The Red Menace

[Nihat]

Exclusive: India's most wanted Maoists revealed

New Delhi: An Intelligence Bureau (IB) dossier with details of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) Politburo and central committee members has finally revealed some of India's most wanted. CNN-IBN has accessed the IB dossier which has the photographs and details of India's most wanted Maoist leaders.

The following are India's most wanted - the Politburo and central committee members of CPI (Maoist), who for more than 30 years now have challenged India's security establishment and often defeated them. These are the people who have been described by the Prime Minister as the biggest internal security threat.

The dossier has been prepared by the IB, Union Home Ministry and the police force of Naxal-affected states. The dossier lists the top brains behind the Naxal threat.

On top of the list, General Secretary Ganpati alias Laxman Rao, 61, carries a reward of Rs 24 lakh and is the main ideological pillar behind the Naxals. The dossier lists Ganpati's family members in Hyderabad, Dharmapuri and Karimnagar districts of Andhra Pradesh.

Number two in the Politburo is Nambala Keshav Rao who comes from a family of government officials with a reward Rs 19 lakh on him. Rao's brothers are Vigilance and CMD level officers in Andhra Pradesh.

Kishanji, the masked darling of the press, is alive and active in the Orissa-Chhattisgarh forests while his younger brother Mallojula Venugopal is also a Politburo member.

Kattam Sudashan, Bureau Secretary of CPI (Maoist), is the alleged mastermind in April 2010 Dantewada massacre in which 76 security personnel were butchered. Kattam is believed to be still influential in the Dantewada region.

Pulluri Prasad Rao alias Chandranna is the secretary of the North Telangana special zonal committee.

Kishan alias Mahesh is the international face of CPI (Maoist) and believed to be the link between Indian and Nepali Maoists. Kishan is the only Bengali amongst the largely Andhra-dominated outfit.

Former DGP, BSF Prakash Singh said, "In any anti-insurgency operations, it is important to know your friends from your foes. These pictures, one hopes, will help that cause."

So far the men fighting the Naxals on the ground have complained that there is no way to find out if the man in the village store is a Naxal waiting to bomb you or an innocent villager. With the Central and state government's coordinating to reveal the identity of the top brass of CPI (Maoist), will it help the actual fight on the ground? Or will the stalemate in the war against Naxals continue?

[Jarita]

^^^ Wonder if there is an EJ connection with Soni Sori?
Either way, unfortunately the Indian state is also responsible for this rise in Maoism along with external influences and EJ atrocity literature. Land and resource grab is a catalyst.

[abhishek_sharma]

Views from the Left

The ‘Jewish lobby’ and Obama

Strong supporters of the Palestinian Authority’s bid for statehood, the Left parties have slammed US President Barack Obama for his recent speech at the United Nations, saying it typified the interests of US imperialism and its steadfast support to Israel. The editorial in the CPM’s People’s Democracy concludes that the Left’s assessment that the policies of the US imperialism will remain the same even after the ascendance of Obama — the first ever African-American president — was right: “In direct contrast to his speech to the United Nations last year where president Obama spoke of his ‘determination to advance Palestinian statehood’, this year, he spoke of how ‘peace is hard’ and vowed to veto the Palestinians bid for statehood if it came to the Security Council,” it says.

“Notwithstanding his demagogic rhetoric,” the editorial argued, “Obama has clearly emerged as a champion of the powerful Jewish lobby that reflects US imperialism’s designs of global hegemony. Clearly, in the background of the current severe economic crisis and recession where the finance capital controlled by the Jewish lobby is a very important factor for president Obama’s effort to refurbish the beleaguered US economy, as he moves in for his reelection, he has taken a hawkish position.”


2G and BJP

The editorial in the CPI’s New Age locates blame for the 2G licencing scam with the NDA as well as the UPA, saying the culprits belong to “various segments” of the present Congress-led coalition as well as the previous BJP-led alliance. “From the enquiry so far and documents submitted to the JPC looking into the spectrum scam, it is quite clear that the spectrum loot started during the Vajpayee regime...,”it alleges. New Age argues it was not surprising that the BJP which “itself is neck-deep in corruption is joining forces with the ruling combination to divert people’s attention from the real issue... In place of insisting on a thorough and comprehensive probe covering all players involved, it is indulging in wordy dual about a possible mid-term poll for Lok Sabha. Actually, both the UPA 2 and BJP know very well that corruption will harm none. We have seen how the Jain Hawala case was hushed up with the connivance of all concerned. The accused list of Hawala case was a virtual Who’s Who of Indian bourgeois political parties,” it claims. Corruption, it adds, is as much a legitimate child of economic neo-liberalism as inflation, price rise and economic disparities.

Distress, not growth

An article in People’s Democracy focuses on the growth in urban population revealed by recently-released provisional population figures for Census 2011. The trend, it says, indicated an “abnormal degree of urbanisation and movement of population from rural to urban areas.” It warns “advocates of neo-liberalism” may use the trend to argue that economic reforms are leading to greater prosperity and employment opportunities, but argues such an interpretation was far from true. “A closer look at regional patterns in the census figures reveals a link between the pattern of urban population growth, corporate investments and rural distress,” it argues, adding that in several states, like Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra, the number of census villages has declined, while towns have increased at an alarming rate.

