[Reader-list] The Naxalites overreached

Thu Apr 8 13:59:25 IST 2010

Dear Anupam Ji,

NamaskAr

I am delighted that you know the complete name of GreatBong. Writing
is his profession and you have all the rights to disagree with him .

It would have been quite nice had you pin pointed the lines where you
disagree with him , so that it would have been useful to
readers,including me , to have a balanced understanding.

Traveling does not necessarily make an expert or non travelling does
not curtail the right to opinion.

You have a lot of opinion about Kashmir , and i doubt you have
traveled there as much.

Regards

Pawan

On Thu, Apr 8, 2010 at 1:28 PM, anupam chakravartty <c.anupam at gmail.com> wrote:
> i think arnab ray should stick to his ideas of popular bollywood
> culture before talking about maoists. he has no clue whatsoever.
>
> like you, i am sure he has not even seen purulia. forget dantewada.
> what will do if i tell you that i have been to dantewada several
> times? ... you could only label people as maoist sympathiser, he is
> pro muslim, he is anti development. label me quickly, else you might
> just run out of stock. fast!
>
> -anupam
>
>
> On Thu, Apr 8, 2010 at 12:52 PM, Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Dear Anupam Ji ,
>>
>> Why are you in anger all the time ? The blogger GreatBong is a famous
>> blogger who has won many awards. His name is Arnab and is an author of
>> just released book "May I Hebb Your Attention Please".He is from
>> Kolkota .
>>
>> Have you traveled to Dantewada ?
>>
>> Pawan
>>
>>
>>
>> He is from Kolkota .
>>
>> On Thu, Apr 8, 2010 at 12:46 PM, anupam chakravartty <c.anupam at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Pawan
>>>
>>> you favorite blogger doesnt even have the guts to put his name on the
>>> record for writing such things. he is like Kishenji, who turns his
>>> back to the camera before speaking addressing the media. my only
>>> advice to this "great bong" is that he should step out his cubicle
>>> before he plays around with his words. i bet he hasnt been either to
>>> gujarat or dantewada to have suggested that indigenous communities
>>> should start dairies in these areas.
>>>
>>> anupam
>>>
>>> On Thu, Apr 8, 2010 at 12:20 PM, Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> Dear Asit ,
>>>>
>>>> While as the nation has condemned whatever you have written , it still
>>>> does not justify the Naxalites and their barbaric acts.
>>>>
>>>> I understand your support to them as your E-Mail ID is quite obvious -
>>>> Asit red salute ....lal salaam.
>>>>
>>>> I am sharing you a piece on this 'civil war' by my favorite blogger :- GreatBong
>>>>
>>>> http://greatbong.net/2010/04/08/the-invisible-civil-war/
>>>>
>>>> We have been in the middle of an invisible civil war for many years
>>>> now. Civil war because it is an armed struggle by a section of the
>>>> people against the democratic administration of the country, a war
>>>> that has spiraled so out of control that representatives of law
>>>> enforcement accept that there are large swathes of country where they
>>>> cannot enter. Invisible because it rarely captures national attention,
>>>> confined as it is to largely rural backward areas for which it is
>>>> pushed to the rear of the news by other things more important to our
>>>> national life—like IPL, Shoaib-Sania and Kites.
>>>>
>>>> That is unless more than seventy-six CRPF personnel are brutally
>>>> massacred at which point of time we are forced to deal with the issue.
>>>> At least for a few news cycles.
>>>>
>>>> For those of us who do care, at least perfunctorily, and who havent
>>>> drunk the “It’s all India’s fault” cool-aid it is tempting to angrily
>>>> shout out “Ms Roy, happy now?” , in the context of her frothing
>>>> diatribe against the Indian government, Hindutva, corporations
>>>> (basically all of her enemies) and her rapturous glorification of the
>>>> violence of Maoists in the execrable piece of garbage recently
>>>> published in Outlook.  But analyzing or rebutting a fanatic
>>>> fundamentalist like Ms. Roy is as futile as deconstructing a Payal
>>>> Rohatgi movie and once you realize that she is essentially a Rakhi
>>>> Sawant with a laptop and a Booker, with the only difference that she
>>>> uses Maoists instead of Mika to get attention, the uselessness of the
>>>> exercise is even more evident.
>>>>
>>>> What however is worth looking at are her rhetorical tools, principally
>>>> because they are re-used by many people who share Ms. Roy’s agenda,
>>>> from your unshaven friend at JNU to the slacker cousin of yours who
>>>> leaves cigarette ash on your carpet. One of it is in presenting random
>>>> pictures of Maoist rebels, women or young men, and saying “India’s
>>>> Biggest Threats” as if the incongruity between their innocent visages
>>>> and the phrase “India’s Biggest Threat” should show how ridiculous a
>>>> liar the Indian government is. Of course, Ms. Roy the point is not the
>>>> bholi soorat that you so lovingly present but that AK47 slung on her
>>>> shoulder. That is the problem. Villains rarely look like Dr. Dong and
>>>> do a Shaam-O-Sasha dance and even Osama would look like a poet had not
