Prachanda to Nepal Students: Prepare for Revolution

Revolutionary students in Kathmandu, May 1, 2010, photo: Jed Brandt

The following first appeared in Himalayan Times Online.

Prachanda presses ANNISU-R for revolt

by TIKA R PRADHAN

2010-12-06 KATHMANDU: UCPN-Maoist Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ today directed the party-aligned All Nepal National Independent Students Union–Revolutionary (ANNISU-R) to select a stronger leadership that can begin preparations for the people’s revolt in right earnest.

“It’s clear that nothing can be taken ahead without the destruction of all old settings of the country through one powerful blow,” said Lekhnath Neupane, ANNISU-R president, following a meeting between party office-bearers and ANNISU-R leaders at the Nayabazar-based residence of party chairman Dahal.

The party headquarters had invited the student leaders to discuss preparations for the upcoming 18th national conference of the union. “The party wants a stronger leadership in the ANNISU-R to materialise its plan to launch a revolt with a huge participation of people,” Neupane said.

Nepal: Student Outrage Over Fuel Price Hike

This was originally in SifyNews.

Students on warpath in Nepal over fuel price hike

Kathmandu, Dec 7 (IANS) For more than five months without a government and no signs yet of the caretaker government convening parliament, Nepal was shaken by renewed violence Tuesday as students went on the warpath against a fresh hike in fuel prices.

Student groups affiliated to the major parties clashed with riot police in various parts of the capital, and security forces charged at them with batons and burst tear smoke cannisters to bring the situation under control.

Enraged protesters targeted government vehicles and set at least one on fire as police arrested eight.

The demonstrations started after the caretaker government of Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal announced a fuel price hike Monday.

The state-owned Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC), that has a monopoly in buying fuel from India across the border and selling it in Nepal, has been incurring a loss of billions of rupees for nearly a decade now due to the earlier state policy of subsidising petroleum products.

With oil prices rising in the international markets, the cash-strapped Nepal government has been trying to slash the subsidy and adjust domestic market prices.

Monday’s hike, the fifth in a year, makes kerosene, petrol and diesel dearer by NRS 3 per litre while cooking gas cylinders will now cost NRS 75 more.

India: Forming a People’s Army a Turning Point

Young Naxalite cadres practise at a training camp in an unidentified village of the Dantewada forests of Chhattisgarh.

This comes from The Hindu, and documents the remarkable growth and support of the Indian Maoists known as Naxalites. Posting here, as usual, does not imply endorsement of the article itself.

Formation of PLGA a turning point in the Maoist movement

by K. Srinivas Reddy

HYDERABAD: When Naxalites announced the formation of the People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army (PLGA) a decade ago, security agencies dismissed it as an attempt by the rebels to regroup their cadres and propaganda to boost their perceived military strength.

Buoyed as they were by the phenomenal success in killing three Central Committee members on December 2, 1999, in an encounter in Koyyuru, the security agencies misjudged the consequences of what was sought to be projected as a “mere nomenclature change.”

Now, the security forces are bracing themselves for intensified attacks in Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal as the Maoists have announced month-long celebrations coinciding with the 10th anniversary of PLGA formation. All these years, the celebrations were only week-long. “This means bigger strikes can be expected in Maoist-affected States,” authorities concede.

In retrospect, it becomes clear that the formation of the PLGA — on December 2, 2000, first death anniversary of the “Koyyur martyrs” — helped the underground organisation improve its military capabilities spectacularly and register an impressive spatial spread of revolutionary movement in newer areas. So much so that the Centre now deploys 62 battalions of the Central Para Military Forces (CPMF) for anti-extremist operations in different States.