The existence of such townships, it argues “indicates an increase in corporate and the other investments in resource rich rural areas. It is well known that the three states have not only attracted such corporate investments but have also been facing agrarian distress in the last decade and a half. There is increasing landlessness amongst the agricultural workers... fuelling displacement and forced migration from these regions... The second factor that points towards the link between rural distress and the growth of the urban population is the percentage of urban population growth in states facing rural distress,” it says.

“In this context it is possible to surmise that the provisional findings of the census point towards a rural-urban imbalance that can be explained only if it is related to the rural distress and corporate penetration that has signified two decades of neo-liberal reforms,” it concludes.

[Aditya_V]

I hope all the causalties on the SSB side are minimised from this incident

Maoists blow up security vehicle in Chhattisgarh

[Aditya_V]

Waugh Indian Liberals will celebrate this while the rest of nationals mourns these deaths.

Three SSB troopers killed in IED explosion in Dantewada

[Stan_Savljevic]

Bellary after mining ban
http://www.flonnet.com/stories/20111021282104000.htm

[ManjaM]

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/196 ... ngady.html

The dead policeman, Mahadeva S Mane (40) of Indi in Bijapur and from the 9th battalion KSRP police, was serving in the Karkala ANF camp on deputation.

The ANF personnel were conducting combing operations at Naravi, Kuthlur, Navoor and Savanalu when they were fired upon by the ultras. Even before the ANF members, who saw Naxals approaching from the opposite direction, could open fire, the 10-member gang, including four women, fired at the police, killing Mane on the spot, according to police. The Naxals are believed to have retreated into the woods. None of them could be apprehended. The shootout lasted for a few minutes and casualties in the ranks of the rebels is not known. ANF personnel from Udupi and Chikmagalur have been deployed and the search operation continued till Sunday evening, but in vain. A pair of sandals, one sickle, one torch and four bamboo sticks were seized from the spot.

It is suspected that the Naxals belonged to the Netravati group led by Vikram Gowda.
Two teams of ANF (14 men each) have been carrying out search operation in Navur for the last three days. “ANF members were carrying out combing operations on Saturday when they confronted the Naxals at 11:30 pm,” Superintendent of Police Laburam said.
DGP Neelam Achutha Rao who visited Belthangady Sunday evening announced Rs 10 lakh to Mane’s family. The family would be allowed to retain its quarters for the time being and one member in the family will be given a government job.

Neelam Achutha Rao, DGP, Bipin Gopalakrishna, ADGP (security), Bhaskar Rao, ANF IGP, Alok Mohan, IGP (Western range), Laburam, SP, Deputy Commissioner Dr N S Channappa Gowda, MLA Vasanth Bangera and district-in-charge Minister Krishna Palemar paid last respect to the departed soul at Belthangady police station in the evening.
However, the police version of the encounter is being questioned by local residents. As the policemen were reportedly stationed in a more secure area and the bullet entered Mane’s back, there is a possibility that it had come from his own team members, they say. “If the Naxals opened fire from the opposite direction, how can it enter the victim’s back?,” a villager asked. Senior officials, however, dismissed the contention.

[sum]

And the reason why the cop died:
A jammed rifle, poor fitness and a cop’s death

According to some of his colleagues, the SLR with Mane was defunct and could not fire, thus rendering him an easy target. While normally the person who carries the weapon maintains it by cleaning and oiling, the personnel are given weapons at random during emergencies, a source said.

“The SLR is a highly sophisticated and a sensitive weapon. If not used or not maintained properly, the weapon stops working. Unused SLRs or those with any problem should not be given to personnel, particularly to those operating in dense jungles. This indeed is a case of mismanagement,” an official said.

Mane’s colleagues hold the top brass of Anti-Naxal Force (ANF) responsible for Mane’s death. In spite of ambush threat by the ultras, Mane was not given a well-maintained SLR. He had even complained about the faulty rifle provided to him a few days ago, his colleagues said, demanding an inquiry into the incident.

It is said Mane had undergone a major surgery on his right leg. He was unable to run and workout every day. His request to send him back to his parent organisation is said to have been turned down by the ANF, six months ago.

Mane was attached to ninth battalion of the KSRP. According to his colleagues, cops fighting ultras need to have quick reflexes and be strong, mentally and physically. It is in this backdrop that personnel aged between 30 and 35 years are drafted for the anti-naxal operations.

But Mane had crossed 40 years when he was selected for the ANF, much against his will, they claimed. Director General and Inspector General of Police Neelam Achyuth Rao told Deccan Herald that he would order a detailed probe into the incident.

And then we wonder as to why there are lack of volunteers for such anti-naxal forces etc!!

[Pranay]

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/indi ... 320546.cms

Candid views by Jairam Ramesh on the Naxal issue... posting in full.

Blaming the state apathy for the Maoist insurgency, Union minister for rural development Jairam Ramesh cited the abysmal spending on districts hit by Left-wing Extremism (LWE).

Of the 60 districts that are facing the problem, expenditure in 25 is lower than the national average and in the 10 worst-hit; it is even less than the median spent for LWE-affected ones.

"The 10 worst districts are Bijaipur, Narayanpur and Dantewada in Chhattisgarh, Gadchiroli in Maharshtra, Khammam in Andhra Pardesh, Lohardaga, Gumla, Latehar and Simdega in Jharkhand and Malkangiri in Orissa. It is here that we need a synergy between the security forces and implementing agencies on the ground to speed up connectivity without which nothing else worthwhile is really possible...The driving force has to be development and addressing the daily concerns of the people, who have every reason to feel alienated," Ramesh said while delivering the Sardar Patel Memorial Lecture here on Tuesday.

