[Reader-list] Fwd: The Government's Planned "Offensive" in Adivasi and Forest Areas

[Rakesh Iyer]

I would say this is a battle where now the Maoists would like to turn
themselves into the elites, and so there is a battle between two groups, one
which wants to become the elites and the others who are already the elites.
The only idea is to gain the power to make decisions to just suit
themselves, without having any compassion or understanding of the entire
situation, the complexities attached to it and any realization that such
violence is not going to solve problems; it hardly has in any context. The
Naxals have done exactly what the state wanted them to do, which is to use
violence. The state would have been in trouble if people had agitated
non-violently or organized themselves into a vote bank and shown the upper
castes a place, but now it's very easy for the elites to brand Naxals as
terrorists, torture people in any any way they like, and get away with it in
the name of 'war against terror'.

Rakesh