The introduction is from an interview Winter Has Its End journalists , Eric Ribellarsi and Jim Weill, did in Nepal with Tilak Pariyar, Chairman of the Dalit National Liberation Front of Nepal, an organization associated with the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist)

“ER: Can you start by explaining what it means to be a Dalit in Nepal?

Dalits are a community within the Hindu religion, based off the caste system. The caste system was brought here by India, and it has been spread all over the South Asian countries. People have been divided up into castes. The laboring classes have been treated as lower class people.

Laboring people have been called “untouchables”. It means that if you touch a laboring person, you will become impure. This system was adopted by the government, as well, which created all of these laws based off of the caste system. And this has been continuing in our society for about 3000 years. The laboring people are forgotten by this system. For this reason the Dalits have gathered in one party, the Maoist Party, the one party that wants to change society.”

The following article is from myrepublica, and is an example of the militant resistance of many of Nepal’s Dalits. 

Dalits Shut Down Palpa, Obstruct Highway

Republica

Palpa, Dec. 27: A Dalit organization in Palpa has called for a strike in Palpa district on Tuesday protesting the murder of Manbir Sunar.

Sunar was thrashed to death by locals in Jubitha-4, Kalikot for intruding into a kitchen of non-Dalit a few days ago.

The strike enforcers are demanding Sunar to be declared a martyr, due compensation to deceased family and stern action against the guilty.

United Dalit Struggle Committee has called for the strike and have shut all academic institutions, marketplaces and shops of the district.

Transportation services have come to a grinding halt. The strike enforcers have been rallying on the road since morning to ensure a total shutdown.

Meanwhile various Dalit organizations have disrupted transportation services in Damauli on Tuesday protesting the manhandling of a Dalit woman.

The Dalit communities have vowed to carry on with their protest until a stern action is taken against the culprits.

Maya Biswakarma, 27 of Nahala, Ghasikuwa-1 , Tanahun was beaten severely  by Ajit Shrestha and his family accusing her of touching a bucket of a non-dalit on Sunday.

Biswakarma  is undergoing treatment at Ratnahari Hospital in Damauli. She has sustained severe injuries in her face, neck and hands.

All transports along with the passengers have been stranded on the road since morning.

From a new article by Arundhati Roy:

“Capitalism’s real gravediggers, it turns out, are not Marx’s revolutionary proletariat but its own delusional cardinals, who have turned ideology into faith. They seem to have trouble comprehending reality or grasping the science of climate change, which says, quite simply, that capitalism (including the Chinese variety) is destroying the planet.“

This article appeared in Financial Times

Beware the ‘gush-up gospel’ behind India’s Billionaires

by Arundhati Roy

January 13,2012

Is it a house or a home? A temple to the new India, or a warehouse for its ghosts? Ever since Antilla arrived on Altamount Road in Mumbai, exuding mystery and quiet menace, things have not been the same. “Here we are,” the friend who took me there said, “pay your respects to our new ruler.”Antilla belongs to India’s richest man, Mukesh Ambani. I’d read about this, the most expensive dwelling ever built, the 27 floors, three helipads, nine lifts, hanging gardens, ballrooms, weather rooms, gymnasiums, six floors of parking, and the 600 servants. Nothing had prepared me for the vertical lawn – a soaring wall of grass attached to a vast metal grid. The grass was dry in patches, bits had fallen off in neat rectangles. Clearly, “trickle down” had not worked.

But “gush-up” has. That’s why in a nation of 1.2bn, India’s 100 richest people own assets equivalent to a quarter of gross domestic product.

The word on the street (and in The New York Times) is, or at least was, that the Ambanis were not living in Antilla. Perhaps they are there now, but people still whisper about ghosts and bad luck, vastu and feng shui. I think it is Marx’s fault. Capitalism, he said “has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, it is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells.”

In India, the 300m of us who belong to the new, post-”reforms” middle class – the market – live side by side with the ghosts of 250,000 debt ridden farmers who have killed themselves, and of the 800m  who have been impoverished and dispossessed to make way for us. And who survive on less than 50 cents a day.

Mr. Ambani is personally worth more than  $20bn. He has a controlling majority stake in Reliance Industries Limited (RIL), a company with a market capitalization of Rs2.41tn($47bn) and an array of global business interests. RIL has a 95 per cent stake in Infotel, which a few weeks ago bought a major share in a media group than runs television news and entertainment channels. Infotel owns the only national 4G broadband license. He also has a cricket team.

RIL is one of a handful of corporations, some family-owned, some not, that run India. Some of the others are Tata, Jindal, Vedanta, Mittal, Infosys, Essar and the other Reliance (ADAG) owned by Mukesh’s brother Anil.Their race for growth has split across Europe, central Asia, Africa and Latin America. The Tatas, for example, run more than 100 companies in 80 countries. They are one of India’s largest private-sector power companies.

Since the cross-ownership of businesses is not restricted by the “gush-up gospel” rules, the more you have, the more you can have. Meanwhile scandal after scandal has exposed, in painful detail, how corporations buy politicians, judges, bureaucrats and media houses, hollowing out democracy, retaining only its rituals.

Huge reserves of bauxite, iron ore, oil and natural gas worth trillions of dollars were sold to corporations for a pittance, defying even the twisted logic of the free market. Cartels of corrupt politicians and corporations have colluded to underestimate the quantity of reserves, and the actual market value of public assets, leading to the siphoning off of billions of dollars of public money.

Then there’s the land grab – the forced displacement of communities, of millions of people whose lands are being appropriated by the state and handed to private enterprise. (The concept of inviolability of private property rarely applies to the property of the poor.)

Mass revolts have broken out, many of them armed. The government has indicated that it will deploy the army to quell them.

Corporations have their own sly strategy to deal with dissent. With a minuscule percentage of their profits they run hospitals, educational institutes and trusts, which in turn fund NGO’s, academics, journalists, artists, film-makers, literary festivals and even protest movements. It is a way of using charity to lure opinion-makers into their sphere of influence. Of infiltrating normality, colonizing ordinariness, so that challenging them seems as absurd (or as esoteric) as challenging “reality” itself. From here, it’s a quick, easy step to “there is no alternative”.

The Tatas run two of the largest charitable trusts in India. (They donated $50m to that needy institution the Harvard Business School. ) The Jindals, with a major stake in mining, metals and power, run the Jindal Global Law School, and will soon open the Jindal School of Government and Public Policy. Financed by the profits from the software giant Infosys, the New India Foundation gives prizes and fellowships to social scientists.

Having worked out how to manage the government, the opposition, the courts, the media and liberal opinion, what remains to be dealt with is the growing unrest, the threat of “people power”. How do you domesticate it? How do you turn protesters into pets? How do you vacuum up people’s fury and redirect it into blind alleys?

The largely middle-class, overtly nationalist anti-corruption  movement in India led by Anna Hazare is a good example. A round-the-clock, corporate sponsored media campaign proclaimed it to be “the voice of the people”. It called for a law that undermined even the remaining dregs of democracy.

Unlike the Occupy Wall Street movement, it did not breathe a word against privatization, corporate monopolies or economic “reforms”. Its principal media backers successfully turned the spotlight away from the huge corporate corruption scandals and used the public mauling of politicians to call for the further withdrawal of discretionary powers from government, for more reforms and more privatization.

After two decades of these “reforms” and of phenomenal but jobless growth, India has more malnourished children than anywhere else in the world, and more poor people in eight of its states than 26 countries of sub-Saharan Africa put together. And now the international financial crisis is closing in. The growth rate has plummeted to 6.9 per cent. Foreign investment is pulling out.

Capitalism’s real gravediggers it turns out, are not Marx’s revolutionary proletariat but its own delusional cardinals, who have turned ideology into faith. They seem to have difficulty comprehending reality or grasping the science of climate change, which says, quite simply, that capitalism (including the Chinese variety) is destroying the planet.

“Trickle down” failed. Now “gush-up” is in trouble  too. As early stars appear in Mumbai’s darkening sky, guards in crisp linen shirts with crackling walkie-talkies appear outside the forbidding gates of Antilla. The lights blaze on. Perhaps it is time for the ghosts to come out and play.