"It is not the naxals who have created the ground conditions ripe for the acceptance of their ideology - it is the singular failure of successive governments...to protect the dignity and Constitutional rights of the poor and the disadvantaged that has created a fertile breeding ground for violence and given naxals space to speak the language of social welfare..." the minister said.

Ramesh took a dig at writer-activist Arundhati Roy while lauding a report of the 17-member expert group of the Planning Commission on development challenges in Maoist-affected areas. "...It may lack the lyrical beauty and sheer poetry, misleading though it may be, of Arundhati Roy's now famous 33-page essay ...but for sheer comprehensiveness and depth of analysis for showing a practical way ahead it has no peers," he said.

He pointed out to the dual victimization of tribals, who are at the receiving end of the Maoist violence and also "victims of state apathy and discrimination".

The minister advocated rationalization of administrative units to overcome the handicap of poor connectivity and infrastructure in these areas.

"My own view is that there is no alternative to the Central government stepping in for financing and executing these tri-junction infrastructure works. It is not happening at the speed at which it is required," Ramesh said. Touching upon one of Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi's favourite topics, he called for a more humane policy on land acquisition.

Ruing the tardy pace of development - a one-km-long Gurupriya Bridge in Malkangiri district has been talked about for three decades, but is yet to be constructed - the minister stressed on the importance of the Prime Minister's Gram Sadak Yojana for the development of LWE-affected districts that would require an investment of about Rs 15,000 crore under the scheme.

[Pratyush]

Maoists put up posters threatening Trinamool leaders

[sum]

So, it was firendly fire which killed the ANF constable and not Maoists ( the force mistook some hunters for maoists):
ANF patrol mistook hunters for naxals

Has the mystery behind Anti Naxal Force (ANF) constable Mahadev S Mane’s death solved? Yes, say reliable sources in the police department.

According to sources, three persons named Surappa, Mohana and Harisha, all residents of Manjetti village of Belthangady taluk, have been interrogated by the police and during the interrogation the trio has confessed to have ventured into the forest for hunting.

“Some local residents mistook the three to be naxalites and informed the ANF. The ANF personnel took positions in the said area, and when the three started running helter-skelter, the ANF opened fired. In the melee, Mane fell to the bullets fired by the ANF personnel,” said the sources.

[Nihat]

Maoists put up posters threatening Trinamool leaders

I'm mighty confused about this , Mamata Banerjee seemed very accommodating towards these terrorists when she first took over, stopped task force Ops. at a critical time and sent CRPF to their camps. Then , out of nowhere she goes to a terrorist infested area and calls them "suprari killers" and thugs and lays down a deadline else Ops. will resume. I mean, what is up with this woman.

[Rudradev]

All this stuff with Mamta Banerjee's electoral tactics, and post-election stance, brings to light one aspect of the Maoist insurgency which sets it apart from all other insurgencies India has had to contend with.

Other insurgencies... from Mizoram to Punjab... were dealt with by corralling their leaders into two camps. So-called "moderates" who were amenable to a political solution within the Indian constitution; and so-called "extremists" or "militants" who were adamant about armed struggle being the only path to success. The strategy was to incorporate the moderates within the political system, encouraging them to stand for elections and acquire a stake in a negotiated status quo, while going after the militants with the full might of our national security apparatus. Militants who surrendered were treated graciously and encouraged to join the moderate camp, redeeming themselves by joining the political process. Bhindranwales etc. notwithstanding... from a medium-to-long-term strategic viewpoint, when combating an established insurgency, this segregation of its leadership was the norm.

What is different about the Maoists is that this strategy of separation has not been applied. There is no hard line drawn between the moderates who could be wooed back into the political system, vs. the extremists who need to be rooted out and shot. The consistency of vision which placed national interest as paramount, has gone out the window, in favour of narrow political interests.

Political overtures and incentives are extended to Maoist leaders who continue to be active in parliamentary, state- and district-level politics during the daytime, while being actively involved in armed terrorist violence at night. Maoists can have their cake and eat it too... participate in "legitimate" politics while also waging war against the state. This is different from former Khalistanis or Mizo rebels who were given a choice; either the ballot box as our fellow citizen, or the gun as our enemy, but never both.

The result of this is that the line between politician and insurgent has become blurred. One aspect of this development, the leaching of moral authority from constitutional politics, has been a foregone conclusion ever since the entry of overt criminals into Indian electoral politics became a widely accepted norm. What is different now, and a very dangerous development in its own right... is that people who pick up the gun, along with the anti-national causes they represent... are becoming legitimized. From eating tainted food we have gone to swallowing poison whole. This is the other side of the coin.

This is a step further from mere mafia-types becoming "legitimized" as politicians. Dons, goondas and smugglers, after all, are only breaking the law for their profit. The Maoists, OTOH, are waging an ideological war that has as its goal the destruction of the Indian State as we know it. Bad enough that you could be both a smuggler and an MP. Today, you can be a lynchpin of electoral politics while fighting violently to undermine the very system that guarantees electoral franchise.

This development devolves from the gleeful willingness of the Mainovadi Congress Government to embrace armed groups who wage war against the very idea of India, as allies against opposition political parties in various states. Today you can be a Maoist "political figure" and a child-murdering terrorist at the SAME time, and Maino acolytes in the National Advisory Council will defend you from the justice of the Indian State as long as you serve the electoral interests of the Mainos.

