LALGARGH Insurrection Invoking ULGUNAN: It is DO OR DIE for West Bengal Aboriginal Tribals, Our Blood Brothers and Sisters. Mainstream Masses Should Stand United with the Tribals to Herald CHANGE. Pay Hike for the Policy makers and Bullets for the Masses invloved in whatsoever resistance.Marxists Expertise in MASS DESTRUCTION MOST. SC and OBC stand with the Ruling Hegemony in the Best Interest of the CREAMY LAUYER!
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| Bib ID | 3287466 |
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| Format | Book , Microform |
| Author | Duyker, Edward Adrian Joseph |
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| Description | 330 p. |
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| Summary | This thesis is an examination of the participation of the Santal tribals, of West Bengal, in the Naxalite (Maoist guerilla) movement between 1967 and 1971. Changes in Santal society are reviewed from the late 18th Century onwards, in an attempt to understand the full implications of the transition from "slash and burn" forest horticulture to settled cultivation. Particular reference is made to the impact of commercialized agriculture and especially to the trauma of indebtedness and land dispossession. The effects of these structural economic changes, together with those of the unequal benefits of the "Green Revolution", are also isolated to provide a general understanding of the pattern of rural polarization and the root causes of Santal Naxalism and violence. Included is an account of Naxalite rural insurgency in West Bengal from its organizational initiation to its campaign of assassination and gun-snatching. It was found that when the Santals became upset with the nature and pace of change (which they could neither understand nor adjust to), they attempted to change forcibly those groups whom they felt most threatened by, i.e., the jotedars and mahajans. In their attempts to reduce the pace and ameliorate the effects of change, the Santals stamped an indelible mark on the Naxalite movement through the use of distinctive tribal weapons, tactics and organizational symbols. Santal violence was aimed firstly at landlords and usurers, but secondly at the institutions of the State which tribals saw reinforcing the oppression under which they lived. The Santal conception of "Liberation War" exemplified a syncretic identification with the Santal insurrection of 1855, and thus an equation with the actions of past heroes. Ultimately, the Santals judged and wrought vengeance upon their enemies as they believed their forebears had. It would seem that the Naxalite-tribal leadership consciously cultivated this association. The ability of the C.P.I.(M-L) however, to pose a threat to the Indian Union was shortlived; in the face of effective government counter-insurgency methods, the movement collapsed. |
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| Notes | (UnM)AAI8317059 Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 44-03, Section: A, page: 0802. Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Melbourne (Australia), 1981. |
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| Reproduction | Microfiche. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms International. |
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| Subjects | Anthropology, Cultural. | History, Asia, Australia and Oceania. |
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| Other Authors | University of Melbourne (Australia) |
I have been interacting with Tribal leaders recently. The General Psyche of our aboriginal brothers is DIE HARD! They are READY TO DIE! Since they have decided to involve in Resistance , nothing may stop them.
I have spent full four years in Jharkhand and during this time , I was habitual to interact with Santhals, Mundas, HO, Kurmi and other militant aboriginal tribes. I am also fortunate to have interacted with tribal people in North East including Naga, Manipuri, Jatia, Bodo and Mizo. I have been talking to aborinal people in South India besides the aboriginal tribals in Bengal, Orissa, Chhatisgargh, Gujarat, Rajsthan and UP. Tribal psyche is same everywhere. They are at home in the most remote areas, in hills and in dense forest. They are very very innocent. Honest by heart. They are always ready to do anything for their friends and guests. They are never known encroaching or manipulating. They have immense capacity to bear Starvation, Calamities, Unemployment, Displacement, Inequality, Injustice, Aggression and so on. But, at the same time, their heart is full of Underground FIRE as seen in Coalfields. They are like Land Mines! They may explode anytime , any where! Once they decide to resist, they are never known to Retreat. Just you brand them maoist or Extremist and try any measure of REPRESSION as the STATE POWER may afford, you won`t be able to crush them. Once they declare HOOL or ULGUNAN, it is always time for all out War and sacrifice. They woun`t surrender!
I am afraid that the Ruling Hegemony and the affliated Political Party as well as Administration are quite Novice to deal with this aboriginal Psyche!
But the Marxist Government of West Bengal and Regimented ruling party CPIM well supported by cadres and PET POlice are never Interactive enough. They are habitual to dictation and subordination! Leaders like Upen Kisku and Nityanand Hembram mislead the Government. The Hegemony depends to much on its Pet SC, ST, OBC and Minority Ministers, MPs and MLAs. The Ruling Hegemony may feel quite safe as SC and ST people stood with the Ruling Front During Nandigram and singur Insurrections. I am well aware of the chareacter of the people like Kanti Biswas, Basudeb Burman, Debesh Biswas and so on. Every SC and OBC as well as Minority leader would try to assert as the saviour of the Ruling Hegemony as they have been doing all these years. Reseravtion and quota could not solve the sustaing puzzles of inherent Inequality and Injustice due to Manusmriti system, but these constitutional provisions have created the most Powerful FIFT Column amongst the Aboriginal, Indigenous and Minority communities. Thus, without doing anything, the Marxists enjoyed Enblock Solid Vote Bank of different communities playing some gimmics of demography!
I was rather very hopeful to see Buddhadeb as the Chief minister of west Bengal. What happened, the world knows today. I have been accustomed to see the marxist Chief Minister and all the ministers interact and move freely amongst the Masses. Now they seem like ROOTLESS TREES or Elegant Palaces struck by Havoc Soil Erosion as we witness accross the PADMA!
I reached Maldah the same day on which Buddhadeb landed there.
I was amazed to see the unprecedented Security Arrangements and the harrassment of the Masses. How alienated have been our dearmost leaders! It is a PITY! It is a Pity that after the successful implementation of Land reforms and rural development during Jyoti Basu tenure, we suddenly discover that nothing is done! It is a sorry state of affairs in West Bengal that the Nephew of Poet Sukanta Bhattacharya is the most unsafe person!
My heart bleeds!
Why don`t they try to understand the Aboriginal Psyche!
