheadings by ranvir sena or Salwa Juddum has been so eloquently reported by our media. the real issue is not development. the real issue is that these tribals have been made aware by Maoists that they are also political subjects and they can articulate their demands instead of being pushed around by the state. for us it is uncomfortable because we have always been elitist in presumption, egalitarian in assumptions. now when they refuse o vacate the land which rightflly belongs to them under the consituion, we see them against dvelopment. why? becasue for so long we have thought what is good for them never presuming they can think for themselves other than casting a vote for every 5 years. so when a journalist like Ms. Roy paints a picture of their lives that does not fit with our narrative, we call her names. i do not like her glorification of Charu Mazumder et al. But the stories we get is true and it hits us hard because we are obssessed with GDP but not inequalities. what is the option for these people to seek recourse? go to a judge who wont listen to them? go to a leader like Madhu Koda? or to the Police? If the govt is serious about this issue it has to allow academics and development experts to engage them and focus on rural empowerment through accountable representatives from these people instead of raising more paramilitiaries with our tax money sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 05:31 AM 140 An awesome article... More often than not the mainstream media chooses to ignore some of the worst cases of State atrocities... not because they are not aware of it... but because "We - the middle class" do not care what is happening to everyone else as long as our dinner and breakfasts are not affected... I am proud that we have people like Arundhati who take the trouble to get to the truth, instead of just skimming the surface and writing the State fed story. If only our so called "democratic" government worked towards fulfilling the promise of our independence - SWARAJ(self-rule) and the vision of Bapuji - Swanirvar samaj (self sufficient societies)... we would not be so easily swayed by the wills, wishes and fancies of some MNCs. I only hope and pray that we stop this destructive path to so called "development"... before it is too late... http://www.darjeelin...-and-The-Damned.html Jai Gorkhaland Upendra Winnipeg, Canada Mar 25, 2010 06:43 AM 141 Sabu - It doesnt matter if a banned Organization has the capability to overthrow the state or if we believe in such a prospect . What matters is what their ideology is and what they stand for . Just read what Ganapathy has to say about what his vision for the future below http://news.rediff.c...might.htm#contentTop Sample extract below " There is a new hope that national liberation struggles will hasten if the Maoist revolution advances. In this context, in accordance with MLM (Marxism Leninism and Maoism), the party always maintained the position of the right to self-determination, including secession of all oppressed nationalities. This has to be utilised to unite with them and form a united front." And you want me to believe they are struggling for tribal rights and we should not take their central threat seriously. Their primary objective is to undermine Indian union and they will take up whatever grievance that they find on their way , be it tribals , telengana , labor unrest , land acquisition for SEZ . Please dont justify Maoist terror tactics by shielding them behind Tribal plight . The day tribals stand for themselves and shun the Maoists is the day their struggle will gain legitimacy . pradeep chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 07:25 AM 142 Hats off to Ms Arundhathi Roy. She is one of the rare Indian celebrity writers with conviction. Ms Arundhati Roy,thanks a lot for brining out in vivid details the lives Maoist's lead in Dandakaranya. Poor people's problems are real. State terrorism is also real. However, I am not convinced about the methods used and shallow rhetoric deployed by the Maoists to bring revolution. They still swear by Maoism, when China is violating all canons of justice vis-a-vis the rural poor in their country, in encouraging the corporates and SEZs. Ideologically Indian Maoists they are on a weak wicket. They cannot show one single country in the world where Maoism is sccessfully practised to alleviate people's problems. They are sacrificing their lives for a lost cause. G. Niranjan Rao Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India Mar 25, 2010 07:26 AM 143 Pradeep, the interview I wrote about is the Riz Khan one (in Part 1). It is on the YouTube on the Internet. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 07:34 AM 144 Pradeep, If you think ideology operates in a vaccum sadly you are mistaken. then it is a belief not an ideology. russian revolution did not take place because Lenin was dreaming about proletarian uprising. there are certain socio cultural conditions in which they operate and find acceptance. for 60 years these people have been neglected an shunned by those same democratic institutions that serve you and me well but turned them away. as i asked you who do they go to. you ask them to shun the maoists. i ask the same too. question is what is replacement in present scenario. have you ever been to bastar, manipur or kashmir to see what the state does there. why would they give up their land when it is their constitutionally protected right and the state refuses to rehablitate them if they do. look a what is ahppening in orissa. why SEZs. would you work in a place where you have no labor rights. i am sure you would not but you would want these people to work there because it suits and profits keep coming although they are being screwed. for