[Rudradev]

Cross-posting a very insightful response to the above, from Brihaspati-ji on the Strategic Scenarios thread. We should keep this big picture in mind even as we dissect the minutiae of the Red movement, one incident at a time.

Rudradev ji raises a very interesting issue. In fact two issues.

The first issue : why are the second phase Maoists not treated with the fragmentation strategy for dealing with insurgencies? Note that in the first phase, the fragmentation policy was adopted. This gave rise to the likes of Santosh Rana, (and to an extent the tail ends of the spectrum like A.K.Roy and even "Guruji").

Without going too deep, I would propose two main reasons behind this distinct dropping of the fragmentation strategy. The first was a temporary disruption in administrative thinking during the post-emergency interregnum, as well as a relative lull in Maoist activity while they regrouped [and big chunks were lying low in the Terai, BD and NE], and a corresponding perception in the centre of having broken the back of the Maoists.

However, an important international component in this was the secret negotiations that went on between USA and Mao leading to the official and overt sealing with a kiss between Nixon and Mao - of a new alignment between China and USA against the USSR. During the latter half of the 70's a strategic realignment was taking place in how the west viewed Maoism and how it planned to fragment the communist movement globally. In this, the Maoists gained a subtle but temporary respite almost globally - the result being that nowadays it is the Maoist version of communist insurgency that we still see in pockets within what are essentially regions/economies highly penetrated by the "west".

the second issue: Maoists in India combine two unique characteristics, they are predominantly from the majority "Hindu" or non-Muslim and non-Christian in origins, while being ideologically inclined towards rejecting "Hinduism".

Their turning towards armed insurgency is in the long tradition of SD based militancy that had in the past been harnessed by visionary leaders and intellectuals towards repulsing foreign invaders, as well as getting rid of indigenous rulers who had collaborated with foreigners - the mercantile interests that exploited the commons in collaboration, and establishing a new rashtra based on age-old principles of natural justice and fairness/welfare deeply imbedded in SD [ideas of rajya-kingship].

As long as Maoists maintain this thrust of going against the "Indian rashtra" in its current form together with their Marxism inspired anti-Hinduism - it is useful to a variety of interests. For the religious imperialists their anti-Hinduism is useful. For the formal national and transnational powers seeking to control India, the Maoists represent an useful opportunity to simultaneously weaken the rashtra, as well as manipulate them into carrying out atrocities which could simultaneously remove obstacles not normally possible within international practice as well as turn back on the very Maoists and mop them up.

This was a tactics used many times - over, with examples being putting Khomeini into power in Iran, and the elimination of the leftist insurgents during and after Mujib in BD.

For all of these "users" of Maoism, including those components of the current regime and rashtra who think that Maoists serve the useful purpose of absorbing the classical revolutionary urge in SD and channelizing it into an anti-Hindu movement - perhaps a teaser :

what if some find it useful to let this "use" of Maoists continue - because it simultaneously ideologically legitimizes armed overthrow of exploitative and unpopular regimes, while setting a precedent for future fragmentation strategy on the Maoists. That fragmentation however will be about targeting the Marxist bit being foreign and a cover for imperialism of the chinese variety - and reclaiming the memes used by the Maoists as being memes of SD itself?

Just a thought. Maoists are in effect doing our work. Preparing the ground. They are useful up to a time. Then they can be eliminated. They can be used both ways.

[abhishek_sharma]

Views from the left

Taking on Advani
The Left has slowly but steadily upped its attack on the BJP. The latest issue of CPM journal People’s Democracy says L.K. Advani is still driven by the ambition to become PM, and that this seems to be the main factor impelling his “hypocritical yatra.” Sitaram Yechury points to B.S. Yeddyurappa to attack the hollowness of the BJP’s anti-corruption stance, and says that when Advani goes around the country in his rath, it will remind people of the “telecom scam and a spate of scandals, which included the stock market scam, the defence deals and the corruption in allotting petrol and gas stations”during the NDA regime.

Yechury also says that Nitish Kumar, in flagging off the yatra, has done a great disservice to the secular values that he professes: “The people being mobilised for the yatra are those belonging to RSS outfits. In the name of fighting corruption, the same crowd is being gathered which has been reared on a communal diet of minority-baiting.”

...And Modi

CPI weekly New Age uses the arrest of Sanjiv Bhatt to attack the Gujarat chief minister, saying the affidavit filed by the IPS officer “exposes the intentions of Modi to proclaim himself as future prime minister.” People’s Democracy, meanwhile, ridicules Narendra Modi’s sadbhavana mission. Modi’s talk of sadbhavana is like the “devil quoting scriptures, after having presided over the worst communal pogrom in independent India,” says the CPM weekly. New Age says that Modi has never expressed any remorse for 2002; he only tried to minimise the riots’ seriousness by arguing that “every action has an equal and opposite reaction.”

It alleges that Bhatt was “made victim of ever new methods of torture” in police custody and claims he was not the only officer who is being victimised: “Modi and the BJP government have been trumpeting the state’s economic growth, though the progress touted is not even factual... Modi-phobia has gripped the police department, the whole bureaucracy in Gujarat. In this situation it is very difficult to bring out the truth. Only regime change could protect the state and the innocent people and the whistleblowers.”