I have been discussing tribal affaires with DR Pashupati Mahato for last three decades and have been studying World History involving Negroids! Every Marxist knows about Spartcus! The Slaves also revolt! The Unipolar Suprpower United sates of AMERICA also witnessed CHANGE!
But we may not expect anything positive from the Zionist Brahaminical capitalist corporate Builder Promoter Ruling Hegemony but MONOPOLISTIC AGGRESSION! It is the turn of Indian People to realise how our Tribal aboriginal Brothers and sistres are treated like WILD ANIMALS and how the Ruling Hegemony uses the LICENSE to kill our people! India never recognised nationality Identities. India never addressed nationality problem.
A leader like Dr AMBEDKAR also failed to mobilise the Tribals along with SC and OBC! Triabls are alienated from the rst of the Indigenous communities. Divied and Rule has worked to sustain the Manusmriti system for Time infinite as the Indian society is divied in more than six Hundred castes! We are alwasy engaged in Infights. We boast to try our best to mobilise Mass Movements in every Corner of this Geo Politics but end in NGOs. Mass Movement is transformed in FUNDED PROJECTs! Thus, we happen to be separate Islands delinked forever. Indian Map is never complete without Indigenous Aboriginal majority. Mind You!
Maoists seized the opportunity to form village-level committees with 10 members each — five men and five women — thus taking their organization to the grassroots. Villagers from Bankura's Taldangra, Purulia's Bandwan and even Hooghly's Polba joined the first open meeting, sending ripples among the police. District police officers sent an SOS to Writers' Buildings, seeking directives on how to contain the 'rebellion'.
The ruling CPM is also at its wit's end. CPM district secretary Dipak Sarkar tried the Keshpur-Garbeta routine by sending in the infamous "bike brigade" but it boomeranged. The tribals — with funds from Jharkhand Dishom Party and Jharkhand Mukti Morcha — replied in the same vein. Toughs went around on motorbikes on Monday, brandishing posters of the 'Committee Against Police Atrocities'.
"We don't call it a tribal movement," said Sidhu Soren, secretary of the apex committee elected from the Dalilpur meet. "Most villagers, cutting across caste and creed, have endorsed our 11-point charter of demands against the police. We will continue with the blockade till the administration concedes to our demands."
Committee member Dhurakhaipil Hansda of Kalaboni warned that any police action "would make matters worse". Sensing the mood, mainstream Opposition parties chose to trail the Maoist agitation, even after the agitators denounced Jharkhand Party MLA Chunibala Hansda. Congress leader Manas Bhuniya backed the Lalgarh agitation, a day after Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee had done so.
“We called all the tribal groups to participate in talks at a district administrative office at Lalgarh. But finally they didn’t turn up,” N.S. Nigam, West Midnapore district magistrate, told IANS.
“There was supposed to be a meeting between the administration and tribal representatives on Friday under the chairmanship of West Midnapore additional district magistrate R.A. Israel,” he said.
Nigam said the tribal representatives called the district administration officer at Dalilpur - a Maoist-affected area in the district.
As per norms, the district administration can’t hold talks at a place inaccessible by road. The dialogue can’t be held under the open sky,” Nigam added, citing inadequate security measures in the area.
Trouble erupted at Lalgarh after the district police arrested some school students and allegedly heckled tribal women after a landmine blast ambushed the convoy of Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and central ministers Ram Vilas Paswan and Jitin Prasada near Bhadutala Nov 2.
The tribals dug up metalled roads and placed big tree trunks across them, virtually cutting off the trouble-prone zone from the rest of the district.
“We are constantly trying to resolve the impasse but still a section of tribals is agitating at Lalgarh. They cut off a portion of Lalgarh and Ramgarh from the rest of the district,” state Inspector General of Police (Law and Order) Raj Kanojia told IANS.
He said the police were keeping a tab on the overall situation.
“We’re hopeful of a solution to this bad law and order situation,” Kanojia said.
Leaders of various tribal groups - some of which are suspected to have links with the Maoists - are protesting for over a week against alleged police actions on the local people.
The tribals also demanded a public apology from the district police for the alleged excesses committed against them during the course of investigation into the landmine blast.
State Home Secretary Ashok Mohan Chakraborty Friday submitted a report to the chief minister explaining the situation at ground zero. Later, the report on Lalgarh would also be forwarded to the central government, officials said.
What tribals want:
* Superintendent of Police Rajesh Singh should hold his ears and do sit-ups, apologise for the arrest of innocent tribals and misbehaving with women during the police raids
* Police withdraws their camps from forest areas
* Cases lodged against the tribals in the last ten years be withdrawn and those arrested for the November 2 blast in Salboni be released
* Rs 2 lakh compensation for the families of those arrested in the last ten years or against whom cases are pending
District Magistrate N S Nigam said that the Committee had sent word that they were agreeable for talks at Lalgarh tomorrow, but the administration had pointed out that this was not possible because of the road blockades.
"My suggestion of holding the meeting at the Collectorate here has also been turned down," Nigam said.
The blockades spread to neighbouring Bankura district, with roads being obstructed at Khaerpahari and Sarulia in Sarenga block, SP Vishal Garg said.
CPI(M) supporters armed with lathis and axes took out a procession at Sarenga in protest against the assault of three party leaders, Ranjit Hembran, Ramu Duley and Tulu Hembram by tribals yesterday, Garg added.
The road between Jhargram and Midnapore, which was cleared of obstruction yesterday, has also been dug up at Harda, cutting off Jhargram town again, he said.
While the blockades at Salboni, Goaltore, Gopiballabpur, and Jamboni remained in place, fresh blockades have been put up at Chakadoba, Banpahari in Belphari police station area by the hardline tribal platform of 'Janogan Police Nirjatan Pratirodh Committee,' which is now spearheading the stir, the SP said.
Meanwhile, a tribal, Chintamoni Murmu, whose eye was damaged when he resisted police's attempt to search his house at Chhotoberia in Lalgarh area, had been sent to the SSKM hospital in Kolkata this evening, after being referred to the Jhargram and the Midnapore hospitals, Nigam said.
