[Reader-list] The Naxalites overreached

[Rahul Asthana]

"I strongly condemn any move to call for 'iron fist' treatment of  
anyone who is not a combatant."
Agreed totally. Though, the state is and should be the only entity that can legally use violence, it should be subject to strict standards of accountability,even if it sometimes may place it at a disadvantage.


----- Original Message ----
From: Shuddhabrata Sengupta <shuddha at sarai.net>
To: Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com>
Cc: reader-list <reader-list at sarai.net>
Sent: Wed, April 7, 2010 6:45:58 AM
Subject: Re: [Reader-list] The Naxalites overreached

Dear all,

Whenever I hear of 'iron fists', I reach for my 'velevet glove'. : ).

I strongly condemn any move to call for 'iron fist' treatment of  
anyone who is not a combatant.  Let me elaborate.

I intensely dislike, and am opposed to the politics of Pawan Durani  
and some of his friends on this list. I think their agendas are  
dangerous and divisive. But I do not think that people should be  
treated with 'iron fists' merely for holding and expressing an  
opinion, no matter how objectionable that opinion may be. It is a  
crime to set off an IED or a mine or kill someone, but it is not a  
crime to call for an understanding of the motivations of those that  
do, or even to say that these acts of violence are part of a 'just  
war'. And the crucial difference between these two lines of action is  
the very basis on which an open society is built and sustained.

But, just as, if the Maoists were to start targetting pro- 
establishment journalists instead of combatants, they would be  
violating a fundamental code of how armed conflict ought to be  
conducted, so too, when people call for 'targeting' Maoist  
sympathizers along with combatants, as if the realm of discourse and  
opinions were a battlefield where punitive and military measures can  
and ought to be taken, they are pointing us in the direction of a  
closed, authoritarian society - where all of society is a prison  
camp. Where people are prosecuted not on the grounds of what they do,  
but on the grounds of what they think, or believe, or what other  
people think they think.

The taking of human life is never something we need to celebrate. The  
deaths of the more than 75 people in an ambush is not something that  
anyone can exult over. But, to be fair, if this party, which was on  
an 'area domination exercise' came across a squad of Maoists who  
happened to be less prepared than them, the killed would have been  
the killers. These two forces are at war, and in a war, combatants  
are not expected to shoot to kill, not to hold their fire.

As is evident from what I have written, much of which has appeared  
here earlier, I have little sympathy for the politics of the Maoists.  
But I strongly feel that we should also think about the culpability  
of those who are pushing the CRPF jawans into a war to defend the  
interests of rapacious mining companies. They are just as responsible  
for these deaths as those who planted the mines or pulled the  
triggers, just as the American presidents who sent young American men  
into war in Vietnam were equally responsible for their deaths, as  
were the Vietcong. The soldiers who are pushed into the frontline of  
any war are the victims of the decisions made by the commanders of  
two armies, their own, as well as of their opponents.

And frankly, if , the story had turned the other way around, if 75  
Maoists were killed in a CRPF ambush, those who are asking for 'iron  
fists' to crush Maoists and their sympathisers today would be  
celebrating. Arnab Goswamy would be singing an aria.

I see a large casualty figure as an occasion to mourn, to reflect on  
what is making the violence happen, not as a reason to call for  
authoritarian measures.  If, we feel strongly about the toll that  
this war is taking, we should be feeling just as strongly, regardless  
of which side the casualties are on.

I watched a hysterical Arnab Goswami go ballistic last night on  
television, asking for measures that will 'wipe out' the menace, that  
will tackle 'sympathizers'. He kept asking two of his panelists whom  
he had  decided were Maoist sympathisers, despite at least one of  
them disagreeing with that appelation, whether they were 'with the  
Indian people' or 'against' them. Now, if you are a Maoist, you will  
automatically reply that killing the armed police and militaries of  
the Indian state automatically proves that you are with the Indian  
people, since the state is the Indian state, in their view, is the  
monster oppressing the Indian people. In this case, both the CRPF  
officers who send their jawans into be slaughtered, as well as the  
Maoists commanders who order the slaughter, act in the name of the  
same 'Indian people'. Both use the language of 'wiping off' the  
opposition. Both seem to need massacres to justify their very  
existence. The 'indian people' must be truly bloodthirsty if so much  
blood is being shed in its name by opposite forces in an escalating war