too long people like you have asked them to shut up and listen to you becasue you think you know what is best for them. go work in SEZs in appaling conditions. dont you feel ashamed subjecting your fellow ciizens to such misery hat you would never wish for your own family. what is development. for whom. how much is the compensation paid to them. i would ask you to check this link www.otherindia.org and check the report the butterfly and the mahua flower. it is by swedish aid organization not some hack job. even these people know they cannot win against the state. but you cannot stop them because they have nothing more to loose after all these years. i asked you how much of manipur is focussed in national media, was it featured that NHRC said Lalmohan Tudu o PCPA was killed point blank at Lalgarh bysecurity forces. thhis is only of many such kilings. but one police officer gets killed and our middle class sentiments get titillated becasue he is one of us, rom middle class maybe knows english, looks like us. But they are tribals so we have a birth right to think we know what is right for them. what they should do. as i said violence on both sides is reprehensible. as the dominant party is the inidan state willing o engage them. no. look at the this forum, anyone who chooses to disagree with he majority is branded a sympathiser. human rights activists are decried as eltists even as enemies of the state. while some such activiss are rabble rouser a majority are freethinkers. why cant we be critical of both sides and listen to what the ribals have to say. how many tribal leaders themselves have been covered by he media. i have no time educated maoist leaders or their intellectual crap as i know what is feasible and what is not. dont create strawman by citing ganapathy and then assailing him. do we have anything democratic to offer to the tribals and listen to them or do we want to settle scores on our terms. his is a political battle than our police cannot solve. why did the state banish Himangshu Kumar. why did it imprison Binayak Sen. Why are we decrying Arundhai now. becasue we cannot handle what they have to say. we want our SEZs, minings and real estate. while the rest can go to hell. make no mistake this mindset is a recipe for disaster when we refuse o listen what the other side has to say or just cherypick words to suit our purpose. how can you believe that with a 1.3 million strong army and many more paramilitary they will overthrow the state. they cannot but they will make us feel uncomfortable just as Kashmiris have done. which is why we are so eager o exterminate them before they can talk sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 08:59 AM 145 Sabu puts forth a valid argument. A crude analogy here - if I were cornered by an opponent closing in on me with a menacing sword, I would grab the next item (stone, stick, soil, whatever) lying besides me and try to counter the opponent. The tribals are in the same cornered situation. After having suffered neglect for more than 60 years, the government, instead of helping them, comes and says that they must vacate the land because mining will take place on their land or a dam will be built there. I am no fan of Maoism or Maoists but the tribals have no one to go to with their problems. In comes the Maoists. We cannot win this war by blasting out the Maoist-Tribals with military force. As long as our policies do not take into account the genuine benefit of the tribals, there will always be another round of uprising. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 09:30 AM 146 Do the tribals have a right to fight injustice?, HELL YES Do Maoists have a right to destroy the little civil infrastructure that's left in that country?, HELL NO You're right, Reader Man and Sabu, Guns and bullets are not the are not the right way to go about it. It is through building schools,hospitals and solid social infrastructure which will lift them out of poverty. Our point is that the Maoists are not letting that happen. Even when the government does build a hospital, this far-left retard screams corruption. The Tribals being Indian citizens, have a right as much as any of us to lead a better life, but how is that possible when your schools are demolished. Protest against land acquisition, but also protest against the fact that they are not letting any doctors into those areas. In fact, this woman may have done more harm than good to the tribal's cause because of her sponsorship. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 09:51 AM 147 Narendra, that is exactly what is wrong with most of us. what is point of stooping to ad hominem attacksÉ If you think you can write better than her, I am sure Oulook will be happy to publish you. Till then, it is for the sake of decency one should keep quiet if one does not have any relevant point to offer. this is a forum to discuss ideas not launch personal attacks sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 10:26 AM 148 This is Journalism at its ultimate best. I'd urge most of the people who have commented to look at the story from the sorry-state of the tribals point of view rather than Arundhati-a-maoist-romanticist. While most of us continue to brand Naxals as the biggest internal threat, the government has already signed 1000 MoU's with multi-national companies to take over the Dandakaranya forests for which villages will be burnt, women will be raped, men and children be-headed. Thank you Arundhati for this and continue the good work. You are an inspiration. Ashwat Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 11:00 AM 149 Thanks Ashwat. It could be 1000 or just 100 MoUs but the first step the government can take is make all these MoUs public. Let the citizens of this nation know what the government plans to do in this tribal belt. And then let there be an independent hearing of each of these MoUs with experts from all fields (including tribal rights bodies) and the tribals themselves. Only then we can hear the true voices of the tribals without interference from either the government or the Maoists. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 11:22 AM 150 Arundhaty. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you for the heart touching report. It made me cry so many times. How ignorant is Indian middle class about what is going on in the forests? How careless it is? Is this called development? Certainly not of the humanity of the mind. And what it came to me the most often when reading is the face and figure of the home minister, that swine. That pig is still working for monstrous corporations like Vedanta, not for the good of Indian people for sure...Is this India's great democracy? Shame, shame, shame...It's ruled by brahmins and the two blocks of Cong and BJP are just a farce to fool the people. Both are pressing for the same agenda, both are equally criminal... I can't tell how grateful I'm to Roy for the masterpiece she made and congratulation to Outlook as well. You have almost broke a taboo by publishing this story. janez jalen Ljubljana, Slovenia Mar 25, 2010 11:24 AM 151 Okay maybe the personal attacks are a bit too far. But you have to admit, this is psuedo-liberalism at its worst, The relevant point is that this far-left maniac is siding with those who have burned down a village, just because the villagers refused to join them, what friend of the poor would do that? What of their rights? I'd like to make my stand clear, I DO NOT SUPPORT OPERATION GREENHUNT, The problems of the poor have to be addressed by bringing in the soft power of the democratically elected government, But you have to make sure that those building the Hospitals are not attacked. The State might be a terrorist, And I emphasize might, but that does make the Maoists freedom fighters. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 11:49 AM 152 A pitiful propagandist you are Narendra. Have you read the Roy's article at all? Do you know in what fashion schools are built and for what they are used? You wouldn't let people live other way than yours, no? Everyone need to live according to your stupid model, for example: sipping Coke and watching stupid TV, going around with your pitiful Tata car. Or maybe you've grabbed enough to buy a Honda? Infrastructure and mainstream model of development brings only harm to these people, don't you understand. It brings stupidity you very mind is promoting. janez jalen Ljubljana, Slovenia Mar 25, 2010 11:54 AM 153 Narendra, what is liberalism then. if expressing sympathy for the poor is called pseudo liberalism, what is then proper liberalism. This is a piece of subjecive journalism. a point of view which we do not ususally hear. you have to thank her for that. i do not think she is saying bombing of schools is right. question is what are those buildings used for. not for education but for housing paramilitary. this is a guerilla war and they are fighting it the way it is meant to be fought. we might not agree with their tactics but we are not in their position. Calling Ms. ROy a far left commentator does not take us anywhere. we should try to mobilize the civil society to act as a mediator between both sides. i believe such attempts have been tried. The maoists in lalgarh have said hey are willing to talk provided certain members of intellegentsia act as mediators. and what does chidambaram do. says everyone who does not toe govt line is a maooist sympathiser. are we living in Bushland or what. Its still Us Vs Them going on. we are all part of the same country, damm it. this piece just gives a glimpse into the history and oppression of these people. i do not think Ms. Roy is a far left rabble rouser or she would not have the credibility to write in this publication. we should stop and reflect quietly what is going on in our names. with our tax money. finishing off our own people. sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 12:35 PM 154 Meaningless! The first word that came to my mind about my own work! And I do what is we call "Peace Building". After reading Arundhati Roy's conversation with Maoist while walking with them and giving light to the hidden truth that no democratic government will ever allow to be seen! grateful for the insights for which she risked her life... And now it is important to remind myself that every bit, including my work is useful, yet it is important to realize that we are living in the midst of violence,and wee need to do every litle bit without giving up, In Peace. Agyatmitra Pune, India Mar 25, 2010 01:29 PM 155 Proper liberalism is where each and every citizen is taught democratic values, this is not the case in India, this is why the Caste system still exists. Majority of the populace does not get proper education, this is the cause of poverty. Praying for the poor who were driven out of their homes by the pollicemen is fine, but what of the poor people whose village was burnt because they refused to join the Maoists? If the politics of development are to be condemned, then so are the tactics of the Maoists. Consider the following scenario, Chidambaram meets with Kishenji, they come up with an agreement that the Majority of the revenue from the mining will be used for development of the area and building civil infrastructure(Hospitals,schools) and that the Maoists Abjure violence and contest elections. If this is how things work out, Then Great. I'd even consider Kishenji a hero, but there are reasons to believe this is not what the Maoists want. You are absolutely right in saying that the civil society groups should resolve this situation, but I genuinely ask you what kind of a truce would you suggest, that will cause them to lay down their arms . I never said that the security forces are heroes bringing in order and prosperity. And trust me, her sponsorship do more harm than good to their cause. If any other journalist comes up with an article which actually highligts their plight, and does not romanticise and glorify the people who blow up a bus carrying civilians, then it's fine. I'm merely suggesting that the Tribals are caught between a rock and a hard place. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 01:53 PM 156 the reality is complicated. we know such a deal is unlikely. although desirable. i would still have reservations about environment as bauxite iron ore mines are highly polluting. but that is still far away from this discussion. the real problem is how to make these people feel they too have a voice. which right now i believe is coming through maoists. there is probably a tribal non tribal divide in representation of the maoist leadership that this article doesnot bring up. if that be the case, then they are not the true representatives of tribal interests. but right now they are the only voice we are hearing. so i think the state should stop such jingoism and try to talk. 60 years of injustice cannot be mitigated in a year. but at least we can start without always blaming each other. can we assure certain human rights and dignity to the tribals who we hae ignored for so long. convincing them they will be redressed is the biggest challenge facing us now. but given the track record of the state, i am not too hopeful. this will probably turn into another bloodbath while we keep arguing on the web. as for ms. roy, i commend her reporting but i do not agree with her views. having said that, in a democracy all views are acceptable and should be debated as long as they are explicitly hate speech. sabu kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 02:03 PM 157 A quick read of the narrow-minded, vicious comments published here as a response to Roy's article convinces me of the need for a revolution in India. Roy is the only voice of conscience of an India that is blinded by corporate greed, political corruption, imperial hubris, and utter injustice to its common people. She may be a small person but her towering courage and boundless love for the downtrodden makes her a giant among Indians and the world. Lal Salam to Roy! Your courage is an inspiration to all. Revolution is inevitable. Nepal today, India tomorrow! Inquilab Jindabad! Alfred Abdul New York, United States Mar 25, 2010 02:31 PM 158 'Alfred Abdul' says: >> Lal Salam to Roy! Your courage is an inspiration to all. Revolution is inevitable. Nepal today, India tomorrow! Inquilab Jindabad! I have this feeling that the FBI would be interested to get to know you. You know, that thing we have about Revolutionary Commie nutters? To a 'lal' hell with the likes of you. Murtuza Polen NYC, United States Mar 25, 2010 02:37 PM 159 We don't want a large, massive offensive(the one that is going on). But at the same time the suggested compromise is not possible. But we could try moving in feet instead of running in miles. Instead of a bloodbath we can do this, Build more schools, hospitals and roads, feed the people. We take a slow and steady approach while dealing with these people, We bring in social infrastructure slowly,village by village,district by district. Instead of an all out offensive(Which will only sow seeds for future generations of maoists) we do it over a period of time, at the same time making sure that the Naxals don't get any stronger. If the Naxal kick in the pants gets the government to do just what they should have done decades ago,they are heroes not just for the tribals, but for the entire nation. The problem with Roy is that she does not have a single good thing to say about India. Is this really so? Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 02:41 PM 160 We waited for 60 years to even hear the voices of these tribals. It will take a long time to come up with a comprehensive solution to their problems because we have not really understood their problems that well in the first place. It cannot be decided overnight on the deadline/ultimatum set up by some MNC/corporate body/government-in-a-hurry. The Indian government needs to understand that we are not China that can implement "projects" overnight without a care of human rights. The human cost of a military campaign will be too high for us to handle in the future unless we become the next military China. Reader Man Kolkata, India Mar 25, 2010 03:03 PM 161 I read a lot of middle class becoming 5 to 25 and the poor getting reduced from 70 to 30 sort of comedies.25 yrs back the city of delhi/mumbai/chennai were all affordable to all classes.the rental rates were within their limits and if they save properly they can get their own small house/apartment.it was the same in most towns/large villages who do cultivation thrice a yr the govt hospitals and schools were the only one for the rich and poor,politician and businessman and since the crowd was from top to bottom it helped the poor too(the standard of aiims is far better to the govt hospitals in lucknow or bangalore as the politicians and rich too get treated in aiims unlike the others).the govt schools produced many stalwarts which included many from the poor as they were the only source of schooling for all whether rich or poor/brahmin or dalit. by reforms the cost of land/rent has shoot up and now 95% of the population cannot afford to rent/own a house in cities/towns. the govt hospitals and schools have been mis managed as it