Tribals are Predestined to starve. Any Tribal Protest anywhere in this Subcontinent is generally branded as EXTREMIST. In India, the Trend happens to crush them with Full Striking Might of the STATE MILITARY Power as AFPSA experience expresses well. A single PAISA is not spent for decalred Development in tribal areas while Rs 628 Corore is allocated. But the governemnet of India has enough money to feed the Capitalist Corporate Money Machine and the Policy makers of brahaminical hegemony,> Thus, Pay Hike for the Policy makers and Bullets for the Masses invloved in whatsoever resistance.
The government on Thursday approved increased pay for officers of Central Public Sector Undertakings with effect from January 1, 2007. The decision, taken by the Cabinet at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, was based on recommendations given by the Second Pay Revision Committee. The package would include revision in Dearness Allowance and other allowances, besides performance related incentives, Minister of State in Prime Minister's Office Prithviraj Chavan said in New Delhi. Extra outgo on account of the new pay structure would be borne by individual CPSUs and no budgetary support is involved.
"The revised pay scales would be implemented by issue of Presidential Directive in respect of each CPSE separately by the administrative ministry concerned," he said.
While the new pay structure would be implementable from January 1, 2007, the new allowances would accrue to employees only after the decision is notified by individual units. Earlier, the government had approved implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission for central government staff and it was implemented from September 1, this year.
Marxists Expertise in MASS DESTRUCTION MOST. SC and OBC stand with the Ruling Hegemony in the Best Interest of the CREAMY LAUYER!While Rs 200 crore had already been allocated for developing slums, the Centre has been urged to divert another Rs 200 crore from JNNURM. Mr Bhattacharya said that under JNNURM Rs 5,700 crore had already been spent since its launch in 2005 through 197 pr ojects sanctioned, of which Centre contributed Rs 2,782 crore and the rest was contributed by the State Government.
Price hike resulted in cost overrun of the projects forcing the State Government to spend Rs 871 crore so far and this would shoot up to Rs 1,200 crore by 2012 when the JNNURM programme would end.
The Chief Minister underscored areas like providing urban home for the poor, development of slums, besides developing drainage and sewerage system, while a decision has been taken for securing Rs 1.900 crore loan from the Asian Development Bank.
Of this 35 per cent would be provided by the State Government as matching grant. In next four years of the tenure of JNNURM, the State Government would set off projects worth Rs 4,500 crore, the Minister said adding that Rs 500 crore of it would be spent for developing small and medium towns.
The adivasis or tribals of Jhargram subdivision in West Bengal are up in arms. They have felled trees to block roads or simply dug them up and cut themselves off from the rest of the state for over a week. It is to protest police excesses against them, after a landmine blast by suspected Maoists barely missed Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and Ram Vilas Paswan on November 2.Of ten people arrested for the blast, three were school boys. The adivasis gheraoed the police station and forced their release. Now they want more.Alleging that the police were unnecessarily harassing tribal villagers in the name of investigating the blasts, armed Maoists supported by some local tribal leaders laid siege to the place. They dug trenches, cutting Lalgarh-Jhargram off from the rest of the state.Not a single approach road to Lalgarh-Jhargram region remains intact. Post sunset the entire region plunges into darkness as all overhead power transmission wires have been cut off. Food and water supply to the region too has virtually stopped. All one sees everywhere are Madhwa activists and all one hears is the constant beating of tribal ‘Dhamsha-Madal’ war beats.
Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee once again cried war on Tuesday, vowing to launch a Nandigram-like agitation in Lalgarh and other parts of West Bengal’s West Midnapore district, if the administration applied the slightest of force to quell the ongoing tension there over alleged police highhandedness.Supporting the Maoist-driven tribal movement in certain pockets of West Midnapore, Mamata said if police and the district administration resorted to force to suppress it, she will not hesitate to launch a Nandigram-like agitation in the district.
“At Nandigram, we resisted the administration’s atrocities. If necessary, we will do the same here,” she told a rally outside district superintendent of police Rakesh Kumar Singh’s office in Midnapore on Tuesday.
But the CPI(M) has made it quite clear that neither would it encourage direct political retaliation nor would it allow the state machinery to take strong action. According to political analysts, the ghost of Nandigram stops the party and government from going all out in Lalgarh-Jhargram.
“The Nandigram firing (March 14, 2007) cost CPI(M) the entire East Midnapore district in the last panchayat elections. So, naturally they cannot dare to be over-active in Lalgarh-Jhargram before the coming Lok Sabha elections, especially in view of the fact that tribal communities were ardent CPI(M) supporters since 1977,” a senior political analyst said.
On the other hand,The villagers in Lalgarh have decided to continue their agitation until the district administration accept their eleven-point demands. The tribal leaders of nearly 90 villages of Lalgarh arrived at the decision after a meeting with the administration on Monday.
West Midnapore District Magistrate N S Nigam said, “The tribals have placed 11 demands and we have agreed to accept a few.” He indicated that the district administration is likely to take steps to restore normalcy at Jhargram and Binpur by Tuesday.
The tribals were represented by the Bharat Jakat Majhi Maroa Juan Ganta (BJMMJG). The DM, Superintendent of Police Rajesh Singh, Additional District Magistrate R Israel and BJMMJG’s national president Nityananda Hembram were among others present in the meeting.
The district administration had held a meeting with the tribal leaders at Lalgarh police station on Friday. But the tribal leaders had placed a fresh demand of withdrawing the police camps from forest areas.
The tribals, meanwhile, blocked another road at Daijuri and at State Highway-6 on Sunday night, cutting off all road links to Jhargram.
A police officer said members of a hardline faction Police Santras Birodhi Janogan have felled the trees, blocking the roads at Gopiballapur, Nayagram, Goaltore, Garbeta and Salboni.
Nigam said the representatives of BJMMJG have met him and agreed to withdraw the blockade from Jhargram and Binpur.
Hembram said the meeting with the district magistrate was successful.
In another development, a paper mill at Jhargram pulled down its shutters for the shortage of raw material. Due to the road blockade, the mill could not receive the supply of raw materials. Six hundred and fifty people are employed in the paper mill.