  I do not recall this intensity of condemnation during instances  
where massacres in 'Naxal' affected regions have happened earlier  
(with a difference in the protagonists of the massacres) say in  
Bihar, at Laxmanpur Bathe, or at Arwal, or Mianpur, where upper  
caste / landlord militias with the tacit backing of the police  
slaughtered peasant activists (Arwal, 24 people died in 1986,  
Laxmanpur Bathe, 58 people died in 1997, Mianpur, 35 people died in  
2001). Do the hackles of our 'patriots' rise more when Maoists or  
Naxals are doing the killing than when peasants or tribals are killed  
by upper caste militias, outfits like the Salwa Judum or the state's  
police and paramilitary forces.

If you look at the table of casualties in the South Asian Terrorism  
Portal for casualties in Naxal affected regions in Bihar for the  
period between 1976 and 2001, for instance, you can see clearly that  
86 or so massacres and incidents of violence were cased by a  
combination of upper caste militias and the state police.


This is the overwhelming majority of incidents. But I do not recall  
anyone having the gall to say on prime time television that the upper/ 
landed caste militias or the Bihar State police and their  
sympathizers should be 'wiped out' or that their 'sympathizers' (who  
include activists of every single mainstream political party in  
India) should be treated with an 'iron fist'.

http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/countries/india/terroristoutfits/ 
massacres.htm

Is this not a case of one standard for 'Maoists' and their actual and/ 
or supposed sympathizers, and quite another for everyone else ?

best

Shuddha


On 07-Apr-10, at 2:22 PM, Pawan Durani wrote:

> It's high time that not only Maosists , but their supporters are
> handled with iron fist.
>
> Regards
>
> Pawan
>
>
> On Wed, Apr 7, 2010 at 1:55 PM, Asit asitreds  
> <asitredsalute at gmail.com> wrote:
>> what about the voilence in gujrat bhagalpur etc which have killed  
>> hundred
>> times more people than in dantewada
>>  what about tens of thousands of noncobatant civilan population  
>> killed by
>> security forces in northeast kashmir and punjab
>> asit
>>
>>
>> On 4/6/10, Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> …and committed a strategic mistake at Dantewada
>>>
>>>
>>> The reason why Naxalites have been able to sustain their insurgency
>>> for so long is due to three main reasons: the absence or failure of
>>> governance; the romanticism and propaganda of their overground
>>> sympathisers; and, finally, due to the relatively subliminal  
>>> nature of
>>> their violence.
>>>
>>> To the extent that their violence was distributed in space and time
>>> they could slip in and out of the public mind, pursue on-and-off  
>>> talks
>>> with state governments and generally avoid provoking the government
>>> into hitting back hard. Over the last five years Naxalites have
>>> violently expanded the geographical spread of their extortion and
>>> protection rackets—yet, the violence in any given place and time has
>>> been below a certain threshold. That threshold itself is high for a
>>> number of reasons, including efforts by their sympathisers to
>>> romanticise their violence, spectacular terrorist attacks by jihadi
>>> groups and due to the remoteness of the areas of their operations.
>>> This allowed Naxalites to get away with murder. A lot of times. In a
>>> lot of places. Literally.
>>>
>>> But killing 73 out of 80 (or 120) CRPF and police personnel in a  
>>> short
>>> span of time in a single battle is no longer subliminal violence. In
>>> all likelihood the Naxalites have crossed a threshold—this  
>>> incident is
>>> likely to stay much longer in the public mind and increase the
>>> pressure on politicians to tackle the Naxalite threat with greater
>>> resolve. Also, given that it has also become an issue of P
>>> Chidambaram’s—and hence the UPA government’s—reputation, the gloves
>>> are likely to come off in the coming weeks.
>>>
>>> There’s a chance that India’s psychological threshold is even  
>>> higher.
>>> But it is more likely that the Naxalites have overreached. Perhaps
>>> their leadership has calculated that they are in the next stage of
>>> their revolutionary war. If so, that would neither the first nor the
>>> only delusion in their minds.
>>>
>>> http://acorn.nationalinterest.in/2010/04/06/the-naxalites- 
>>> overreached/
>>> _________________________________________
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>>
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Shuddhabrata Sengupta
The Sarai Programme at CSDS
Raqs Media Collective
shuddha at sarai.net
www.sarai.net
www.raqsmediacollective.net


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