Joy for Wall Street

New Age continues to focus on what it called the “gripping discontent in the West and the rest.” An article says people have risen not only against tyrants (in the Middle East) but also against the economic tyranny of the West operating through the World Bank, IMF, and WTO. “Occupy Wall Street” may be the latest sign of a popular global backlash against elites, with increasingly shared slogans and tactics, an elated Left concludes: “In almost every continent, 2011 has seen an almost unprecedented rise in both peaceful and sometimes violent unrest and dissent. Protesters in a lengthening list of countries, including Israel, India, Chile, China, Britain, Spain and now the US, all increasingly link their actions explicitly to the popular revolutions that have shaken up the Middle East,” it says. “America’s Left is finally going to lead a popular dissent,” it concludes.

[brihaspati]

They read it wrong - entirely. Just as the official parties read Hitler and Nazism wrong and sidelined or even persecuted those Marxists who had the clarity to see the future. This "popular" movement is typically based in urban townships and mega-cities. Even if initiated by well meaning key activists, the movement will only get punch when it organizes - and almost inevitably this background leads to first leftist adventurism - which is crushed by the state selectively to eliminate the liberals- and which finally transitions into a middle-class+"lumpen" "national socialism" under the subtle guidance of the captains of industry and finance from behind the state.

[Kashi]

Three cops killed in Chhattisgarh Naxal attack

Naxals ambushed a police party killing three personnel and injuring four others in Chhattisgarh's Bastar district on Friday.

The police team was on its way to Netanar village, where the Naxals had damaged a forest department rest house on Thursday night, when it came under attack, superintendent of police, Bastar, Ratan Lal Dange said.

The Naxals set off an IED and opened fire on the policemen as they approached the village, 300 kms from Raipur.

Three policemen were killed on the spot and four injured in the attack, the SP said.

Additional forces have been rushed to the area.

RIP to the deceased policemen.

[pgbhat]

Blind in Dantewada

[anchal]

^^ I have seen firsthand photogpraphs of the attack on CG policeman. It will be inappropriate to post them on BR though. Reprehensible savagery.
I just hope honorable a$$ses in Delhi realize the enormity which forces are facing in CG. I have one of my blood relatives who is fighting the Naxals, just few days ago one of his colleagues died of fever because he could not be shifted to a better hospital

[ManjaM]

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/201 ... ttack.html

On February 10, 2005, a group of about 200 suspected naxals had attacked the ninth battalion of the Karnataka State Reserve Police while they were camping at a school and rained bombs and bullets on them.

The attack, which left a police sub-inspector, seven constables and a civilian dead, was said to be in retaliation to naxal leader Saket Rajan’s killing in a police encounter at Menasina Hadya in Chikmagalur.

The police had arrested 109 suspects in the case, of which charge sheets were filed against 22, including three minor boys.

Want of evidence

Reading out the judgement in a packed hall of the Second Additional District Sessions Court, Judge B Balakrishna said the accused were acquitted for want of evidence.

“You are not being acquitted because you have been proven to be innocent beyond doubt or because it has been established that you are not naxals or have no connections with naxal groups. You are being released because the police have not conducted a thorough investigation and provided enough evidence to convict you,” the judge said reading out the verdict aloud.

While the judgement brought a smile on the faces of the 19 accused, the police were visibly unhappy with the outcome of the case.

The cases against the three minors among the 22 accused is being heard at the Juvenile Justice Court in Bangalore.

[Aditya_V]

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/201 ... ttack.html

On February 10, 2005, a group of about 200 suspected naxals had attacked the ninth battalion of the Karnataka State Reserve Police while they were camping at a school and rained bombs and bullets on them.

The attack, which left a police sub-inspector, seven constables and a civilian dead, was said to be in retaliation to naxal leader Saket Rajan’s killing in a police encounter at Menasina Hadya in Chikmagalur.

The police had arrested 109 suspects in the case, of which charge sheets were filed against 22, including three minor boys.

Want of evidence

Reading out the judgement in a packed hall of the Second Additional District Sessions Court, Judge B Balakrishna said the accused were acquitted for want of evidence.

“You are not being acquitted because you have been proven to be innocent beyond doubt or because it has been established that you are not naxals or have no connections with naxal groups. You are being released because the police have not conducted a thorough investigation and provided enough evidence to convict you,” the judge said reading out the verdict aloud.

While the judgement brought a smile on the faces of the 19 accused, the police were visibly unhappy with the outcome of the case.

The cases against the three minors among the 22 accused is being heard at the Juvenile Justice Court in Bangalore.

So the police will now take law into thier own hands and target them quietly.

The problem is our legal system is too slow and makes it easy for criminals(many who are politicians at the Top) to get away. So more and more people will prefer to settle scores and face legal action rather follow the legal process.

[abhishek_sharma]

Views from the left

Nuclear discontent
Having taken the lead in constituting a multi-party national committee opposed to the Jaitapur nuclear project, the CPM is again sharpening its criticism of the UPA on the civil nuclear front. In the latest edition of People’s Democracy, party boss Prakash Karat lambasts the Manmohan Singh government, and says that the “false claims” made while pushing for the Indo-US nuclear deal, are now being exposed. It has not paved the way for full nuclear cooperation with the US and the latest NSG guidelines have added to India’s woes.