According to the following article, the Unified Communist Party of Nepal(Maoist) are legalizing land transactions that occurred during the People’s War period (1996-2006). It seems likely that many of these transactions involved the distribution or confiscation of land held by wealthy peasants. 

Maoists set to leaglise 5‚000 war time transactions

January 19, 2012

The “People’s Government” formed by Maoists during the decade-long insurgency had certified some 5,000 land transactions in the Salyan district alone, and the incumbent Maoist-led government is all set to implement it legally.

The all-party mechanism coordinated by Maoist Secretary Tikaram Oli had sent the records approved by the Maoist People’s Government in the district to the Land Reform Ministry through the District Land Revenue Office one year ago.

“We had passed the lands to give relief to the people during people’s war. We are waiting for the implementation of the government decision to recognize them”, Oli said.

As per the government’s decision, District Land Revenue offices have to endorse any land transaction or division of property in a family if it was certified by Maoists’ so-called People’s Government.

Although scores of locals have taken land ownership certificates from the Land Revenue Office with the end of Maoist insurgency, the Maoist, however, said less than 30 percent have taken them.

“They have been given the land ownership certificate and we too have the xerox,” he said.

At a time when opposition parties have been demanding government to pull out the decision to legalize war time transactions, Oli warned if the legal recognition of the deal is not implemented, the farmers will rebel.

Most of war time transactions were conducted in Bafukhola, Shivarath and Bame VDCs as they were Maoist base areas during the conflict.

In the context of revolutionary war in the Indian countryside,

While the CPI (Maoist) is busy now defending itself and its mass base of poor agricultural classesand tribals against a relentless and violent attack by the Indian state, a revival of revolutionary democratic work in the urban areas is an extremely serious issue. Once again we emphasize that a careful reorganization of the entire matrix of the working class and democratic mass movements in urban area is necessary and such a complementary movement comprising such concrete mass-political actions in the sphere of health might be one component of that.

Thanks to Joe for the intro, and for alerting us to this article. It originally appeared at Sanhati.

The Aftermath of the AMRI Tragedy: Some Related Thoughts on Democratic Work in Urban Areas of India

by Krishanu Mandal

January 5, 2012

This article provides a case for mass-political movements around health-care and expropriation of private health-care sector as one component of the revival of revolutionary democratic work in urban area.

The gruesome death of about 90 people, mostly critically ill and infirm patients, due to the fire at the AMRI (AdvancedMedicare and Research Institute) Hospital in Kolkata, India in the second week of December has made international news. This has been followed by a comparably gruesome death of more than 170 people by drinking poison-laced country-liquor in a region of southern West Bengal a few days later. The response of the common people to these incidents stimulates some introductory thoughts on diversification of democratic work in urban areas of India.

Let us take the AMRI fire incident first.

The background facts of the AMRI incident are quite transparent now. The hospital management did not inform the governmental fire services presumably because then it would have been officially confirmed that they have been violating fire-safety norms for long. Resident doctors were not present because the hospital seem to have been hiring junior unauthorized house-staff at some pittance for these jobs, a common practice in such private health care shops. Indeed, reading an account of the origin and development of this hospital is a masochistic exercise. The hospital is one of the first progenies, born in 1996, of the marriage between the greed of the business class and the CPIM, which had shed any veneer of communist ideology by the mid-1990s. The bonhomie was embodied at the personal level by the bond between Sravan Todi and Jyoti Basu. Todi, a pal of the patriarch, of course did not have to care a lot about legal use of land or safety norms for a public building. The Todis and the Goenkas and the Agarwals were not entirely ungrateful. In return of profitting perhaps billions, Basu and Subhash Chakraborty, two of the prime polluters of CPIM, were famously treated (and finally died) in AMRI, and not in any of the governmental hospitals of Kolkata where the actual proletarians perish due to lack of treatment, care and medicine. CPIM, of course, has mumbled protestations through `Ganashakti’, its Bengali mouthpiece, that they are not the sole thieves–that Trinamool Congress, during its tenure at the Kolkata Corporation, also had a finger in this pie.

The response from the administration and the “mainstream” political bodies so far has been along predictable lines. There have been candlelight vigils in Kolkata and formation of committees to oversee that fire-safety regulations are followed in public buildings. These committees are providing pious notifications to the errant institutions. When some rumblings rose about the Nightingale Hospital, another money-sucking machine in the posh part of Kolkata, governmental politicians soon assured that the hospital should continue its business as usual (yes, it gave a promise to take measures for fire-safety–just as AMRI did). The mighty police forces, who were so efficient in catching and then murdering Koteswara Rao (Kishenji), seem to be clueless about the whereabouts of Aditya Agarwal and Preeti Sureka, the high-flying, globe-trotting young scions of the Emami dynasty managing AMRI. Of course, it would be criminal for the police to torture the elder Goenkas and Agarwals to extract information as they did to Koteswara Rao (pictures here: http://indianvanguard.wordpress.com/2011/12/07/).

In contrast, the people in the Sangrampur-Magrahat region, where the mass-death by poisoned liquor took place, took swift action by themselves. They physically demolished the dens of manufacturing such liquors. The personnel of the local police station, famous for openly collecting cut-money from these liquor-based thugs (these thugs have a symbiotic life with CPIM and Trinamool Congress) locked the police station and fled.

The question that stands out then, is why, after the AMRI incident, did people stop merely at smashing the reception of another wing of the hospital. Why did they not invade the houses of the Todis and the Goenkas and the Agarwals, drag these big bosses out into the streets, punish them then and there and make them cough out fines of some crores of rupees–as allegedly happens in the famous “kangaroo courts” of the CPI (Maoist)–where justice for such blatant crimes are quick and immediately effective?

The private hospitals in Kolkata, and perhaps all over India, are almost literally “soulless, vampire bastards making money off human pain” (see Endnote 1). We do not know exactly the average rate of return for investments in private health-care in India, but the rapid pace of entry in this sector implies that the return must be abnormally high (see Endnote 2).

The very poor and destitute, of course, have no hope of ever being treated in such private hospitals and nursing homes–even though these were set up and are run, like AMRI, by direct assistance and munificence of the state governments. It is well known that, as a matter of course, such hospitals often decline to provide even life-saving emergency treatments to patients dying from road accidents nearby if they are not paid several thousands of rupees in advance (see, e.g.,http://news.asiaone.com/News/Latest%2BNews/Asia/Story/A1Story20100413-210095.html). Infuriated people sometimes react, but alas, again only by breaking a few glasses and computer monitors in the hospital buildings. And these hospitals continue to run their multi-million dollar businesses unimpeded, while some “official enquiries”, promised by disingenuous ministers (see Endnote 3) get conveniently forgotten over the years.

The people, certainly, can start taking steps for themselves in this regard. We are talking of those people who cannot pay the price of more than a thousand rupees to get a couple of X-Rays done from these private clinics and who, after waiting in a long queue in the cash-starved government hospitals, finally end up with a disfigured bone. Of those people who cannot pay several thousands of rupees for expensive blood tests and thus, may have to die undiagnosed. Of those people who cannot afford expensive chemotherapy in the AMRI Cancer Centre, who sometimes charge several thousands of rupees for injecting a blood-generating hormone and die a painful death, nearly untreated, in a local public health centre (if they are fortunate enough to get a bed). Of those people who have to mortgage their residence to have a heart-surgery done.

These people get angry at such injustice, they flare up bravely, but their anger gets dissipated and nothing sustainable emerges from these sporadic outbursts of the poor people’s justified anger.

This leads us to emphasize that health is an arena around which collective revolutionary activities can be built up fruitfully in urban parts of India perhaps with relative ease. While both time-tested class-based movements (like organized movements of the wage-labourers) and mass movements (like those against price-hike, privatization etc) are extremely necessary to fight against the relentless onslaught of the big capital and its local cronies on the common people of India, we put a tentative suggestion that generating a mass movement around the democratic demands of health-care may be a relatively easier task. First, this issue of healthcare has a universal appeal among the poor, the coalition of exploited classes. Next, unlike, for example in trade unions in organized sector, no revisionist caucus is occupying space here already, nor does there exist, in this arena, a history of betrayal by a leadership calling themselves communist. And thirdly, the spontaneity of protests by the common people against exploitation in this sector provides one encouragement.

