Operation Green Hunt—a massive paramilitary campaign being conducted on behalf of domestic and foreign-based capital by the Indian government within the vast forested areas in the interior of the country where primitive conditions of life prevail—is a war on the region’s tribal inhabitants and on the leftist guerillas who find fertile ground for recruitment among this increasingly dispossessed and desperate population. Marxists in India would seek to mobilize the working class to defend these groups against state repression.
In demanding an end to the killing and displacement of tribals, Marxists would not call on the capitalist state to better the conditions of these people instead; to do so is to reinforce the illusion that this state does not necessarily act in the interests of the Indian bourgeoisie and its imperialist masters. The masses of the subcontinent need a revolutionary workers’ state to serve their own, counterposed interests.
While defending them militarily against police and paramilitary forces, Marxists would give no political support to the Naxalite (guerillaist) Maoists who, though presently under the gun, openly seek an alliance with a mythical progressive “national bourgeoisie.” Principled military defense of this group against the capitalist state implies neither condonation of their crimes against workers and the poor, such as the killing of trade-union leader Thomas Munda in Orissa for failing to heed a Maoist-initiated blockade, nor endorsement of their reformist political program.
Despite their claims to Marxism, the Maoist guerillas have nothing to do with the working class and base themselves entirely on peasants and the landless. As Trotsky explained, these classes, unlike the industrial proletariat, lack the unity, organization, and social power to play an independent revolutionary role. The burning social questions of the region—including the liberation of tribals, who are among the most oppressed and marginalized populations on earth—will not be settled in the jungles.
“India: Down With Government War on Maoists, Tribal Peoples! Only Workers Revolution Can Liberate the Indian Masses”
(Workers Vanguard, July 30, 2010)
Below are links to other selected sources on this question. (Please note that we don’t necessarily agree with what they say or share the aims of their authors.)
updates:
The war in Bastar (Frontline, June 29, 2013)
Mahendra Karma and his cynical form of vigilantism by Sudeep Chakravarti (live mint/WSJ, May 28, 2013)
Chhattisgarh: Preliminary Report on the Fact Finding in Bijapur by Democratic Students’ Union (Sanhati, March 16, 2013)
Operation Green Hunt Enters New Phase (Sanhati, March 29, 2012)
India sets out on a fight for the forest (The National, March 27, 2012)
Chhattisgarh villages torched in police rampage (The Hindu, March 23, 2011)
Operation Green Hunt’s urban avatar by Arundhati Roy (Dawn (Karachi), June 12, 2010)
India reviews anti-Maoist policy (BBC, May 18, 2010)
War on Maoists by Praful Bidwai (Frontline, March 13-26, 2010)
Green Hunt: the anatomy of an operation (The Hindu, February 6, 2010)
India is ignoring its citizens by Eric Randolph (The Guardian, February 3, 2010)
India launches Maoist offensive in five states (BBC, January 22, 2010)
India prepares to fight rebel Maoists (UPI, October 31, 2010)
Maoist Rebels Widen Deadly Reach Across India (New York Times, October 31, 2009)
background:
Arundhati Roy: The heart of India is under attack (The Guardian, October 30, 2009)
Arundhati Roy: Walking with the Comrades (Outlook India, March 29, 2010)
India’s tribals in land fight with business (Financial Times, March 10, 2010)
‘The biggest land grab after Columbus’ (Hindustan Times, November 13, 2009)
Indian government Committee on State Agrarian Relations and Unfinished Task of Land Reforms draft report: Alienation of Tribal and Dalits Lands
report of an expert council to an Indian government planning commission: Development Challenges in Extremist Affected Areas
A War in the Heart of India by Ramachandra Guha (The Nation, June 27, 2007)
Arundhati Roy on Naxalism: ‘It’s outright war and both sides are choosing their weapons’ (Tehelka, March 31, 2007)
CPI(Maoist) General Secretary Ganapathy interviewed (January 2010)
The Reality of Mining in India by photojournalist Tom Pietrasik (March 7, 2010)
Development for Dummies (April 17, 2010) and Kalinagar: ‘Development, Death and Despair’ (April 25, 2010) by photojournalist Javed Iqbal
Maoists, a portfolio shot between 2004 and 2009 by photojournalist Mustafa Quraishi
India’s Dirty War by Megha Bahree (Forbes, April, 23 2010)
interview with Arundhati Roy on Democracy Now! radio show (March 22, 2010)
Profile: India’s Maoist rebels (BBC, April 6, 2010)
Fact Sheet on Operation Green Hunt published by Campaign against War on People (November 11, 2010)
Scorched-Earth Tactics return to Chhattisgarh by Eric Randolph (Current Intelligence, March 23, 2011)
In Dantewada, poor fight poor in a dehumanising war (Times of India, March 24, 2011)
sites (for information’s sake):
International Campaign Against War on the People of India
Comments