Karat says that the government has not divulged the real cost of the reactors to be set up in Jaitapur. He claims that protests have erupted in other places too, Chhaya Mithi Virdi in Bhavnagar district in Gujarat, Kovvada in Srikakulam district in Andhra Pradesh, and Koodankulam in Tamil Nadu. The fifth site — Haripur in West Bengal — has already been abandoned after local opposition. Karat asks the UPA to heed the voice of the people and halt all plans to import nuclear power reactors.

“Along with this, the regulatory authority to be set up to oversee the safety of nuclear plants has to be genuinely independent and autonomous, unlike the bill presented in Parliament... There has to be a safety review of all existing nuclear plants and this must be conducted by an independent committee. Only this will reassure the people,” he says.

Get real

The People’s Democracy editorial rubbishes the Planning Commission’s Human Development Report, which claimed that SC/STs and Muslims are finally catching up with the rest of the country on important human development indices.

It claims that the conditions for these sections, notwithstanding national aggregate statistics, has not improved in any significant sense. “Such hype about India’s ‘success story’ obfuscates the reality presented by the very same report of the Planning Commission,” it says. “The report shows that today (2004-2005, the last year for which data is available), nearly 31 crores of our people live under the officially defined poverty line... Since 1973-74 (when poverty was first measured in India) and 2004-05, the number of officially defined ‘poor’ has come down by a mere 1.9 crores.”

It adds: “The overall per capita intake of calories and pulses (protein) has fallen by 8 per cent between 1983 and 2004-05 in the rural areas and by 3.3 per cent in the urban areas.” Besides, half of India’s children under the age of three are malnourished, which is worse than in sub-Saharan Africa, it says. “This is the reality check,” it concludes.

The end of capital

The CPI predicts that the “deepening crisis of international finance capital” will engulf even countries that had escaped the severity of the 2008 global recession, like India. An editorial in New Age says that even the economist prime minister, Manmohan Singh, has suggested that India may no longer remain an exception, and that the documents adopted at the IBSA summit reflected the concern of developing countries. “The protagonists of economic neoliberalism — the prescription doled out by international finance capital and its tools like the IMF and the World Bank — have been forced to admit that with these policies, there is no escape from price rise,” it says. The editorial questions the prediction that prices will ease after March.

With the Occupy Wall Street protests gaining momentum, it says time is closing for a “concerted attack on the capitalist order itself, particularly its new avatar, economic neoliberalism, that was very proudly presented as the only alternative path of development since the disintegration of the Soviet Union and collapse of the socialist regimes in Eastern Europe.”

“This ‘only alternative’ has caused the severest economic crisis in the past one century... Despite all the rhetoric, capitalism is bound to collapse,” it concludes.

[Pratyush]

PC discusses plan to check Maoists in Assam

[Rudradev]

Encouraging news from another nation that has suffered from a Maoist Terrorist Insurgency for many decades.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/farc-leader-ca ... 17386.html

After years of bitter, dogged perseverance, Columbian security forces have finally nailed the arch-terrorist Alfonso Cano and put an end to the bloody, vicious depradations of the Communist FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia) Maoist group. This is the equivalent of nailing Pirabhakaran.

More power to Bogota in securing their nation from the vile pathology of international Communism! May India do the same, and wipe out every last one of these scumbag Maovadi ideologues in their jungle hideouts... no matter what or how long it takes.

[brihaspati]

Encouraging news from another nation that has suffered from a Maoist Terrorist Insurgency for many decades.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/farc-leader-ca ... 17386.html

After years of bitter, dogged perseverance, Columbian security forces have finally nailed the arch-terrorist Alfonso Cano and put an end to the bloody, vicious depradations of the Communist FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia) Maoist group. This is the equivalent of nailing Pirabhakaran.

More power to Bogota in securing their nation from the vile pathology of international Communism! May India do the same, and wipe out every last one of these scumbag Maovadi ideologues in their jungle hideouts... no matter what or how long it takes.

Alfonso must have fallen out with the drug-barons and factional ambitions within the Maoists. In Columbia the rashtra is practically run by the drug-mafia. The Columbian forces somehow never manage to nail the key drug-barons (unlike the red-barons) - unless of course there is an inner war going on in which more of the barons gang up on one of their own.

[ManjaM]

So the police will now take law into thier own hands and target them quietly.

The problem is our legal system is too slow and makes it easy for criminals(many who are politicians at the Top) to get away. So more and more people will prefer to settle scores and face legal action rather follow the legal process.

Saheb, I dont know the details of the judgement, but in this case, the process has moved reasonably quickly. Atleast the judge seems to believe that although these guys might have had a hand in the killings, there is not sufficient evidence to convict them.

[abhishek_sharma]

Views from the Left

West Asian adventures

With the US having toppled the Gaddafi regime in Libya, the CPM believes Washington and its allies will now go after Syria and Iran. What is being witnessed, it says, is a “heightened aggressiveness” by imperialism in West Asia, and the “manoeuvres” of imperialist powers command access and control over the region’s oil and natural gas resources.

“The Libyan adventure was meant to hijack the Arab popular uprising. After the Tunisian and Egyptian popular uprisings overthrew the despotic governments there, Israel felt increasingly isolated. In the second phase, the US and its allies have in the name of democracy and support to popular uprisings carried out the successful operation in Libya. Syria is the next target and finally Iran,” the editorial in People’s Democracy argues.

The editorial links West Asia policy fo the financial crisis in the West, too. For the debilitated economies of the US and Europe, the capture of the resources of West Asia is a “prize much coveted”, it says.

