From: Kranti Priya <naxalbari_in@yahoo.co.in>
Date: Sat, May 8, 2010 at 5:29 PM
Subject: [** MAOIST_REVOLUTION **] Article on Green hunt - Communist Party of India (Marxist - Leninist) Naxalbari
To: maoist_revolution@yahoogroups.com
Patriotism and Human Rights in India's Civil War
ajith
Unprecedented in the intensity of attack and extent of loss inflicted on the state forces, the Dantewada ambush that caused the death of 76 CRPF men became a defining moment in Indian politics. The fact that it took place right in the midst of Operation Greenhunt, an encirclement and suppression campaign being carried out with heavy deployment of forces, the message this gave, was duly recorded by the people; as well as by their enemies. While the revolutionary masses in India and abroad rejoiced, the main ruling class political parties like the BJP and CPM kept aside all political differences to join in supporting Home Minister Chidambaram. It is reported that Chidambaram's throat quavered while reporting to the Lok Sabha that the Maoists characterise it as a "pigsty"; perhaps because this wouldn't be a true market valuation of the Indian parliament bursting to the seams with crorepaties, busy in making more crores! But what is most significant is the, forced, public admission made by the rulers on the true nature of the armed struggle going on in the central-eastern region of India. Till now the activists of the CPI (Maoist) were being described as an anti-development gang using the Adivasis to cover up their loot of forest contractors. Now the Manmohan Singh government has been forced to confess the truth - it is a political movement fighting for political power.
The society we live in and the political power (state) protecting it stand on one side. Opposed to it are an emergent new society and the political power protecting it. Both are fighting each other. A civil war. This is the contemporary reality of India. The military activities of the People's Guerrilla Army (PLGA) fighters led by the CPI (Maoist) and the Indian state must be examined in this light. Loss of human lives is inevitable in any war. To judge its right and wrong we must first seek out the logic and legitimation of this civil war.
What we see on one side of this civil war is existing Indian society with exploitation and oppression oozing from every pore, the state protecting it and its armed forces. Ranged against this is a new society being built as part of a struggle to create an India and a world free of exploitation, and the new state and armed forces that make this possible. Here, the Adivasis, pushed to the margins of society for centuries together and put down by mainstream society as 'primitives', are in the forefront. This is a brilliant example of the creativeness of peoples dismissed as backward and the enormous capacity of Maoism to unleash and guide it. Confronting the Indian state they are creating an alternate life, a development path, that stands out as a model for the whole country; something that should replace imperialist destructive development, caste-feudal stagnation, and along with that Brahminist social structures and values. The revolutionary people's war being waged under the leadership of the CPI (Maoist) is just. The suppression campaign carried out by the Central-State rulers against it is unjust.
Among the 76 CRPF men killed in the ambush most would have come from poor or middle class families. Just like the fighters of the PGLA who attacked and killed them, they too were born to the people. Such fratricide is certainly an ever present tragic feature of any civil war. This is not new to the Indian subcontinent. But what is legitimised by the Puranas with the plea of justice, is here denied by the ruling classes and those who support them. According to them, the killed CRPF soldiers were patriots and the Maoists, who attacked them, traitors. This is something we must examine. We must determine what exactly patriotism is.
During British colonial rule the meaning of patriotism was quite clear. It was defined by the anti-colonial independence struggle. All the ruling class parties argue that this was rendered irrelevant with the transfer of power in 1947. In this the Congress, BJP, CPM, BSP and everyone else are agreed. Well it is true that India is nobody's colony today. But the struggle that commenced in those days still remains to be completed. Imperialist domination continues to be our life reality. Not only is the struggle against this, the fight to realise real freedom, still relevant, it is decisive. This is apparent from the aggressive penetration of globalisation and the way it has wrecked the lives of the people. It cannot be denied by counterposing the luxurious consumption made possible for the rich and some middle class. For those who grasp the Indian scene thus, the stand on the anti-imperialist struggle still remains the criterion of patriotism. They would argue that only thorough anti-imperialists can be true patriots. They would act upon this. This is what the Maoist forces are doing.
Coming specifically to the Dantewada situation, Central and State rulers are in a hurry to hand over the rich resources of this region to foreign monopolies and their dependent local monopolies. What they vociferously protest as 'blocking development' is the obstacle posed to this by the Maoist people's war. So who are the patriots here? The rulers who wish to sell off the whole country or the Maoists who resist this and fight to free the country from the shackles of imperialism? The answer would be plain for anyone concerned about this country - the Maoists and all those who resist the obscenities enforced in the name of development by the ruling classes are those who represent the country's interests. Therefore, though born to the people, men of the state forces killed in Dantewada and other places were tools of traitors to the country and its people. While these deaths are to be mourned, they should certainly not be honoured. The rulers must conceal this. They must create favourable public opinion to continue recruiting cannon fodder from among the masses to wage war against the people and the country. This is why the cremations of those state forces men who fell in battle are made into big media events and huge amounts in compensation are extended as lures.
If killing and maiming is inevitable in a war where the contenders face each other with weapons, does this eliminate the space for human rights? No, but the issue must be grasped in the war context. There are international pacts on human rights norms to be practiced by contending forces when countries wage war or there is a civil war. They are coded in the Geneva Convention and its Appendix. They characterise the torture or killing of prisoners of war or civilians as war crimes. Human rights violations in a war context consists of violation of such norms.
In the civil war in India, such violations have been rare on the part of the revolutionary camp. However, they don't just break the norms of the Geneva Convention; they go against the very approach of a Maoist people's war. Opinions expressed by the leaders of the CPI (Maoist) make it clear that they view this issue with equal seriousness. Whenever such incidents took place they have publicly accepted blame and made self-criticism. One hopes that they will also start the practice of informing the people about the disciplinary steps taken against such violators, something already implemented by other Maoist parties in war situations.
What is the record of the other side, the Indian state? Can anyone forget the protest staged by a group of mothers in the capital of Manipur drawing attention to the unbearable atrocities suffered by their people at the hands of the Indian armed forces? Standing naked before the gates of a military camp they shouted "Come out and rape us!" This is the record of the Indian army, paramilitary and police forces. They keep it up in the area covered by Operation Greenhunt. They kill people. Loot their grain and cattle. Burn down houses. Rape women. Torture and kill prisoners. These cowards even force the masses to walk in front of them as a human shield. The people being attacked are mostly Adivasis, and that too as part of a 'hunt for Maoists'. What more sanction is needed for the Indian armed forces, so notorious for its people-killing sprees?
Even in the matter of ensuring ones own safety, anyone engaged in war must attack and destroy the opposing side. The humanism possible for the Maoists even in this act of humans killing humans is given by their politics, their noble communist consciousness. The new society and new humans they seek to create through the revolutionary war guides their acts right during the war itself. This is impossible for the Indian state's armed forces. They are the sentries of the anti-people, anti-human social conditions we live in. (end)
(translated from Munnaniporali, No:137, May 2010)
--
Palash Biswas
Pl Read:
http://nandigramunited-banga.blogspot.com/
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