Indeed, the space of such plausible movements in the entire matrix of urban activities of the revolutionary left has to be determined carefully by the activists with grassroot experiences. Also, the exact structure, formation and modes of operations for such activities in this sector, of course, would be shaped by concrete local conditions. However, below we give one possible avowedly utopian picture deriving from the recent and ongoing experiences of resistance movements in India.

People’s Committees at locality levels, the representative bodies of people’s power which brought about the mass rebellion against the oppressive CPIM in Bengal and which are leading death-defying struggles against multinational-imperialist aggression in various pockets in India, may be formed: People’s Committees for Health Security. Such committees can go to the various profiteering private health centres and find out how these facilities are flouting existing rules: using unauthorized structures, running commercial establishments in buildings meant for residential housing (and thus, availing cheap electricity and evading tax), dumping pollutants and hazardous substances and thus endangering the locality and so on…. Given the cheap cyber-access these days, documentation and communication of such evidences have also become easier. And then they can enforce some punishment instantly: for example, cutting illegal electricity supply will hit such private medical facilities where it hurts most as they have to switch to expensive private electricity generators. Moreover, they can also compel that the guility be fined punitively through mass agitations: thus expropriating these ruthless exploiters. The money thus collected can be spent in the local public health centres: so that these poor people themselves may reap the fruit and the functioning of these centres can also be actively monitored by such a people’s body. Quite naturally, these are steps also for establishing and asserting the genuine democratic power of the people, going beyond the periodic charades known as elections.

This sounds fanciful, utopian (and we emphasize again that the exact forms of such practices will, of course, be shaped by the relevant local conditions). Yet, the revolutionaries of the CPI (Maoist), the naxalites, have been implementing similar things for years in the more remote corners of India. Yes, such actions may require going beyond the existing legality of the Indian state: the state that kills Sidhu Soren and Azad and Kishenji, but actively arranges for Warren Anderson, whose excellent management led thousands to get killed in Bhopal in 1984, or Ottavio Quattrocchi, the noted thief of the Bofors case, to get into safety from Indian laws.

Of course we know that such assertion of power by the exploited classes will not be easy. The apparatus of the state will not sit pretty. To protect their masters, the big capital and its local allies and agents, the coercive apparatus of the state will pounce upon the poor people attempting such steps. Otherwise the Naxalites, fighting precisely for such people’s power, would not have had to take up arms and build underground organizations. The Indian state has proved that it is ready even to unleash a low-intensity civil war upon the common people to protect its interests, the interests of the exploiters. But the people can, and do, fight back.

It has been pointed out about CPI (Maoist) (and it agrees) that in very recent years this organization has been forced to sideline mass-political work, especially in urban areas. While the CPI (Maoist) is busy now defending itself and its mass base of poor agricultural classes and tribals against a relentless and violent attack by the Indian state, a revival of revolutionary democratic work in the urban areas is an extremely serious issue. Once again we emphasize that a careful reorganization of the entire matrix of the working class and democratic mass movements in urban area is necessary and such a complementary movement comprising such concrete mass-political actions in the sphere of health might be one component of that. We reiterate that launching such democratic work in a relatively virgin yet fertile territory provides another sphere where joint front among the working class, the middle classes and the students can be built up.

The Naxalites have shaken the Indian state in interior hinterlands–imported military choppers are hunting them now. Such complementary work in the urban areas would advance our revolution.

****

Endnotes:

Endnote 1: This is a telling and famous remark made by Bill Maher, the liberal American comedian, on for-profit healthcare in the context of the nationwide uproar in US over the introduction of the ‘Obamacare’ (seehttp://politicalhumor.about.com/b/2011/01/20/best-bill-maher-quotes-ever.htm).

Endnote 2: The only academically rigorous work, so far as we know, which has analyzed aspects of privately provided healthcare in recent metropolitan India is that by J. Das and J. Hammer (in 2007 in Journal of Development Economics, vol 83, pp. 1-36). It shows the prevalence of needless expenses induced by private health-practitioners in Delhi.

Endnote 3: Whatever has happened to the misdeeds of the Peerless Hospital in Kolkata cited above (http://news.asiaone.com/News/Latest%2BNews/Asia/Story/A1Story20100413-210095.html)?

The following is a discussion of a group of adivasi (tribal) people in Northeastern India who are resisting forced displacement from their land and homes by corporate mining and industrial interests.

In a span of three to four years the Jharkhandi people began to realize that the central & state governments were not for peoples’ welfare but that they were laying steps to sell off peoples’ land, their water & forest resources together with all the mineral riches to corporate houses. They decided to act. Wherever projects together with land requirements were announced, people mobilized and organized themselves and said a definite ‘no’ to the government and companies. People’s Resistance Movements Against Dispacement sprang up in different parts of Jharkhand from 2004 onwards.

Explanatory notes: an MOU is a “Memorandum of Understanding, in this case between corporations and the Indian state. A lakh is a unit of measurement equal to 100,000.

Though this piece is a great introduction to tribal resistance in India, this site does not necessarily endorse all the analysis contained within. The article originally appeared at Sanhati.

Where Ants Drove Out Elephants – The Story of People’s Resistance to Displacement in Jharkhand

January 6, 2012

By Stan Swamy

This article is an introduction to the trajectory of peoples’ movements against displacement in Jharkhand in the last few years. As the author writes, the resistance in Jharkhand has resulted in the fact that “[o]ut of the about one hundred MOUs signed by Jharkhand government with industrialists, hardly three or four companies have succeeded in acquiring some land, set up their industries and start partial production.” – Ed.

Displacement is painful for anybody – to leave the place where one was born and brought up, the house that one built with one’s own labour. It is most painful when no alternate resettlement has been worked out and one has nowhere to go. And when it comes to the indigenous Adivasi People for whom their land is not just an economic commodity but a source of spiritual sustenance, it can be heart-rending.

A very conservative estimate indicates that during the last 50 years approximately 2 crore 13 lakh people have been displaced in the country owing to big projects such as mines, dams, industries, wild-life sanctuaries, field firing range etc. Of this, at least 40%, approximating 85 lakhs, are Indigenous Adivasi People. Of all the displaced, only one-fourth have been resettled. The remaining were given some cash compensation arbitrarily fixed by local administration and then neatly forgotten.

Independent studies done during the mid-1990s reveal that in Jharkhand about 15 lakh persons have been displaced and about 15 lakh acres of land alienated from mainly Adivasi people. Needless to say, during the last 15 years a lot more displacement of people and alienation of land have taken place. Strange but true, rehabilitation of the displaced was never taken seriously by any govt during all these six decades when the process of industrialization for ‘national development’ has been in vogue. In fact there was no rehabilitation policy at all!

***
MOU-signing spree after the creation of Jharkhand
***

The real reason for the creation of Jharkhand as a separate state in November 2000 was not so much to respect and honour the long cherished wish and struggle of the indigenous people to govern themselves as per their culture & traditions, but in view of opening up the vast mineral resources to national & international mining companies whose pressure was increasingly brought to bear on the government. Quite understandably, one MOU after another was signed between the state government and various companies without any reference or consultation or consent of the mainly Adivasi people in whose land all this natural wealth is stored.

Legal safeguards meant to protect Adivasi land from being alienated to non-Adivasis such as The Chotanagpur Tenancy Act (1908), The Santal Parganas Tenancy Act (1949), the Constitutional provisions through the Vth Schedule, The Provisions (Extension to Scheduled Areas)Act (1996), some significant Supreme Court judgments such as The Samata Judgment (1997) were and continue to be neatly ignored by the central & state govts in generously awarding vast tracts of land to industrialists at their asking. Over hundred such MOUs were signed during 2001 and 2010. Rough estimates indicate that about 1.4 lakh acres of land have been signed off. A cruel betrayal of the Adivasi people for whom land is not just an economic commodity but a source of spiritual/cultural sustenance.

***
Enough is enough . . .
***

In a span of three to four years the Jharkhandi people began to realize that the central & state governments were not for peoples’ welfare but that they were laying steps to sell off peoples’ land, their water & forest resources together with all the mineral riches to corporate houses. They decided to act. Wherever projects together with land requirements were announced, people mobilized and organized themselves and said a definite ‘no’ to the government and companies. People’s Resistance Movements Against Dispacement sprang up in different parts of Jharkhand from 2004 onwards.