The Lalgarh-Jhargram region continues to be cut off from the rest of West Bengal as the police and administration are wary of using force with Nandigram still fresh in their memory.
The area has been on the boil since the November 2 landmine blast at Salboni that narrowly missed chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and Union steel and fertiliser minister Ram Vilas Paswan.
State Home Secretary Ashok Mohan Chakrabarty quoted an intelligence report and said: “The report says the villagers have genuine grievances and certain forces are trying to capitalise on these problems.”
Chakraborty was in West Midnapore to hold a series of meetings with tribal organisations on Wednesday. Accompanied by Director General of Police Anup Bhusan Bohra, Chakrabarty met leaders from six tribal organisations, including Bharat Jakat Majhi Madoa (BJMM), which is spearheading the agitation.
The leaders complained of underdevelopment and police atrocities in tribal regions, especially Jhargram, where 30 per cent of the population belongs to the tribal and Kurmi community.
The officials, however, avoided meeting leaders of political parties like the Jharkhand Party and the Jharkhand Desham Party.
After the meeting, BJMM chief Nityananda Hembram said: “We hope normalcy will be restored in the area soon. We have assured the government of all possible help.” The home secretary, however, said: “Despite their assurance, situation continues to be tense because of some forces.”
While the situation in Jhargram, Binupur and Belpahari may return to normalcy with the help of the BJMM, in Lalgarh no such hope is in sight. Sources in the district administration said the government has information that the political parties have lost their control over the tribals in Lalgarh.
A villagers’ committee has been formed in the area to continue the agitation. Even the BJMM has no control over this committee. Chakraborty expressed the government’s willingness to resolve the deadlock and said, “We can talk with the committee if it wants.”
On Wednesday, the committee has written to the Lalgarh block development officer that a team of villagers would like to meet the administration on November 21. But the meeting should be held in Lalgarh only, they demanded.
They have already placed an 11-point charter of demands before the administration.
“All their demands cannot be accepted. Some demands are genuine. But some are politically motivated. If we accept all of these, we will be surrendering to the acts of terror,” Chakraborty said.
Upholding the demand of the agitating tribal group, Bharat Jakat Majhi Madhwa (Disham Majhi), Mamata said the state government should apologise for the situation. “I know the conditions tribals live in. The state government has done nothing for them so far. Now, if they try to undemocratically resist their democratic movement, I will not remain silent.”
Meanwhile, the district administration started the process of clearing some of the blocked roads in the Lalgarh-Jhargram area. Roads, which were blocked using tree trunks, were partially cleared.
However, Lalgarh continues to remain cut off from the rest of the district. Madhwa leaders said the blockade will continue till their demands are met.
"Our problem is police torture and the harassment of our women and children in the guise of a hunt for Maoists," said Dilip Hembrom, adivasi activist.
At Lalgarh on November 14, an adivasi delegation placed 11 demands before the administration, including the removal of police and CRPF camps from the Maoist-affected area. But some of the demands give the story away, like the release of all those people arrested in connection with Maoist cases in the last 10 years.
"All Maoist cases should be withdrawn, that is not possible. Again they were asking CRPF camps should be shifted. That is not possible," said R A Israel, Additional District Magistrate.
The talks ended inconclusively.
"There has been no solution to the problem. We have only placed our demands," said Sidhu Soren, adivasi delegate.
So for 10 days now, the Jhargram area is cut off. In the face of public fury, the police have been forced to handle the situation with kid gloves. Meanwhile, the investigation into the landmine blast has been pushed to the backburner.
The ongoing agitation by tribals over alleged police atrocities in West Midnapore district following the Salboni mine blast on Saturday spilled to Belpahari, a Maoist infested area, after four inconclusive rounds of talks with the administration.
While Jhargram town and areas adjoining Lalgarh remained under siege for the ninth day with all road communications completely cut off, trees have also been placed at several places on the Jhargram-Belpahari stretch stalling traffic.
The road link connecting Jhargram, Purulia and Bankura was also cut off with large boulders placed at many places. Trees were felled near Aoulia and Magura villages close to Binpur, while a bomb was found embedded in one of the trees.
The agitators also dug up roads at several places thereby isolating a Special Operation Group camp at Negudia. However, the blockade near Binpur was re-erected today, a day after it was lifted after the Bharat Jakat Majhi Marwa Juan Ganta, a prominent body of tribals, had several rounds of talks with the local administration.
Maoist thumbs down for cops
Shyam Sundar Roy
MIDNAPORE, Nov. 20: When the Midnapore West district police are in two minds over attending a meeting tomorrow called by the Police Santras Birodhi Public Committee (PSBPC) of Lalgarh at Dalilpur Chowk, an interior village in Lalgarh, on security plea, the CPI (Maoist) held a day-long meeting on Singlohar Hilltop at Laljal, 25 km from Belpahari town, today.
The PSBPC and police meeting would discuss the former’s 11-point charter of demands to pave the way for restoring normality in Lalgarh, Jhargram, Binpur and other areas by lifting their 16-day agitation. In the Maoist meeting, organised for the first time in broad daylight, unlike previous occasions, the outfit is believed to have prepared a blueprint on the Lalgarh issue, in which a good number of heavily-armed action squad leaders, including some women members, were present. The meeting was an open challenge to the police as two camps of the Central forces are situated at Niguria on the east and at Jamtalgar on the west, each about 5 k.m. from the hill site.
A 15-member team of Maoist cadres from Lalgarh riding five two-wheelers are also reported to have attended the meeting. Later, at a public meeting in the afternoon, which was attended by about 10,000 people from 40 or 45 villages of Belpahari and 15 or 16 villages from adjoining Barikul block, speakers charged up the villagers mentioning cases of police torture on innocent people in Belpahari, Binpur and Lalgarh areas of the district.
They were reminded that as many as 87 such cases had occurred over the past 10 years in the district and there were seven rape cases in Belpahari block. But the police did not entertain the complaints as ruling party cadres were involved. Reminding the villagers of their political line, the Maoist leaders asked them to join the agitation against police torture and not to have truck with any political party.