>>>> we known his other activities.
>>>>
>>>> The second is in humanizing terrorist organizations by saying “Look at
>>>> the kind of development work they have done.”  Well even the
>>>> Mujahideen in Kashmir did earthquake relief and it is well known that
>>>> terrorists do public outreach programs to win hearts and minds. Just
>>>> like big industrial houses. However people like Ms. Roy will sneer at
>>>> the altruism of big business and glorify that of terrorists. Not
>>>> surprising.
>>>>
>>>> The third is of course making wild accusations of government excesses
>>>> and then obviating the necessity of providing supporting evidence by
>>>> saying “The corporate press suppressed the news.” This is an old game,
>>>> a game played by radicals across the political spectrum. Get some wild
>>>> bit of news, either from “alternative media” or from unimpeachable
>>>> sources like Maoists with a gun and say “There is no proof for this
>>>> assertion of mine because there can never be.” This is not to say that
>>>> government excesses do not take place (italicized for the benefit of
>>>> those rushing to comment with a “On so-and-so day the government did
>>>> this and this was reported in Newspaper so-and-so) but much of the
>>>> accusations are just that. Accusations with nothing to back them up.
>>>> Accusations so often repeated that they become fact.
>>>>
>>>> And what is worth touching upon is the Big Lie that people like Ms.
>>>> Roy perpetuate. That somehow we are seeing another Santhal Rebellion
>>>> with the oppressive British being replaced by the oppressive Indian
>>>> (Hindu) state. During the British era, Santhals using bows and arrows
>>>> went up against British guns and cannons. Today’s Maoist “tribals”
>>>> have AK47s and ultra-modern weaponry and commando-like training, which
>>>> obviously some agency has supplied to them. In that respect this is
>>>> not a “spontaneous” rising of the dispossessed but a carefully
>>>> engineered insurrection with the fighting fuel being supplied by our
>>>> “good neighbors”  and the propaganda lungs (since propaganda is a
>>>> vital part of Communist struggle) being supplied by “We know who”.
>>>>
>>>> However what is true is that fighting footsoldiers of the Maoist
>>>> movement are coming from the ranks of tribals and it is important we
>>>> try to understand, even imperfectly since a full understanding of such
>>>> a difficult problem requires much study which we are unable to do
>>>> between two KKR matches, what is going on. What our Maoists in the
>>>> press would tell us is a very simple story. One one side are the good
>>>> people—the tribals, monstrously poor, sitting on minerals, being
>>>> exploited and taken advantage of. On on the other side are the bad
>>>> people—-big industrial houses, the Indian government, police, army and
>>>> Hindutva (Yes the last word people like Ms. Roy put in every piece
>>>> almost as if padding a piece for Google Adwords purpose). And that the
>>>> tribals, the good guys, are launching a justified armed struggle
>>>> against the bad guys.
>>>>
>>>> The truth is slightly different. The tribals are not a monlithic
>>>> entity. A few of them have, over the generations, taken advantage of
>>>> quotas and the other special privileges provided to them by the
>>>> Constitution as well as economic liberalization to improve their lot.
>>>> Some of them have become middlemen, some of them small businessmen
>>>> like brick kiln owners. A few of them, over generations, have risen in
>>>> ranks even further becoming powerhouses like a Madhu Koda or Shibu
>>>> Soren. But there are others who have stayed behind rolling kendu
>>>> leaves and essentially doing the same things that their ancestors did.
>>>> Now when big mining companies moved in, it was those “advanced”
>>>> tribals who saw an opportunity to make more money by becoming
>>>> land-brokers. Needless to say, they were coming up against their
>>>> socially immobile brethren who naturally resented the comparative
>>>> wealth and influence of their fellow-tribals. And then “people”
>>>> started putting AK47s in the hands of those pissed off telling them
>>>> “Grab what you dont have. We can make our own laws.”
>>>>
>>>> Soon government-supported, pro-development “tribals” (Salwa
>>>> Judum—–Mahendra Karma the founder of Salwa Judum is an ethnic Adivasi
>>>> himself who had made it “big”) and the dispossessed but armed tribals
>>>> were fighting each other,  in an increasing spiral of violence. And
>>>> despite what the “liberals” would have you believe,  these
>>>> “dispossessed” tribals forming the Maoists are not Robin Hoods. They
>>>> go about terrorizing villages, collecting extortion and protection
>>>> money and organizing people’s courts for punishing “informers” i.e.
>>>> those who were trying to get into the gang of the “advanced” tribals.
>>>> So yes this isnt a battle between good and evil but a massive gang war
>>>> being played out in the backwoods with no heroes and no villains. Only
>>>> victims.
>>>>
>>>> A solution is difficult to find here. And I wont be presumptuous to
>>>> say I have any idea what should be done. However I feel that part of