The CPM believes the bringing of Libya under Nato influence has enormous implications. Washington can now find a base for its African Military Command and the Mediterranean can now be converted into a Nato lake. The French, on the other hand, can now breathe easy as Gaddafi’s challenge to their traditional influence in West Africa has been terminated. “Nato is now the global military arm of imperialism reaching into Africa, Asia and all parts of the world,” it concludes.

It points out that the “Nobel Peace Prize-winning President Obama” has begun to ratchet up tensions in Iran. The US is also devising ways to effect a regime change in Syria. “Faced with declining popularity and the presidential elections coming up next year, Obama is seeking to shore up his support among the pro-Israel lobby by making hostile manoeuvres against Iran,” it says.

Peace in Nepal

The CPI’s New Age focuses its attention on the 7-point agreement reached by the political parties of Nepal recently, saying it may prove to be a turning point in the history of that country if implemented sincerely. The lead editorial says the agreement should also help “extremist forces” in the entire region draw some positive lessons and stop dreaming of a “corridor of revolution” across several national boundaries.

“The protagonists and managers of international finance capital shamefully exploit the futile experiments of these so-called Left extremists who go under the umbrella of Maoists, either by slandering the entire Left for their misadventures or by using them for much of the undesirable activities that ultimately harm the common people,” it says.

It argues the accord could not only pave the way for much-needed stability in Nepal, but also soothe the entire region’s political situation. For, it says, the political bickering in Nepal has made relations with neighbours including India into a sore point — and “undesirable elements” had used the chaos in Nepal to promote terror and export weapons.

The final crisis

Keenly watching the unfolding “Occupy Wall Street” movement in the US, the Left in India — excited and euphoric — believes it marks the beginning of a whole new historical phase of resistance. Prabhat Patnaik argues in People’s Democracy that previously, protests and resistance movements focused on some particular issue, project or policy: “These are not to be pooh-poohed, but they do not pose a challenge to the system as a whole. Capitalism can live with such movements, conceding something here, negotiating some settlement there, risking a prolonged face-off somewhere else.”

This movement is, however, qualitiatively different in nature, he claims: “The Occupy Wall Street movement by contrast is not concerned with any such specific demands; indeed, to the chagrin of the pundits, it does not even have an agenda of any description. It is simply, conceptually, a rejection of the system as a whole. This rejection is not based on any intricate theoretical arguments; it is simply visceral.”

The other distinct feature of the movement, he claims, is that it has gone beyond mere “morality” to the question of “property”. It is not an attack on the state, it is an assault on finance capital, and hence, by implication, on capitalist property.

[Aditya_V]

Lefts cores a victory, destroys 2 schools

Reds bulldoze two school buildings in Gaya

[Pratyush]

^^^

Quoting from the above

The SSP vehemently denied the Maoist charge that the school buildings were used to provide shelter to security ssforces engaged in combing operations against them.

If it was being used as such, the destruction would have become justifiable. Yes??

The DDM just dosent get it, do they. That this is war to destroy Indian democracy and transplant it with Alien ideals. But if they did they would not be DDMs would they

[Jarita]

Encouraging news from another nation that has suffered from a Maoist Terrorist Insurgency for many decades.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/farc-leader-ca ... 17386.html

After years of bitter, dogged perseverance, Columbian security forces have finally nailed the arch-terrorist Alfonso Cano and put an end to the bloody, vicious depradations of the Communist FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia) Maoist group. This is the equivalent of nailing Pirabhakaran.

More power to Bogota in securing their nation from the vile pathology of international Communism! May India do the same, and wipe out every last one of these scumbag Maovadi ideologues in their jungle hideouts... no matter what or how long it takes.

Alfonso must have fallen out with the drug-barons and factional ambitions within the Maoists. In Columbia the rashtra is practically run by the drug-mafia. The Columbian forces somehow never manage to nail the key drug-barons (unlike the red-barons) - unless of course there is an inner war going on in which more of the barons gang up on one of their own.

The columbian drug mafia has been forced to move up north. The strategy the columbian govt used was interesting - they went after the drug mafia first and this guy later. What probably happened was that Alfonso's support structure collpased.
Unfortunately the mafia is now is Mexico and busy destroying Mexican society. Some grotesque images came out recently

[Pratyush]

TOI ticker.

Maoists call off the truce in WB, blame Mamata.

[brihaspati]

^^^MB had been pricking the centre over the oil price hike. If she chooses to, she can highlight the coincidences which are now forming a pattern. She can strike two birds with the same stone by showing them as bracketed together.

[Virupaksha]

and just like that MB and the reds fall off each other exactly coinciding with the exact moment MB is able to stand independent of congress.

[abhishek_sharma]

Views from the Left

IAEA on Iran

An article in CPM weekly People’s Democracy argues the recent IAEA report about Iran’s nuclear programme and the subsequent media blitz was an attempt to prepare the ground for harsher sanctions on Tehran. “First, use the IAEA to prepare a report reiterating various things it has said in the past regarding Iran’s nuclear programme... While it will not contain any smoking gun regarding Iran’s nuclear weapon ambitions, it can be dressed up through a media blitz as a new threat...A campaign on the need for a military strike and how Israel may do it unilaterally can then be used to stampede the international community to impose much harsher sanctions,” it argues.