Meanwhile, the ongoing agitation in and around Lalgarh was further enhanced with a stretch of road between Lalgarh and Midnapore at Brindapur Nad being dug up on the state highway and at Harda in Binpur, cutting off Jhargram from Bankura and Durgapur and also the Sarenga-Midnapore Road at Goaltore.
Only yesterday, the state home secretary had said that investigation would be conducted against police excesses in Lalgarh, if specific complaints were received. This seemed to have added fuel to fire.
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=2&theme=&usrsess=1&id=231774
To trust or not to trust
Biswabrata Goswami
LALGARH (West Midnapore), Nov. 20: A visit to any of the tribal villages reveals a similar picture. There is a feeling of no trust amid the government's trust-building exercise to bring normality in these areas. The tribals do not trust policemen or government officials or any other outsider (mediamen for example), the police do not trust tribals, not even their so-called “sources” in the community and for any outsider, it is difficult to trust anyone to ensure one’s safety.
An uneasy calm prevails in these villages. A visit to a tribal village ~ Narcha, close to Kantapahari around evening revealed that most villagers were in their houses and no sooner had they noticed an “outsider” entering their village, conversing in whispers in their tribal language. Only after enquiring satisfactorily about the identity of this correspondent, did they begin to talk.
Highlighting the plight of their community, tribal men, mostly living below poverty line, without access to basic amenities said they are sustaining themselves by selling forest produces like Babui grass and Kendu leaves. Some are engaged as agricultural labourers.
Sixty-year-old Mr Sambhu Mandi said: “We are used to our conditions. Earlier, we had issues for our developments, but nothing has changed. In addition to this, frequent police raids at different tribal villages have disappointed us. How long shall we be victimised.”
Mr Subrata Hanshda, a former-gram panchayat pradhan of 8 no. Sinjua panchayat, in which Nachra village is situated, also alleged, “The state government may claim to have allotted six per cent of the total plan outlay for the tribal sub-plan. Though there was hardly any funds crunch, money was diverted to other accounts. The Paschimanchal Unnayan Parishad failed to utilise the funds on time. Despite the hype over the special food subsidy card for people living below poverty line, corruption and nepotism is rampant among babus and ruling party leaders.”
While talking with Baburam (name changed on request), a 19-year-old boy in this village, it was revealed that Maoists have been making inroads into the tribal hinterland of south Bengal adjoining Jharkhand, particularly, in West Midnapore, Bankura and Purulia for the past few months with many tribal youths being inducted by them. These arid backward districts, covered with hills and jungles, are being targeted by the Maoists, said Baburam. What it also indicates is that Maoists want the red-liberated zones to be extended over similar terrain in other states and this will be their ideal guerrilla base for a protracted people’s war.
“They have already made a state committee comprising about 160 members from different tribal communities under the banner of ‘Polishi Santrash Birodhi Janasadharaner Committee’ and this committee has different sub-committees comprising at least 10 members at different villages,” said Baburam.
A senior IPS officer who is responsible for gathering information about the Maoists in the region said on condition of anonymity: “The Maoists have intelligently used the rough terrain and jungles along the borders of West Bengal, Orissa, Jharkhand, Bihar and Nepal. The squads in Andhra Pradesh, Chhatisgarh, Jharkhand and Bengal exchange information regularly. We have so far failed to infiltrate these squads.”
Govt speak
The state administration will have to take steps to restore normalcy at the trouble-torn Lalgarh only after reaching a consensus through dialogue with the agitating adivasis. This was decided at the bipartite meeting the CPI-M and the RSP had on Thursday evening to take stock of the political situation in the state.
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=2&theme=&usrsess=1&id=231772
Maoists turn saviours
Biswabrata Goswami
BINPUR (Jhargram), Nov. 19: Just as the weak rays of the sun struggle to break through the dense forest areas here, a few tribal youths from nearby villages come to the Sonajhura forest near Kantapahari to meet their ‘leaders'. The youths are all from tribal communities, but their ‘leaders' are not and they remain inaccessible to any outsider here.
It was later learnt from local people that these ‘leaders' comprising five or six people, including a woman, are all Maoist cadres. The ‘first morning’ meeting was convened by one of their prominent squad leaders Ramkrishna alias Ramu. Ramu was earlier leader of the Jamboni squad, but recently he took charge of one of the Maoists’ Lalgarh squads.
A few months ago, this very scene was not familiar to the locals. But, this time around, the Maoist cadres are being treated as saviours by the tribals and so, these youth have come forward to assist them to wage war against police ‘atrocities’ and state ‘oppression’.
What was evident amidst conversation with tribals here is that despite a positive political, institutional and financial commitment to tribal development from the government side, there is presently a large scale displacement and general decline in the community. A major section of tribal youths have been displaced from their own culture, speak Bengali, sing Hindi songs and watch popular television serials now.
An interaction with the tribal youths and senior tribal people at different villages of Lalgarh, Binpur, Silda and Dahijuri has revealed that they very much resent the frequent police atrocities. These young people have no connection with the so-called elite Adivasi people who have already been ‘de-classed' from their own tribal society after establishing themselves with help of government aid. These elite Adivasis have done little to uplift the younger generation.
Frustrated, these youths have found the Maoists as saviours who can protect them from police atrocities and oppressions. The attraction to the Maoists gained pace soon after the police torture on tribal women at Choto Pelia village following the landmine blast near Salboni on the chief minister’s convoy.
“Maoist cadres have laid a trap to attract the tribal people and they have primarily succeeded in their job. After learning about the widening cracks in the tribal unity, they have started attracting the tribal youths and they have already formed village committees successfully. In the name of the ‘Janasadharan’, the Maoists were behind the tribal leaders in launching this movement first, but with the passage of time, they have taken over the movement,” said Mr Babu Bose, general secretary of the Jharkhand Jana Mukti Morcha.
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=6&theme=&usrsess=1&id=231664
Riz case: Cop trio moves SC against high court order
2008-11-21 [15:07:00 hrs]
The three police officers accused in the Rizwanur Rahman death case have moved Supreme Court against a Calcutta High Court order which cancelled their interim bail. The high court had given the three officers Ajoy Kumar, Sukanti Chakraborty and Krishnendu Das time till Friday to surrender before the 14th metropolitan magistrate's court. The three officers are now waiting for the apex court's decision.