is only the poor who visit them and noone who matters bothers about their state the lower middle class aspires to be rich and get into the trap of putting their children in pvt schools and getting treated in pvt hospitals making them descend to poor very fast.the number of homeless have increased post reforms as in old india there were places for refugees like tibetans/roaming communities like gypsies,vangujjars and any skilled worker/group and coming and camping in villagetown was not resisted now even biharis/north indians who work as labours/masons/drivers r not tolerated and reforms defenitely have a role in it.shivsena in 70s were against southindians who dominated the white collar govt jobs but now post reforms they are threatened even by unskilled labour.upper/middle/lower/poor class r all myths used by economists to cheat one and all.the cost of living has gone up several hundred times in the past 20 yrs and hence the suffereing of the poor and lower middle class has multiplied. the tribals have been living like these for 1000s of yrs and any modernisation should be on their terms and not forced by some with ulterior motives.they will defenitely not be against dams and development if they r a part of it but unfortunately its not so.punjabis running from pakistan during partition were given land in delhi/chandigarh etc which were quiet precious at that time too and now value in crores but the poor tribals r given pittance. why can they be given land in all main cities which r under the govt if they really want to help them. why cant they be trained and employed in railways/army/paramilitary forces etc which they r more than willing to join. why naxalite problem aroses in areas where there r mixed populations and reddys/kayasths/bhumihars own the lands and not in nagaland or mizoram (the govt goes for cease fire with those tribals as it has realised that the entire population is tribal and they dont have any caste/group over there to play to their tunes. ganapathi chennai, India Mar 25, 2010 04:27 PM 162 It is great effort, great journalism. The pain can be understood only by those who loose their land to deaf & dumb government which still implement 1894 Land acquisition Act enacted by Britishers to acquire Indian land as per their convenience. Indian Government is doing what Britishers did to us through it's politicians and bureaucrats. These politicians and bureaucrats forget that they are part of us. It is always easy to criticize by writing mails sitting in AC rooms and with fingers dancing on your laptop. Atleast somebody has tried to go to roots and analyze and address the problem which most of us are unaware of. Pankaj Yadav Gurgaon, India Mar 25, 2010 05:10 PM 163 http://bratgaba.sule...uicide-or-murder.htm In the context of the existing situation in our villages and tribal areas, I don't think Kanu Sanyal could have had any other end. Remember the film Rang De Basanti? I have had many an argument with friends (who incidentally call me 'jholawala') about the end being too pessimistic – all the boys die – it was largely opined that the writer and director erred in ending the story thus. My opinion differed – there could have been NO other rational ending to that story. The boys (in the film) were up against the full might of a determinedly corrupt govt which had skeletons to hide – they had to be killed, there was no other way out; there was no way they could have won the grossly unequal battle and suicide would have been a copout. Kanu Sanyal, likewise, had to be either killed, or he had to end it himself. There was no way he could win, and I guess, knowing that to be the only truth, knowing that the 'system' was too strong for mere mortals, he chose to end it himself. Maybe we'd have paid more attention to Kanu Sanyal and his cause if he was named Che Guevara – just a thought. It is fashionable to have Che's posters on the walls even though he had nothing to do with India, but a poster of Kanu Sanyal or any of his ilk would invite immediate arrest. Get this - there are more than 400 Facebook pages on Che Guevara – just one of those pages has a 'fan' list of 350,000 (many Indians) – Kanu Sanyal has just ONE page – with a rich picking of NINE fans. Bharatram Gaba Bombay, India Mar 25, 2010 05:38 PM 164 The Maoists are a solution worse than the problen,people. Good governance is the only way out of this, we as middle class must make the government get the people out of poverty. I don't want India to do the same thing to the tribals, what the "Australians"(Peter, Author of comment #23) did to the Aborigines or what Americans did to the American Indians. But we must also make sure that we don't become like the Chinese civil war. Why can't we take the Scandinavian route, Becoming a developed country with Inclusive growth. Social Democracies like Sweden are the Solution, Not China and certainly not the license Raj. Narendra Hyderabad, India Mar 25, 2010 07:25 PM 165 I think the ket argument Ms. Roy makes is this "The Indian Constitution, the moral underpinning of Indian democracy, was adopted by Parliament in 1950. It was a tragic day for tribal people. The Constitution ratified colonial policy and made the State custodian of tribal homelands. Overnight, it turned the entire tribal population into squatters on their own land. It denied them their traditional rights to forest produce, it criminalised a whole way of life. In exchange for the right to vote, it snatched away their right to livelihood and dignity." How can the Indian state sell of land as its own and ignore the millions that have lived on it for centuries. Its the corporate land grab in connivance with Manmohan, Chidambaram and Sonia that is the key issue. 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