The article says that the only new evidence is satellite imagery of a “bus-sized container” in Parchin, a military base near Tehran, which the IAEA believes could be used in tests for such explosive testing. “Why Iranians should use an overground container for this(...) when they have buried much of their nuclear facilities underground,” the article asks. It says the key issue here would be a breach of NPT provisions if Iran proceeded to withdraw fissile material out of safeguards and reprocesses it to weapons grade. “This, the IAEA admits, Iran has not done. The report says there is no evidence that Iran has made a strategic decision to actually build a nuclear bomb”. It adds that “it is time we put not only Iran’s nuclear disarmament but global nuclear disarmament back on the agenda.”


Not Lokpal alone

With a week to go for the winter session of Parliament, the editorial in CPI journal New Age gives a sense of the Left’s strategy. It says that the obvious focus of the session would be on the passage of the Lokpal Bill, but that should not deflect attention from more serious problems like price rise, unemployment and economic disparity. During the monsoon session, it says, the Congress and the BJP collaborated to block a meaningful discussion on price rise, for which the Left had given advance notice. It says that the winter session must consider the government’s attempts “at selling the house silver to meet the growing financial deficit,” and discusses the sale of shares of profit-making PSUs and legislation allowing FDI into the finance sector, particularly banks and insurance.

Apart from economic issues, it says there are emerging threats from communal forces. Privatisation of education and the entry of foreign universities also need urgent attention. “Corruption needs to be focused on, but much more important issues outlined above also need to get the attention they deserve,” it concludes.

Price of oil

The People’s Democracy editorial focuses on the petrol price hike, saying the move will benefit the government’s exchequer the most, as more than 40 per cent of this increase goes to the government as taxes and duties.

“With this hike in 2011-12, the Central government expects to earn about Rs 82,000 crore as excise duty alone. During 2010-11, estimates show that the total revenue from the petroleum sector to the Central government in the form of all taxes and duties exceeded Rs 1,20,000 crore,” it says. “In other words, the people are subsidising the government and not the other way around.”

It tries to debunk the two arguments in favour of the hike — that oil companies are suffering losses with under-recoveries projected to touch Rs 1.32 lakh crore in 2011-12 as compared to Rs 78,000 crore in 2010-11, and the concern over fiscal deficit.”Under-recovery is the difference between the import parity price and the retail price of petroleum products. It is, thus, a notional loss that is determined by the international prices and not by the actual costs domestically. This is, thus, a myth perpetuated by the neo-liberal reformists admirably aided by the corporate media,” it argues. In fact, it says, the major oil companies have been making profits, quoting their audited financial results. As far as the fiscal deficit goes, it says that while the government wants to cut subsidies, the tax foregone in the last three years was a staggering Rs 14,28,028 crore. “Of this, Rs 3,63,875 crore have been the concessions to the corporates and the rich. Compare this concession, Mr Prime Minister, with the estimated fiscal deficit of Rs 4,65,000 crore,” it says.

[Pratyush]

Mamata calls Maoists more dangerous than terrorists

[Pratyush]

Woman activist beaten, axed to death in Jharkhand

Any one knows more about her, the description in the PTI report leads me conclude that she was a naxal sympathiser. A typical anti development crusader.

[Aditya_V]

Woman activist beaten, axed to death in Jharkhand

Any one knows more about her, the description in the PTI report leads me conclude that she was a naxal sympathiser. A typical anti development crusader.

Whatever be the reason, nobody should be hacked to death.

[vijayk]

http://www.thenervousbreakdown.com/atas ... interview/

You’ve said some pretty harsh things about a certain writer cum activists on the Left–no names!–who, we in the States, kind of like. She seems, in an environment of rapacious capitalism, to be a friend of the poor and marginalised. What possible objection could you have to her?

Aatish: None except that I don’t think she’s a friend of the poor at all. She would like to doom them to a permanent state of picturesque poverty. They are beautiful to her–the poor–beautiful, benign and faceless. And that is exactly how she wants them to stay. Let me say also that it is not the poor who animate her politics. Oh, no! The people who get her into the streets are the new middle classes. This class, still among the most fragile in India, people who have newly emerged from the most dire conditions, are despicable to her. She mocks their clothes; their trouble with English; she hates their ambitions; when India wins the cricket and she sees them celebrating, her skin crawls; she wants, more than anything, to do these people down. And it is her overwhelming hatred of them that allows her to be a friend of movements that are seemingly far apart. The jihadists, the Maoists, the Kashmir movement, the anti-development people…they’re all her friends. Anyone who can prove a credible threat to the future of India is a friend of that woman. I would go so far as to say she has a prurient fascination with the enemies of India. And where do they love her? In Pakistan, and in the faculty rooms of Europe and America. No surprise there.

Also, this business of pretending she’s a lone voice in the wilderness. What rubbish! At least have the good grace to admit that not one thing she says is provocative or new; it is perfectly banal. And we know how well the universities Europe and America reward this bogus cant!

[Rahul M]

the maovadis p!ssing off MB is the best news I have heard in sometime. maoists spurned her genuine efforts at reconciliation with stalling and arrogant demands and then replied with killing a few TMC workers.
not one to forget this insult, MB is nothing if not doggedly persistent. she will them hunt them down relentlessly till there are none left.
I think they just made the biggest mistake of their lives, from here onwards it's endgame for them in bengal. it might take a year or ten but she will not rest until she has uprooted them completely from the state.

[Yayavar]

I hope so...SS Ray did that once too but they came back hydra-like.