Thursday was scheduled for the next hearing at 14th metropolitan magistrate Madhumita Ray's court. But the three officers didn't appear.
The lawyers appearing for the police officers claimed that they had moved Supreme Court. The counsel for Rizwan's family then asked them to produce a document to prove that they had filed the special leave petition (SLP). The defence counsel sought time till afternoon for producing the required document. The hearing was adjourned till 2 pm.
Immediately after hearing resumed later in the afternoon, the defence lawyers produced the two diary numbers (of the SLP filed at Supreme Court) before the magistrate. An hour later, the magistrate scheduled the next hearing of the case on November 24.
The bail plea of another accused, S M Mohiuddin alias Pappu, a social worker, was rejected by the court. Moving the bail application, Pappu's lawyer said he had appeared before the court when he had been summoned and has already spent more than 20 days in judicial custody. The CBI lawyer Partha Tapaswi pleaded for turning down the bail plea as he was one of the main accused. "He had accepted Rs 11 lakh from the Todis to separate the couple," Tapaswi said. Pappu's lawyer argued that the money was not found. Pappu will remain in judicial custody till December 3.
The arrest warrant issued against prime accused Ashok Todi, his brother Pradip and cousin Anil Saraogi was also extended till December 3. Ashok Todi has already moved Supreme Court against the arrest warrant and the hearing is scheduled for November 25.
"The high court order is still valid. They have just filed an SLP before Supreme Court. The apex court has not yet given its verdict. In case the matter does not come up for hearing on Friday, the three accused officers will have to surrender at court," said Tapaswi.
One of the defence lawyers, Kaushik Dey, said they would wait for the Supreme Court's order. "The high court order was based on our application. If their appeal is turned down by Supreme Court and they still don't surrender, we will appeal for an arrest warrant against the three," said Anindya Rout, counsel for the Rahman family.
Ashok Todi and his brothers filed a petition before Calcutta High Court Justice Indira Banerjee seeking that their passport, impounded by CBI, be returned.
Confusion over funds for Maradona's visit
2008-11-21 [13:40:00 hrs]
Around Rs 8 crore will be spent in bringing Argentine soccer legend Diego Armando Maradona in Kolkata, his maiden trip to Asia. However, it is still not clear where this huge amount will come from.
Celebrity Management Group, a private event management company, in association with Uruguayan firm Balwens Group, is organising Maradona's vist to Kolkata. Dharamdutt Panday, chief executive officer of CMG, does not know who will be paying the money. "We are unaware of it as we are looking after everything but financial matters," he said.
Shamik Lahiri, CPI(M) MP from Diamond Harbour, who flew to Buenos Ayres to strike a deal with Maradona regarding the visit, too does not have any idea about it. "He (Maradona) is a diehard fan of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez. That is why he is keen on coming to West Bengal, which is being ruled by the Communists for more than 30 years," Lahiri said.
According to sources, Eden City, which is developing the largest housing project at Maheshtala in south Kolkata, will pay the entire amount. Company officials, however, have denied it. Eden City is also the developer of the Indian Football School, which Maradona is set to inaugurate during his stay in Kolkata.
A highly placed official of the Indian Football Association, the parent body of football in West Bengal, said: "The sponsor will get back his money through advertisement on and off the ground, telecast rights, ticket selling and others. The revenue-sharing formula will be in place."
Meanwhile, the proposed football academy in Bardhaman, which will be jointly run by Bardhaman Sports Development Authority, the West Bengal Government and Techno India, will initially get Rs 7 crore from the state government. Though Techno India managing director Satyam Roy Chowdhury denied saying anything about the expenditure for the academy, it is learnt that the company is prepared to spend Rs 15 crore per year.
Blockade builds Maoist corridor
PRONAB MONDAL
Belpahari, Nov. 20: A road blockade inspired by the Lalgarh backlash has made a 16km stretch out of bounds for police and gifted Maoists a safe corridor from Jharkhand to Bengal.
Villagers have blocked the road between Belpahari and Banspahari to express solidarity with the campaign in Lalgarh against alleged police atrocities. The police have said the Lalgarh protest has been hijacked by the Maoists.
It is not clear whether the Belpahari blockade had been laid two weeks ago to aid the extremists but they have ended up the biggest beneficiaries and the police the losers, sources said.
The police used to patrol the road in West Midnapore right up to the Jharkhand border to stop the rebels from sneaking in. But for the last two weeks, they could not proceed beyond Belpahari, about 22km from the state border. The villagers have placed tree trunks all along the stretch.
“This area, a CPI (Maoist) stronghold now, plays a key role in keeping the Lalgarh protest alive. As we are not clearing the logs to avoid provoking the tribals, anyone can do anything there after crossing over from Jharkhand,” said Prasanta Gayen, the officer in charge of Belpahari police station.
“We have information that outsiders are entering from Jharkhand through the Belpahari road and heading towards Lalgarh (60km away) through Binpur,” said an intelligence branch official. The rebels move through the forests on the two sides of the road.
Sasadhar Mahato, the prime accused in the November 2 blast that struck a convoy of Union ministers, is roaming in the area, the Maoist leader’s brother, Chhatrapati, said.
The first trunk blocking the road is placed not more than a kilometre from Belpahari police station.
The entire 16km stretch is deserted. In places, boulders have been placed. Even the narrow paths off the main road have been blocked with logs.
This correspondent saw around 500 tribals gathered with arms near Banspahari.
Asked how they earned their livelihood as they had stopped working, Jamuna Hembram said: “Those who love us take care of us.”