>>>> the solution would be to have tribals brought into the mainstream. For
>>>> too long I have seen people, usually city folks and academics,
>>>> glorifying tribal life as the last surviving vestige of a simple,
>>>> ancient way of living. But a tribal life, of subsisting on hunting and
>>>> rolling kendu leaves, is a life that is medieval and there is a reason
>>>> why people in most parts of the country abandoned this lifestyle many
>>>> centuries ago (After all we all were tribals once). As mentioned
>>>> before, the tension underlying the Maoist struggle is between those
>>>> who have forsaken their old life for “capitalist pleasures” which in
>>>> turn has led to an understanding of how they can leverage their
>>>> possession of natural reserves for their own benefit,  and those who
>>>> have not.
>>>>
>>>> While glorying Maoists, Ms. Roy says that they have gotten tribals
>>>> organized and have won victories like getting a better price for kendu
>>>> leaves. However it should be noted that poor and exploited people in
>>>> other parts of the country did not need guns and terrorists to get
>>>> organized. They formed cooperatives like Gujarat Co-operative Milk
>>>> Marketing Federation Ltd (Amul) and changed their futures peacefully.
>>>> So community organization, as Ms. Roy hints, does not need Maoists. As
>>>> a matter of fact, Maoists prevent aid and assistance from reaching
>>>> those that need it (being a kind of mafia themselves) and the
>>>> perpetuation of the Maoist movement, as strategized by its handlers
>>>> who are anything but tribals, depends critically on people being angry
>>>> at the government. Hence lack of real development, as done by the
>>>> government, serves them well because then they can show themselves to
>>>> be an alternative.
>>>>
>>>> In conclusion, I sometimes wonder what would happen to people like Ms.
>>>> Roy should the Maoists actually succeed in overthrowing the Indian
>>>> state in a few decades, a publicly stated aim. Well based on the
>>>> glorious example of Chairman Mao and his attitude towards
>>>> “intellectuals” during the Cultural Revolution and of his disciple Pol
>>>> Pot, who made them work in the fields till they died, the fate of
>>>> champagne liberals like Ms. Roy would not be all that great. But
>>>> somehow I think she wouldnt stay around in the country to find out.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Pawan
>>>>
>>>> On Thu, Apr 8, 2010 at 11:53 AM, Asit asitreds <asitredsalute at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>  i was not talking about maoists i was just saying why you people were not
>>>>> outraged when thousands were killed and raped in gujrat riots when babri
>>>>> masjid was  was raged, when hundreds of honour killings takes place in and
>>>>> around delhi, when dalit women are paraded naked in the country, when
>>>>> peaceful democratic mass movements are ruthless supressed for the super
>>>>> profits of a few corporations, when thousands of farmers are forced out of
>>>>> their land for sezs, mines and factories for the profits of national and
>>>>> international big business, when rural poor in kalahandi sell their
>>>>> daughters in dire poverty the list is endless, im surprised you people are
>>>>> not at all bothered about the starvation deaths and the acute agrian crisis
>>>>> where more than two lakh farmers have commited suicide dont you think their
>>>>> lives are also imortant
>>>>> asit
>>>>>
>>>>> On Wed, Apr 7, 2010 at 11:11 PM, A.K. Malik <akmalik45 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Dear Durani Sahib,
>>>>>>                  I fully agree with you. However, the record of the
>>>>>> current governance in the country is dismal.They may say they will deal with
>>>>>> it firmly but ultimately the Govt buckles under pressure from various
>>>>>> quarters including the supporters. No one can justify what is being done by
>>>>>> the Maoists. I don't know in what way Asit is trying to justify the same.
>>>>>> Regards,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> (A.K.MALIK)
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> --- On Wed, 4/7/10, Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> > From: Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com>
>>>>>> > Subject: Re: [Reader-list] The Naxalites overreached
>>>>>> > To: "Asit asitreds" <asitredsalute at gmail.com>
>>>>>> > Cc: "reader-list" <reader-list at sarai.net>
>>>>>> > Date: Wednesday, April 7, 2010, 2:22 PM
>>>>>> > 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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>>>>>> > the city.
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>>>>>> > _________________________________________
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>>>>>> > city.
>>>>>> > Critiques & Collaborations
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>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> _________________________________________
>>>>>> reader-list: an open discussion list on media and the city.
>>>>>> Critiques & Collaborations
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>>>>>
>>>> _________________________________________
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