Even as people stood together in the form of micro-resistance movements, the industrialists , local administration, police, lower judiciary, most of print & electronic media and the urban middle class joined forces. They began to sing the song of ‘development’ and accused the peoples’ resistance movements as ‘anti-development’. The police started to harass the leaders of people’s movements as ‘obstructing government work’ and as having extremist leanings. It is this situation which brought together activists leading anti-dispacement struggles, some socially concerned intellectuals, a few members of the media, a few folk artists, and some journalists. After a series of discussions & reflections it was decided to bring together the various anti-dispacement movements under some umbrella organizations so as to strengthen people’s struggles and to express support & solidarity to each other. Three to four such macro bodies emerged. Public meetings, rallies, advocacy , press conferences were held to educate and motivate the people in struggle. It was made very clear that these anti-displacement movements will not enter into any dialogue with the government or the company to discuss rehabilitation facilities for particular projects since it would imply that people accept to be displaced.

By 2009 it became clear that companies are not making any in roads in Jharkhand in terms of acquiring land and setting up their industries whereas they are ready with their large investments and latest technology and the only thing they want is land. The corporate houses then started to exert pressure on the central & state governments to take some drastic steps by which this stalemate could be put an end to.

***
Operation Green Hunt . . . meant to hunt out the people and clear their green fields & forests to give to mining companies.
***

A new philosophy was created to the effect that development is not taking place in the tribal belt of central India because of the ‘menace of Naxalism’ and if the Naxals/Maoists can be eliminated, the government will undertake systematic development programs and the tribal population will catch up in the developmental process. Hundreds of police and CRPF jawans were sent into the villages of the so-called “red zone”. They did not have the guts to go deep into the jungles and confront the Naxals. Instead they gave vent to their frustration on the helpless innocent village folk. They harassed them, beat them up, ransacked their houses, humiliated the elderly, dishonoured the women, arrested or shot any young person. They were not accountable to any civil authority. The peaceful life of village communities was shattered.

Protests against state repression by human rights & civic rights groups started in good earnest. During 2010 public meetings, rallies, advocacy work condemning state action against its own citizens were conducted. At the same time, resistance to displacement was also strengthened. The end result was despite the state coming down so heavily on them, the indigenous adivasi / moolvasi people steadfastly refused to part with their land for the industrialists. Out of the about one hundred MOUs signed by Jharkhand govt with industrialists, hardly three or four companies have succeeded in acquiring some land, set up their industries and start partial production. This too they did by dividing local communities, enticing them with false promises or threatening them by using hired hooligans. Most significantly, the big companies which asked for hundreds and thousands of acres of land were turned away empty handed. This is indeed a heroic achievement of the poorest of the poor against the mighty industrialist giants.

***
‘Operation Anaconda’!
***

This operation brought in a change of strategy in the state’s war against the Adivasi people. It was unleashed in August 2011. Anaconda, the huge serpent of the Amazon basin in Latin America, was the code name. A thickly forested area by name of ‘Saranda’ in Singhbhum district which had been under the influence of CPI (Maoists), was chosen as a forewarning of things to come. So now on it will not be a hunt spread out over a large area but pin point smaller compact areas as “terrorist affected” and swipe the Adivasi people out even as Anaconda swipes every thing in its way.

Thousands of police and para-military forces were brought in from the different parts of the country to do the swiping operation. Even the names of these battalions (“Greyhounds”, “Cobras”, “Scorpians”) were supposed to evoke a sense of fright among people. They were mostly outsiders who did not know the culture, language of the Adivasi people and they did not have any sympathy towards the simple village people. Their achievement during these months was three villagers dead, three in death bed, several houses destroyed and granaries incinerated. They swept through village after village, destroyed the straw roofs, drove the people out of their homes, burnt their clothes, valuables, stole their money and killed their cattle.

This cruel action of the state was brought to light and condemned by human rights activists, artists, leftist political parties, press & electronic media. An appeal was made to the National Human Rights Commission which was good enough to respond and made its investigation although its final report is still awaited.

The central & state governments have gone into face-saving exercise, ended the infamous Operation Anaconda, offered some monetary relief to the victims and is now speaking of developing Saranda villages with top bureaucrats in command. The end result of this cruel exercise on people is that the Jharkhand government has allotted iron-ore to 19 steel companies.

At the same time, the Adivasi people who have nothing to lose but the chains of state repression, will continue to resist displacement and land alienation.

***
Where lies the future …?
***

Three apparent possibilities:

1. The “red corridor” is also the mineral corridor. The state, through its war on people, may clear the mineral rich land from the indigenous adivasi and hand it over to mining corporates on a platter. The people will be driven out of their ancestral land and forced to settle down in the slums of towns & cities and eke out a living as casual and contract labour. They will lose their adivasi identity, their culture, their language, their communitarian character. The extermination of the indigenous adivasi will be complete.

2. Flocking to join the Maoist militants as the sole alternative. This is a real possibility insofar as the bourgeois state is bending over backwards to oblige the corporates rather than fulfill its constitutional obligations towards its own people, particularly the indigenous adivasi people who have been the most exploited and oppressed all through India’s independent history. It is this state which has scant regard for those constitutional & legal provisions and some judicial interventions which have sought to protect and safeguard the interests of the indigenous peoples of India.

Is there any wonder then the Adivasi youth constitute 99% of Maoists in Jharkhand and neighbouring states?

3. Drop the gun and start talking to Maoist militants. This is still a possibility if people who cherish the cause of justice will rise up to the occasion. Writers, poets, artists, media persons, human rights activists/defenders, trade/labour union activists, cultural activists, each using their own forums, can surely highlight the inhumanity in the state’s war on poorest of the poor. Justice -oriented legal professionals can well initiate legal action against the state for its violations of constitutional and legal provisions to protect the rights of the indigenous people. Advocacy work can be done with well-disposed legislators, parliamentarians, political parties. Christian churches, whose 90% membership consists of indigenous people in the tribal belt of central India, should surely raise their voice against the unjust displacement of adivasi people and alienation of adivasi land.

In short, It is time to stand up and be counted.

The Sri Lankan regime has carried out repression against the Tamil

“If the war on the side of the Regime and the State was
waged based on a political ideology and an accompanying military doctrine aimed at militarily liquidating the LTTE, along with its political-military leadership, and to annihilate the political status of the Tamil nation, if the war was waged under a military
doctrine with no regard for collateral damage in order to achieve this
objective; and with that, to consolidate a Sinhala-Buddhist
hegemonic-chauvinist-militarist State that would feed into the
political agenda of perpetuating the Rajapakse dynastic regime,
then the war itself is on trial.”

The original post appeared at Democracy and Class Struggle. Thanks to Joseph for pointing it out, and writing the introduction.

The LLRC Report: A Process of Reconciliation or Perpetuation of a

Dynastic Military Junta?

December 29, 2011

by Surendra Ajit Rupasinghe, Secretary, Ceylon Communist Party – Maoist

The LLRC Report has served to polarize an already, irrevocably, polarized society, placed barriers in bringing about reconciliation and opened the country to even more foreign intervention.  Here was a golden opportunity for the State and the Regime to come clean, on which basis the bridges of reconciliation could have been built and all foreign powers that intend to pursue their geo-political agendas by exploiting the situation would have been silenced. This issue affects all of us. It is our collective honor and dignity that is at stake. As citizens, as the supreme People of Lanka, we do not want our country to be seen as a morally degenerate banana republic. The country belongs to us, its citizens. It cannot be held hostage to any particular political agenda or regime. This issue affects our collective moral conscience, our shared sense of justice, our collective identity as a civilized human community. Therefore, we must pursue the debate, however consequential it may be.Why could not the LLRC be constituted by eminent and trusted citizens of all nationalities and communities, instead of servants of the State and the regime,  that is itself part of the investigation? Why could it not have been constituted with the participation and observation of eminent and trusted international personalities that have neither truck with foreign powers nor the regime? These questions have to be addressed with honesty and integrity.

The following is an interview with CP Gajurel, a leader of the revolutionary faction of Nepal’s Maoist party. Here, he responds to Prachanda’s recent Central Committee document. 

It originally appeared at myrepublica.com

Interview – ‘Dahal’s Paper a Surrender’

by Kiran Pun

December 25,2011

Republica: Party Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal has presented a political document at the CC meeting. What do you have to say about it?