More roads, including one that was repaired, in Lalgarh and Jhargram were dug up today. The tribals have placed a series of demands, mostly linked to police repentance, some of which have been termed “unrealistic” by the government.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081121/jsp/bengal/story_10141491.jsp
AXES TO GRIND
From a distance, it looked like a tribal ritual in progress. A small group of men, with axes, tangi, ballam, bows and arrows, had gathered on the state highway No. 6, between Jhargram and Dahijuri. In a field on the right sat men enjoying a session of handiya. Three men were playing the dhamsa and the madol as another danced to their heady beats. But a closer look revealed that there was nothing festive about the occasion. Another tree — this time an arjun — was being felled to block the motor-links between Jhargram and Lalgarh more securely. Three young men sat in front of the cut branches writing posters, dipping sponge-tipped sticks into bottles of alta.
The number of trees sacrificed at the altar of the people’s movement in Lalgarh would be close to a hundred. They were mostly date-palms, but there were some sals and arjuns as well. This is something of a paradox, for tribals are known for their symbiotic relationship with the forest and its resources. V.K. Yadav, the chief conservator of forests in West Bengal, denies that the trees being cut off to block roads are the property of the forest department. “They belong to the PWD,” he said, adding that the forest protection officers in his department would have taken immediate action had there been any mass felling of trees in the forest area.
Yadav takes pride in the fact that his department is one of the few government offices still being allowed to function in the disturbed area: “It is only because they have faith in us.” Surai Kisku of Dharampur certainly does. She received training from the department to bind sal leaves and stitch them into plates.
Paresh Tudu, among those who assembled at the tree-felling site, claimed that they were doing the PWD a favour, since the latter was supposed to cut the trees anyway to facilitate the construction of roads. So who gets all the wood once the agitation runs its course? Yadav insists that the tribals are so honest that they would hand over the trunks to the authorities straightaway. But in front of the Lalgarh police station, a group of men talked about how much money each trunk would fetch and how it would go to fund future Maoist “operations”.
Make no mistake, even the tree blockade had its uses. It made roadies out of journalists, though many of them ended up nursing aches and sprains. Till then, “bike-bahini” was a term associated with the malevolent cadre of the ruling party, which had put the fear of god into the minds of people in Nandigram not so long ago. But here in Lalgarh, a different bike-bahini was taking shape. The fleet looked valiant when the riders had to walk their vehicles across sandy banks of the Kangsabati and then over the flimsiest of bridges. And it looked comical when the pillions tried to do their Roger Kingdom act on trees sprawled across the road. Perhaps it is true, as remarked by one of the riders, that “motorbikes are the future of journalism in Bengal, just as the spade is the future of political agitation here”.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081120/jsp/opinion/story_10136075.jsp
Misplaced Targets
Manas Joardar
With gross domestic product (GDP) growing at a nearly two-digit rate during last several years, India is being projected by various quarters as a potential economic super power. In the count of billionaires too ~ 36 out of a global total of 946 ~ India is a brilliant performer. In our way to excelling others, we could surpass all the rich countries of the world barring only America at the top.
Most of the Indians ~ as despair as ever ~ however, feel little urge to celebrate this great economic upheaval. And quite rightly so. That a substantial growth in GDP may not bring about a fair increase in income of the general mass of people, has been explained by social scientists.
Supposing one ~ out of a total of 100 ~ has an income of Rs 2,40,100.00 per annum and 99 others Rs 100.00 each. The per capita income stands out at Rs 2,500.00. If, during the next year, income of the first person jumps up to Rs 2,65,100.00 and that of the others remains unchanged, per capita income of them all goes up to Rs 2,750.00. An overall ten per cent rise results in per capita income of all, albeit 99 per cent have no increase in their actual income at all!
Shining India?
In per capita GDP score, India ~ ranking 123rd in 2000 ~ occupies 117th position in 2005 among 177 countries of the world. In terms of Human Development Index (HDI), however, position has come down from 124 to 128 during the period (Table – 1). It is horrifying to see that over 80 per cent of Indian population is poor or nearly so under the $2-a-day income criterion and more than one third extremely poor ($1-a-day). China, another potential superpower, is much better off.
Table -1
________________________________________________________________________________
HDI Country HDI rank Human poverty GDP per capita Population below
rank index (HPI-1) rank income poverty line (%)
2000 2005 2000 2005 2000 2005 $1 a day $2 a day
_______________________________________________________________________________
38 Argentina 34 38 4.1 44 47 6.6 17.4
51 Cuba 55 51 4.1 4.7 90 94
52 Mexico 54 52 9.4 6.8 55 59 3.0 11.6
63 Malaysia 59 63 52 57 <2 9.3
81 China 96 81 14.9 11.7 96 86 9.9 34.9
99 Sri Lanka 89 99 17.6 17.8 108 106 5.6 41.6
128 India 124 128 33.1 31.3 123 117 34.3 80.4
136 Pakistan 138 136 41.0 36.2 131 127 17.0 73.6
140 Bangladesh 145 140 42.4 40.5 130 140 41.3 84.0
151 Zimbabwe 128 151 36.1 40.3 116 142 56.1 83.0
_________________________________________________________________________________
Source: UNDP Human Development Report 2002, 2007/2008
Whereas computation of HDI is based upon longevity, knowledge and a decent standard of living, that of Human Poverty Index for the developing countries (HPI-1) considers the percentage of people
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not expected to survive to age 40, percentage of illiterate adults and percentage of people without access to safe water, health services and under-5 under-weight children. Here also India remains far behind Sri Lanka and China.
According to a UNICEF report, India ~ an abode of the highest number of under-nourished children of the world ~ could achieve only 1.4% improvement in the prevalence of under-weight children between 1990 and 2004 and is quite far off from the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of reducing under-five mortality rate by two-thirds within 2015. Similar dismal is the performance record on other social sectors (Table – 2) including the MDGs: halving the proportion of extremely poor people and people without access to sanitation and safe water, achieving primary education for all, reducing maternal mortality rate by three-quarters, ensuring gender equality, environmental stability etc, all within 2015.