CP Gajurel: The document has proved that our leadership is swiftly heading toward ‘rightist and opportunistic” political line. The document has justified the mistakes committed by political leadership. So, the document has adopted the path of surrender.  We do not accept it. Party Senior Vice-chairman Kiran (Mohan Baidya) will present another document from our side.This means, the document would not be helpful for party unity?

CP Gajurel: Yes. How will the party unite when the genuine concerns that have already been registered by party leaders and cadres are not addressed.  So, the document would not be in anyway helpful for party unity.

What do you think would be crucial to party unity?

CP Gajurel: First of all, the document has to clearly address the mandate of the Palungtar plenum. But Dahal’s document has neglected the mandate. He has claimed in his document that the four-point deal, the seven-point deal, army integration, BIPPA, return of seized properties, were the decisions taken by the party. But these decisions have been taken by Dahal and PM Bhattarai and not the party.

“One Western reporter compared the atmosphere in Wukan to that of the Paris Commune, a veteran Hong Kong journalist reminisced about Beijing in the spring of 1989, before the crackdown on Tiananmen. He described then an almost intoxicating sense of unity and generosity, where cab drivers drove protesters for free and thieves vowed to switch professions, buoyed  by a feeling that all was good and possible in the fleeting moment.”

This article is from Foreign Policy

The Spirit of Wukan

by Rachel Beitarie

December 23, 2011

Wukan,China – Peasants do not have a good record of facing off with the Communist Party. Rural standoffs usually end with the arrest of the ringleaders and an increased security presence for the remaining residents. Yet on Thursday afternoon, Dec. 22, residents of the embattled village of Wukan scored a major achievement in their 11-day stand-off with local government, securing the release of one of the village’s three detained leaders, the other two were released today.On Wednesday, a deputy party secretary of Guangdong Province arrived to negotiate with village leaders, promising to grant all of their initial demands: release of three elected representatives of Wukan who were detained two seeks ago; return of the body of Xue Jinbo, a village leader who died in police custody; and direct negotiations with the temporary committee, an interim governing body chosen by villagers, whose members were earlier denounced by the government as criminals. “It is totally unprecedented that a high-level official will come to talk  with protesting farmers,” one activist who came to witness events told me on Tuesday night.

In September, residents of Wukan accused local officials of embezzling more than $110 million dollars of money owed to them for selling more than 80 percent of the villagers arable land to developers, and marched on the county seat. Significantly, compared with the tens of thousands of other protests that happen across China each year, local officials fled Wukan on Dec. 11, leaving the town in the hands of the village community. Their success puts them in a risky position, as the Wukanese have challenged  not just the local authorities but a basic assumption behind Communist Party rule: that the Chinese people, and especially the rural masses, need authoritarian rule to prevent the country from descending into chaos.

Ten days into life without police or party officials, Wukan was almost peaceful, save for the array of police forces that surrounded the town.  Still, the gumption of the Wukanese may be a new model  for activism in communities across China.

After initial destruction of property of local government offices. Wukan’s temporary committee announced this to be a nonviolent protest.  The deserted police station is still locked and intact, as are the houses of local elites and families of officials, most of whom never left the village.

Villagers refrained from looting and instead focused on bringing food into the village through back roads, away from security forces that massed outside. They coordinated mass rallies, making protest signs and cooked for the hordes of journalists who descended on the village.

One western reporter compared the atmosphere in Wukan to that of the Paris Commune; a veteran Hong Kong journalist reminisced about Beijing in the spring of 19989, before the crackdown on Tienanmen. He described then an almost intoxicating sense of unity and generosity, where cab drivers drove protesters for free and thieves vowed to switch professions , buoyed by a feeling that all was good and possible in the fleeting moment.

But can the spirit of Wukan last? The small farming village of 13,000 thousand embodies social changes brought about  by more than 30 years of economic reforms in China. The first generation of migrant workers that  left their villages to work in the cities is now retiring from factory work. Many of them have returned to their villages to open small businesses or work their families’ fields. But they have found a harsh truth. Local governments, relying ever more heavily on land sales to generate income and wielding unchecked power over their citizens, have left rural residents with few ways to support themselves.

In Wuken, the protest was supported by a group of returnees, mostly in their thirties and forties, who had moved back to the village over the past few years planning to settle back into  rural life – but who have been unsettled by the pervasive corruption.

Yang Semao, 43, head of the temporary committee, came back to the village in June after a few years working in the boomtown of Shehzhen, about 100 miles away. “When I returned it became clear to me that things are getting worse here,” he says. Many of the villagers had lost much of their land in the deal, while high inflation eats away at their savings.

Until a few months ago, it was each person to himself here,” says another recent returnee, Jiang, who gave just his last name for fear of government reprisal for speaking to reporters. “Some of us petitioned but we weren’t very organized. Now we think it’s better if we act together. We become more organized, more united, with each day that passes.”

Rachel Beitarie is a freelance writer in China.

The following is a document presented to the UCPN(M) Central Committee by Vice Chairman Mohan Baidya ‘Kiran’. It is long, but important for understanding the current situation facing Nepal’s Maoist party. As one might expect, it discusses many of the dangerous choices made by some leaders of the UCPN(M), including the dissolution of the People’s Liberation Army, the BIPPA trade agreement with India, and the failure to make necessary preparations for revolt.

Kiran also reaffirms that a “New People’s Democracy,” as a temporary stage in preparation for socialism, is the party’s minimum program. Kiran argues that not only is this the official line of the party, as decided on by the Chunbang meeting of 2005, but more importantly that this line “is necessary as well as possible.”

In the Chunbang meeting, the UCPN(M) collectively recognized that the reactionary parties, like Nepali Congress and the Communist party of Nepal (United Marxist-Leninist) would try to turn the government into a bourgeois parliamentary republic. This is precisely the situation the Maoists have been facing for the past 5 years, as the bourgeois parties have been doing everything in their power to prevent a new, revolutionary Nepal.

But those bourgeois parties have had some assistance. Kiran argues that the party’s inability to move past the parliamentary swamp is due to a shift in strategy, one that was never agreed upon by the party as a whole. Referring to Prachanda specifically, Kiran notes that

“the Constituent Assembly is being taken not as a tactics but strategy. In this way, efforts have been made to end and liquidate the new people’s democratic revolution and mass insurrection.”

The piece also explains, quite candidly, that democratic centralism has broken down within the party and is “a mess”. He even goes as far as to say that the leadership of the party has “acted against the people,” and that class divisions have risen within the party. These are hard words, speaking to a bitter, difficult situation.

Ultimately though, the document is not pessimistic. Kiran argues forcefully that revolution is still possible.  His general plan affords more priority to mass mobilizations, or the “street front” than the parliamentary front. The plan also involves the strengthening of cultural and educational programs within the party, as well as the “People’s Volunteers,” a people’s fighting force that can be mobilized in the absence of the PLA and the Young Communist League. The document also demands that the party refuse to compromise on a constitution that does not meet the needs of women, oppressed nationality groups and those from oppressed castes.

The ideological divides within the UCPN(M) are deep. This document will not heal many of those schisms, nor does it provide answers for all of the questions facing Nepal. But it does show that there are revolutionaries within the party who have a broad outline for future struggle.

Thanks to Frontlines of Revolutionary Struggle for making this document available.

Kiran : On problems of the party and their resolution

1. Need for a new report:

Now, the class struggle is at a serious juncture and this class struggle has been reflected on our party’s two-line struggle. The history of Nepal’s new people’s democratic revolution and communist movement is at a new turning point.  We are in the grave type of labor pain. While, on the one hand, the conspiracy to liquidate the process of great people’s war initiated in 1996 into parliamentary quagmire is being consolidated; the revolutionary line, on the other, has emerged more effectively against this trend with a new commitment to give continuity to the Nepali new people’s democratic revolution.

In the history of Nepali people’s revolution and communist movement, a chapter has come to an end and a new chapter has begun. And this process is moving ahead. In order for us to carry forward and complete the task of Nepali revolution, a new historic necessity has emerged in the class struggle and two-line struggle of the party that requires us to face newer and more serious challenges. History has sought a clear-cut and straight answer from us whether to resolutely march forward facing and overcoming these challenges or to surrender before the reactionaries.

But our revolution continues. In this crucial period, the sacrifice and contribution and the stories of unprecedented courage and bravery of our great martyrs, disappeared and injured warriors and the people demonstrated in the entire Nepal’s revolution and great People’s War must be remembered with especial significance and due respect. The great ideals and dreams of people’s liberation and revolution are linked together as integral part of the fierce class struggle and two-line struggle in the party. And we can never forget these ideals and dreams.

The political report  entitled “Brief Political Report on Emerging Crisis: Their solution and Future Programmes”  presented by Chairman comrade Prachanda on December 24, 2011 in the central committee meeting has not recognized and acknowledged this complexity and reality of the class struggle and the two-line struggle. This has, hence, necessitated a separate political report.

2.  On report presented by Chairman Comrade:

The main issues and principal trends raised in the report presented by Chairman Comrade can be briefly summed up as below:

The fourth point of the report has mentioned about existing uniformity and polemics in the party. The reports says: “There is no formal dispute in the party on MLM/Thought (Marxism-Leninism-Maoism/ Mao Thought) as the directive principle of revolution and the defence, application and development of its fundamental propositions; socialism and communism as party’s ultimate goal and maximum programme; new people’s democracy as party’s strategy and its programme as the minimum programme; adopting the people’s federal republic and federal republic as party’s main tactics in the present objective situation of the country;  and going for mass insurrection with especial focus on national liberation and federal republic. But contradictions and disputes have often taken place on issues concerning the tactical steps to achieve the above mentioned goals, which have attracted and had impact on party’s overall ideology on certain conditions”.  It is, therefore necessary to raise some of the issues mentioned here.

On guiding principle of the party, there should not be parallel and confusing phrases like Marxism-Leninism-Maoism/ Mao Thought. There had been long debate on this issue and it had been agreed to resolve this issues with completing certain procedures. In this connection, we had registered our views that it would be appropriate to resolve this issue through certain procedure and use the phrase ‘Maoism’.

It is clear that we have adopted new people’s democracy as party’s minimum programme and strategy; and socialism and communism as our maximum programme.  But Chairman Comrade in various media outlets and more particularly in an interview to Kramvanga magazine (Volume 2, November/December 2011 Issue) has said that demarcation line between new people’s democratic revolution and socialist revolution is getting thinner and the task of completing new people’s democratic revolution and the task of completing the socialist revolution have been centralized into a single task. These views of the chairman have created a big confusion and serious ideological question on the issue concerning the phases, programmes, strategy and tactics of the revolution.  If Chairman’s views are at all true, his concept regarding new people’s democratic revolution is guided by comprador, bureaucratic and capitalist orientation. These views are not compatible with the reality of a country like Nepal which is in semi-feudal, semi-colonial and neo-colonial condition.

In this quotation, it is stated that there is no dispute over people’s federal republic and the federal republic as party’s principal tactics of the party.  But the party, as stated in the quote, has never adopted two phrases as parallel tactics of the party simultaneously. This clearly indicates a mutual contradiction.

The fifth point of the report has stated that the two line struggle or the main issue of dispute is gradually being dragged into the debate whether the achievements of the tactics of federal republic should be established or they are to be destroyed dubbing them as partial reforms in the reactionary system.  This is not a question of dismantling the achievements but the real question is whether to stick to parliamentary system accepting democratic republic as party’s strategy or march forward for the establishment of people’s federal republic. The above mentioned report that states ‘establishment and destruction’ is directed against the position of federal republic the party had adopted in the Chunbang meeting of the central committee which states ‘reactionary class and their parties will try to transform the democratic republic into a bourgeoisie parliamentary republic whereas the proletariat’s party like ours will transform it into new people’s democratic republic’.

Similarly, in the beginning of the same report, the tactics basically relating to peace, constitution and the government has been taken as a focal point of the current internal struggle and contradictions within the party. It has also stated that this issue has been dragged into ideological debate concerning party’s ideology and strategy. This is true to a large extent. But our issues on ideology and strategy are based on mutually two opposite perspective and values.

Peace, constitution and government are definitely linked as an integral part of the ideology and strategy.  In the view of Chairman Comrade, the meaning of peace is disarming the People’s Liberation Army, surrender and liquidate the people’s democratic revolution; meaning of the constitution is writing of a parliamentary constitution and the meaning of government is the acceptance of slavery of the old state machinery.  Compromises (‘Give and take’) are made in negotiation. But in this entire process, he has only given everything but not taken any thing. This is not only a compromise but a total surrender and capitulation. Circumstances have shown that the Constituent Assembly is being taken not as a tactics but strategy. In this way, efforts have been made to end and liquidate the new people’s democratic revolution and mass insurrection.

In the fifth point of the same report, Chairman Comrade has stated that mass insurrection could not immediately materialize despite repeated and conscious attempts. But this is not true. This is only his claim. In fact, he had never been effortful and oriented towards that direction.

Now right revisionism has posed a serious threat to communist revolution both at home and abroad. But, the fifth point of Comrade chairman’s report has stated that the ‘threat of right revisionist’ will be countered and the ‘mechanical and sectarian outlook’ would only serve the counter revolution. It can be easily understood that the attack has been directed against the revolutionary line in the present two-line struggle of the party.

Chairman Comrade’s report has portrayed party’s condition in a very pessimistic way. Stating that the party is dangerously heading towards dissolution and liquidation, it has said ‘the party is in fact dying’. Stating that the collective decision, individual responsibility, democratic centralism, levy system, quota, financial transparency and sacrifices and commitment are being bulldozed by personal interest, he has said that personal interest and selfish motive have become dominant in the party.   By raising these issues he has tried to divert and dilute the main issues and problems. But, in reality, he is the archetype and focal point of all these trends, tendencies, problems and self interest. Similarly, while the report has attempted to hide the contradiction between the existing affluent class of the party and the working class on the one hand, it has, on the other, stated that the entire party is dying. This is distortion of the fact because only the old and conservative force was dying but the entire party.  In reality, the old party is dying and a new party is being born.

In the fifth and eighth point of the Chairman Comrade’s report, it is stated that the handover of the keys of the containers and four-point and seven-point agreements had been unanimously endorsed by the concerned committees and bodies of the party. This is a white lie. The reality is different. In the meeting of the standing committee of the party, note of dissent had been registered on issues concerning army integration, four-point agreement and on the phrase of democratic republican constitution that was mentioned in the four-point agreement. Reservation had also been expressed on some issues. Quite surprisingly, the departmental in-charge of the people’s Liberation Army had also not been informed while handing over the keys of the containers. In addition to this, it has been clearly stated in the letters submitted by Comrade Kiran and comrade Badal to the central committee on these issues. Chairman’s report has not given any satisfactory answer and clarification on these issues.  The eighth point of the report has mentioned the issues we had raised in our letter to the central committee concerning four-point agreement, keys of the containers, seven-pint agreement, return of the property, BIPPA ( Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement made signed with India) but has not acknowledged the mistakes. And most lately, the report has not even mentioned the letter submitted to the Chairman with a request to address the issues of People’s Liberation Army. The report has totally ignored and undermined the seriousness of the issues.

In the ninth point of the report presented by Chairman Comrade, ten point suggestions have been presented in order to solve the existing problems of the party. On the surface, these suggestions seem to be appropriate. But, in essence, they have not realized the crux of the problem.  The existing problems of the party are related mainly to the outlook and procedures. Problems related to outlook are linked with ideology, strategy, programmes and political line. Problems related to procedures have relation mainly with democratic centralism. National congress has been proposed as the central remedy to solve the problems.  It would be difficult to create an atmosphere of trust in the party without conducting intensive debate on all issues, without making correct analysis and review, without making self-criticism and without opting for self-transformation by correcting all mistakes, weaknesses and shortcomings. Without doing this, the national congress cannot solve the problems. In order to maintain discipline and establish democratic centralism, in the first place, the party must make sure that its policies, programmes and political line are revolutionary and that an environment of trust must be created in the leadership. There has been encroachment into and violation of party’s discipline and procedures from the comrades of principal leadership and some other responsible comrades. Against this background, it is essential on the part of the leadership to pay special attention to the seriousness of the situation and express commitment to be transformed.

The concluding part of the report contains ‘organizational consolidation and people’s mobilization programme’. The programme concerning the mobilization of the people is abstract. And it has not paid attention to the programme related to struggle. Although some of the points of this programmes are correct, this type of programme will be meaningless unless the fundamental problems are resolved.

What is most notable in the report which is worth contemplating is the fact that it has not put forward any programmes in a solid manner against imperialism and expansionism and in favor of national independence. Instead, it has indirectly supported the BIPPA.

I n the entire report, Chairman Comrade has made a vain effort to look for a principal reason of the existing crisis of the party somewhere else. In fact, the epicenter of this type of crisis inherently lies in the principal leadership itself. In overall summation, the political report presented in the central committee meeting is based on eclectic style and oriented towards rightist opportunism. In conclusion, this report cannot solve the current problems and crisis of the party.

3.   On problems of party and the revolution:

a. Organizational problem:

Now everything is in a mess in the party including democratic centralism, system of criticism-self criticism, collective decision-making process, individual responsibility, committee and leadership system, working style and procedures, financial procedures, policy about the people, policy about party workers and international fraternal relationship.  The principal reasons behind this mess in the life of the party are: the rift between the upper class and lower class in the party; party being used as a tool of reformism and compromise instead of using the party as a tool for revolution and class struggle; bureaucratic and compromising and anarchic tendency that has developed in some responsible comrades in the leadership; and violation of the party’s decision by the principal leadership instead of their strict implementation.  It is, thus, necessary firstly for the principal leadership and also for the entire leadership to be transformed by correcting all mistakes and weaknesses.

b.  On Peace and Constitution:

We are all for peace and constitution.  But we are not in favour of peace and constitution that are against the interests of the country and the people.  In order for the establishment of peace in favour of the country and the people, formulation of national security policy, framing of people’s constitution and army integration in a dignified manner are necessary. But, instead of paying serious attention towards these issues, the People’s Liberation Army is being dissolved in a humiliating and insulting way.  The integration of People’s Liberation Army is being done in DDR (disarm, dissolve and rehabilitate) model on the basis of individual recruitment and disarmament, instead of opting for SSR (security sector reforms) model. Writing of the constitution in favour of people shall mean the people’s federal republican constitution with anti-feudal and anti-imperialist essence that accordingly ensures state restructuring, guarantees the rights of the people including workers and peasants, ensures special rights for women, dalits ( oppressed) and Muslim communities, accepts the right to self-determination for ethnic nationalities and Madhesi communities and establishes ethnic self-rule.

Now the possibility of framing this type of constitution is getting thinner. This is because domestic and international reactionaries are hatching serious conspiracy to push the Unified CPN (Maoist) into the quagmire of parliamentary politics and national capitulation and to once again deceive the people. In this situation, there is no possibility of the peace process to advance ahead in favour of the people and the country.  The possibility of framing the constitution is also getting thinner and thinner.

c.On streets, parliament and the government:

We have adopted the decision to advance the peace and constitution framing process in favour of the people and, should that fail, we need to use the fronts of streets, parliament and government for the preparation of a new revolution.  But these fronts have not been properly used.

In recent days, there has not been any programme of struggle. The streets are virtually getting empty. Despite the fact that some comrades have played meaningful and adequate role in framing the constitution in parliament or Constituent Assembly, the principal leadership has not at all played effective role for the interest o the people. Instead, the leadership has acted against the people.  The party had unanimously decided that Chairman comrade should not remain in the dispute resolution sub-committee of the Constituent Assembly and due attention of the Chairman comrade had been repeatedly drawn not to continue to remain in the said sub-committee when he ignored the party decision. Even now he has been in this sub-committee against the decision of the party and has arbitrarily abandoned the propositions of the party. Chairman Comrade has arbitrarily obliterated some of the issues from the documents that had been adopted amidst struggle by majority of our members of Constituent Assembly. The domination of bureaucratic and comprador capitalist class is growing and Chairman Comrade himself has been backing this class.  If this situation continues, the validity of the Constituent Assembly has almost come to an end.

While in power, the government, instead of working for the interest of the people, the country and the revolution, has acted against the interest of the people, country and the revolution. Despite agreement reached to withdraw and annul the cases charged against the Maoist leaders and workers during the People’s War, no effort has been made in this regard. As a result, conspiracy is being hatched to entrap Maoist leaders and workers in cases filed against them during the People’s War.  Instead of safeguarding national independence while in power, the Bilateral Investment Protection and Promotion Agreement (BIPPA) has been signed in the interest of expansionism. This has posed an additional obstacle in building independent national economy.  The people are being evicted from the land they captured during the great People’s War without making an alternative arrangement for them on the basis of revolutionary land reforms.  Instead of working for the interest of workers, they are being deprived of their right to protest. The comrades who are in the leadership of the government are presenting themselves in an anarchic manner grossly ignoring the political line, decisions, directives and mechanism of the party. In this situation, there is no justification of the party to remain in power.

d. On two-line struggle:

Two line struggles is underway for a long time in the party which has gone through many stages. The crux of the two-line struggle is whether we should remain satisfied with the democratic republic or march ahead for people’s federal republic; whether to dissolve the revolution into parliamentary system or make preparation for mass insurrection; whether to defend our national independence or opt for national capitulation; whether to opt for peace process with dignified army integration while resolving the fundamental problems related to people’s self-rule and livelihood or kneel down before the old state power; and whether to frame a constitution with the essence of anti-imperialism and anti-feudalism  or write a parliamentary regressive constitution.

In the party, this two-line struggle has gone through many ups and downs. Until the period when central committee meeting was held soon after the Palungtar plenum, the party had adopted revolutionary political line. When question was raised for the implementation of this political line, the situation started reversing. In the central committee meeting held in April 2011, party’s revolutionary political line suddenly rendered into minority status. Coming to the present time passing through the process of formation of the government under our party’s leadership, the situation has completely taken a U-turn.  The decision on army integration made in the standing committee in May 2011, four point agreement signed with the Madhesi parties, decision on handing over the keys of containers, instruction given to the local administration on the return of land and property seized during the People’s War , BIPPA, and seven-point agreement including army integration are the result of this U-turn.

The principal leadership has decisive role to play as to which direction the two-line struggle has to be taken. Like the class struggle, the principal leadership has to play a revolutionary role in both strategy and tactics also in two-line struggle. But in the present two-line struggle, our principal leadership played just the opposite role in strategy and tactics.  It played the role exactly against Mao’s ‘three dos and three don’ts’.  In this entire process, the principal leadership has adopted the strategy of tricking and lying the revolutionary rank and file against the revolutionary political line, playing one against the other, presenting itself  in an opaque and abstract manner, adopting the policy of weakening others, enticing the leaders and workers with false promises and assurances and later betraying. This type of strategy only benefits the class enemy and has been benefiting them.

In the similar manner, the principal leadership has been trying to make the two-line struggle unhealthy. Chairman Comrade has been saying that Dhobighat understanding was an ‘unholy alliance’.  But it is now clear as to whom and what type of relation he is developing. He has labeled unfounded charges against the comrades who have opposed his political line. He has accused the revolutionary leaders and workers of being dissatisfied because of not getting ministerial portfolio and position. In this way, he has undermined the two-line struggle that is being launched on the basis of ideology, principle and policies. It is known to all how frightened and worried he was when the Dhobighat understanding was reached. He feared that his position would be weakened or lost if Dhobighat understanding materialized.  Thus, the question now is not about the position but for the revolution, principle and policies.

Now the two-line struggle in the party is being transformed into the struggle between the affluent class and deprived class. Revolutionary line is being weakened and defeated while the opportunist line is getting victorious. The party is being swiftly directed and oriented towards rightist opportunism and national capitulation. We still have time. It is urgent on our part to play special role to save the party from disaster and transform the party into revolutionary line. And we must do it.

In the present age of globalized imperialism and proletarian revolution, the process of upgrading the class status of the leaders of proletarian class, infiltration of class enemies into the party, ideological and political sterilization takes place in a swifter manner.  All of us must be alert against this trend

e.On prospect of new people’s democratic revolution:

Despite the establishment of democratic republic and institutionalization of federalism and secularism, and despite the formation of the government under our party’s leadership, Nepal is still in semi-feudal and semi-colonized state. The state power is still at the hands of comprador and bureaucratic capitalist and feudal class.  Now it is clear that the contradiction between comprador bureaucratic capitalist class and Indian expansionism on the one side and the Nepalese people on the other has become the principal contradiction.

At this point of time, there is a serious question and challenge before us. The question is whether we should bow down before parliamentary reformism and national capitulation or struggle for people’s federal republic and national independence.  In the present circumstances, there is no concrete possibility of framing a people’s constitution, protection of national independence and resolution of fundamental problems of people’s livelihood. Against this background, we must stand firmly in favour of the country, people and the revolution. There is no alternative other than this.

New People’s Democratic Revolution in Nepal is necessary as well as possible. If we advance the preparatory works in an effective manner, there are ample conditions for mass insurrection.  In this connection the following issues are worth mentioning: Firstly, people want to live not in an old style but in a new ways.  People are seeking change and transformation. People will be forced to come to the street for struggle if the constitution was not framed in their interest. Secondly, the question relating to the defence of national independence is becoming more serious and challenging. Nepal has its historic role and tradition in the fight against imperialism. Nepalese people want liberation from all kinds of imperialist and Indian expansionist intervention and domination. Thirdly, crisis is deepening and intensifying in all political, economical and cultural fronts. This is the crisis of reactionary state power. This crisis has impacted all classes and sectors. People are not in the position to bear this crisis. Fourthly, there has been stiff struggle and fighting among the Nepalese parliamentary and reactionary forces for power and position. The entire state power and mechanism has been affected by these kinds of contradictions.  Fifthly, there is a stiff competition among some international powers to use Nepal for their own interest.  But some countries tend to respect Nepal’s sovereignty and national dignity and have been doing it.  Sixthly, our party is the center of people’s hope for their bright future. But there are several and serious deviations in the party and these deviations have deepened. The two-line struggle is, hence, getting very strong and powerful. Today’s need is to unite and unify the party with due transformation by making country, people, and the revolution as a focal point; by conducting the two-line struggle in a healthy and friendly manner; and by freeing ourselves from all kinds of deviation. It is clear that the party would be very powerful and will be able to lead the revolution only when we are able to accomplish this historic need.

f. Programmes, policies and political line:

The essence of our programmes, policies and political line is to advance towards the path of achieving the great goal of socialism and communism by liberating the country from semi-feudal and semi-imperialist condition through the new people’s democratic revolution. Our principal tactics is to make preparation for the establishment of people’s federal republic, defence of national independence and resolution of fundamental problems related to people’s livelihood. The decisions adopted in the central committee meeting held after the expanded meeting in Palungtar on party’s future political line and action plans are fundamentally correct even now.  Based on these decisions, we need to move ahead with additional modifications.

g. On minimum programme to resolve the problems:

The following propositions are made to resolve the existing problems:

1. Should move ahead on the basis of political line adopted by the central committee meeting held immediately after the Palungtar expanded meeting with some modifications.
2. Should address and resolve with correct analysis the problems and issues raised and presented  at different dates to the headquarters by party’s vice chairman and general secretary comrades on four-point agreement; handing over the keys of containers;  instruction to local administration concerning the return of the seized land and property; army integration; the seven point-agreement;  BIPPA; demands of ‘ disqualified’ PLA members; appropriate package for PLA warriors working in YCL and volunteer Squad;  payment of allowances that had earlier been deducted from the allowances of members s of PLA working for the security of the leadership;  categorization of injured warriors and provision of their  pension, employment and the dignified support package for them.
3. Should withdraw party representatives from the government. Should conduct parliamentary front more effectively and accord priority to the street front.
4. Should frame a constitution based on people’s federal republic with anti-feudalist and anti-imperialist essence. To guarantee the interests and representation of workers’ and peasants’ class; special right to women, dalits and Muslim communities; theoretical acceptance of ethnic  autonomous rule with the right to self-determination to nationalities and Madhesi communities; state restructuring on new basis; and rights of people with fully proportionate representation and inclusive system.
5. If there is no guarantee of advancing the peace process for the interest of the country and the people as well as the framing of the people’s constitution, the task of integration of PLA and framing of the anti-people constitution should not be taken forward. The revolution is to be advanced in a new approach in the different situation.
6. Should be serious on issues concerning the protection of country’s national independence and  sovereignty; and pursue struggle taking up the issues like abrogation of all unequal treaties and agreements including the 1950 treaty, framing of the people’s constitution, revolutionary land reforms and other burning issues related to people’s livelihood.
7. Democratic centralism, committee system and collective decision-making mechanism should be established in the party.
8. The dissenting views in the party related to the public concerns should be made public and the principle of ‘freedom in criticism and uniformity in action’ should be implemented.
9. A minimum standard should be formulated and immediately implemented to revitalize party’s cultural, political and organizational life and a base should be created to build a new type of the party.
10. At present, priority should be accorded to solve the issues concerning the class struggle and make preparation for party’s national congress only after these issues are addressed and resolved.
11. Special attention should be accorded to pay due respect and provide relief to the families of the martyrs and disappeared warriors and ensure appropriate arrangement for the treatment of and relief to the disabled and injured warriors and make the status of the disappeared warriors.
12. Should make party’s financial and accounting transaction and procedures scientific , up to date and transparent; make accounts and financial transaction of cantonments public, The provident and other property in kind of People’s Liberation Army should be made transparent and arrangement should be made for their judicious distribution.
13. 4.Future programmes and action plan:

The future programmes and action plans are related to four preparations. These can be presented this way:

Ideological and political preparation:

-          Resisting comprador and bureaucratic capitalism, feudalism , imperialism and expansionism, strong people’s base should be created in favour of new people’s democratic revolution, people’s federal republic and national independence

-          Developing reliable internal fraternal relationship and accordingly build public opinion for independence and liberation of the country and the people.

-          Launch of effective ideological struggle against all kinds of revisionism and especially rightist revisionism; national capitulation and neo-revisionism.

-          Party schooling is to be started. Arrangements are to be made for political schooling.

Organizational preparation:

a. Party:

- Correcting mistakes, weaknesses and shortcomings, party should be unified with transformation

- Conducting two-line struggle in a healthy and friendly manner

-Development of a new procedure for the conduct of two-line struggle.

b.People’s volunteers:

-People’s volunteers are to be mobilized in an organized way from the central to the local level

- With formulating concrete programmes, the people’s volunteers are to be involved in people’s service and mobilization of the people.

c. United Front:

-          At the central level, a united front is to be created comprising patriotic, republican and leftist people

-          At the local level, united front is to be created based on the local situation and need.

d.      Three means:

At the local level, the tasks of the party, people’s volunteers and the united front’s are to be advanced in an organized manner

e.      Problems of the cadres:

-          All resources of the party are to be distributed equitably and judiciously

-          Economic plans are to be prepared at the center, states and district levels and productive activities are to be launched.

5. Preparation related to struggle:

The tasks of struggle and mobilization of people are to be advanced on the following issues:

1. Constitution framing
2. Defence of national independence; abrogation of 1950 unequal treaty, agreement on upper Karnali and Arun III and BIPPA. Demand for new treaties on the basis of mutual equality and understanding and protest against border encroachment are to be intensified
3. Addressing people’s burning problems like the ones related to their livelihood and protest against inflation ( price hike), black market
4. Resolution of problems related to  domestic servants  ( hali, gothala and haruwa), landless squatters and kamaiyas ( bonded labourers) with focus on revolutionary land reforms
5. Relief package or pension to disqualified members of the People’s Liberation Army; relief to the PLA warriors who had left the cantonments and are currently working in the YCL.
6. Resolution of the problems of families of the martyrs and disappeared warriors; and resolution of the problems of injured warriors.
7. Withdrawal or dismissal of all charges and cases filed against the Maoists during the People’s War.

6. Other Preparations:

Other preparations are related to and based on various subjects

Programme Schedule

Organization aspect:

-          Immediately after the meeting of the central committee, meetings at the state and district level should be held and action plans be formulated

-          Schooling is to be conducted at various levels.

 Aspect related to struggle:

-          Concrete programme of struggle to be prepared

-          The struggle is to be advanced on phase wise. The concretization of tasks concerning organization and struggle are to be determined in the headquarters or at the meeting of the standing committee