Table - 2
__________________________________________________________________________________
Country Adult Population lacking Infant mortality Under 5 Maternal mortality
illiteracy safe water safe sanitation rate under-weight rate
(%) (%) (%) (per 1000) (%) (per lakh)
_____________________________________________________________________________________
Argentina 2.8 4 9 15 4 77
Mexico 8.4 3 21 22 8 60
Malaysia 11.3 1 6 10 11 62
China 9.1 23 56 23 8 45
Sri Lanka 9.3 21 9 12 29 58
Maldives 3.7 17 41 33 30 120
India 39.0 14 67 56 47 450
Pakistan 50.1 9 41 79 38 320
Bangladesh 52.5 26 61 54 48 570
Zimbabwe 10.6 19 47 81 17 880
_____________________________________________________________________________________
Source: UNDP Human Development Report 2007/2008
The government of India while glorifying the market economy for the economic growth can not entirely hide out the inconvenient truth either. “It is indicative that the country has done better in terms of per capita income than in other components of human development” – goes the observation made in this year’s pre-budget Economic Survey.
Two Worlds
India, in pursuit of a whooping GDP growth through economic reforms, liberalization and globalization, has, as always, grossly neglected the plight of the downtrodden condemned to live a sub-human life.
The report Development Challenges in the Extremist Affected Areas (DCEAA), submitted recently by an Expert Group set up in May, 2006 under the aegis of the Planning Commission, on “Development Issues to deal with Causes of Discontent , Unrest and Extremism”, remarks - “we have two worlds of education, two worlds of health, two worlds of transport and two worlds of housing, with a gaping divide in between.”
The Indian Constitution pledged for a progressive reduction in social and economic inequalities. A score of legislations have been enacted to abolish ~ for example ~ untouchability, manual scavenging, atrocities on SCs and STs, bonded labour system, gender based wage inequality and so on. So many
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Commissions ~ National Commissions for SC and ST, National Commission for Safai Karmacharies, National Commission for Backward Classes ~ to name a few ~ have been constituted.
All this notwithstanding, there is hardly any let up in the woes of the targeted section. “Inequalities between classes, between town and country, and between the upper castes and the under-privileged communities are increasing” ~ goes the view of the Expert Group expressed in DCAEE.
Dalit and adivasi communities remained excluded from the main stream education system through ages. Even sixty years after independence, their literacy rate is much lower and school drop-out rate and poverty much higher than the national average. Of the total SC households, 10 percent are landless and another 77 per cent near-landless.
Table - 3
____________________________________________________________
Literacy rate (%) School drop out rate (I – VIII)(%)
SC ST Others SC ST All
2 0 0 1 2003 - 2004
_____________________________________________________________
Male 67 59 79 57.33 69.04 51.85
Female 42 35 58 62.19 71.43 52.92
Total 55 47 69 59.42 70.05 52.32
______________________________________________________________
According to a study, out of around 60 million people who have been displaced/affected during 1947 to 2004 due to various development drives such as power plant, irrigation, mining and industrial projects, 40 per cent are tribals, 20 per cent dalits and another 20 per cent OBCs. Only one third of them have been resettled so far. Whereas the population resettled after displacement during 1951-1995 was 34 per cent in Goa, 33 per cent in Orissa, 28 per cent in Andhra Pradesh, it was only 9 per cent in West Bengal and 13 per cent in Kerala.
Untouchability Offenses Act , 1955, could not abolish the curse from most parts of the country. Over one million people are still engaged in manually removing human excreta. The Employment of Manual Scavengers and Construction of Dry Latrines (Prohibition) Act,1993 took four years for the Centre to notify it in the Gazette. In most of the States it is still hanging fire. Implementation record of the Protection of Civil Rights Act and the SC & ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act is awful. In the opinion of the Expert Group, “incidence of atrocities on SCs and STs is on the increase.” Minimum Wages Act remains on paper only. National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, that could go a long way in providing job opportunities, is plagued with utter neglect and heinous corrupt practices.
Naxal Activity
In a press conference held in February, Mahasweta Devi, the noted writer with a long working experience among the tribal people, delineated before the media persons that atrocities from various government agencies over the years compelled the poor people to lend support to the Maoist party. The DCEAA resonates ~ “Much of the unrest in society, especially that which has given rise to militant movements such as the Naxalite movement, is linked to lack of access to basic resources to sustain livelihood.” Much quoted assertion of Romain Rolland might appear quite revealing in this context – “When order is injustice, disorder is the beginning of justice.”
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Naxal activity is now quite widespread, infesting around a quarter of our rural districts. The Expert Group affirms that “the main support of the movement comes from the dalits and adivasis” who constitute 24 per cent of our population.
To achieve the objective of establishing an egalitarian social order, use of arms ~ whether we like it or not ~ is not a forbidden proposition in the Maoist political lexicon. It is precisely on this score that the ruling State power calls the shot in cleverly diverting public opinion against the radical left only to shield its abysmal record of non-performance. That is why a Maoist tag to any dissenting voice raised by individuals or civil society organizations including civil rights bodies is so desperately sought after.
Whether substantiated by any material evidence or not, branding a mass movement ~ or for that matter any dissenting stanch ~ not playing in tune with the State machinery as Naxal hatched, has become quite handy in recent times.
We see ~ among many others ~ Dr Binayak Sen - a great champion of human rights, general secretary of the Chhattisgarh chapter of PUCL, an internationally recognised social activist and a staunch believer in nonviolence being charged with Naxal links and made to remain in incarceration without trial for more than a year. We see Govindan Kutty - editor of the journal “People’s March” of Kerala, Prasanta Rahi - a senior journalist of Uttarakhanda, Lachit Bardoloi - an adviser of the Manabadhikar Sangram Samity of Assam, Leitangthem Umakanta Meitei – the secretary general of the “Threatened Indigenous People’s Society” of Manipur, along with thousands of others, getting arrested for raising voice of protest.
We hear our Prime Minister, a distinguished scholar, nonchalantly declaring Naxalites as the biggest internal security threat to India since independence. We see in many of the States, enactment of special security legislations together with security measures like Salwa Judum in Chhattisgarh and countless violation of human rights guaranteed by the Indian Constitution.
West Bengal Scenario
Radical left political activity has not been formally banned in West Bengal. For propagating a progressive image, the left front have enacted, instead, rules to accord first class status to all political prisoners. In practice, the law is violated almost without exception. The format of State repression is little different from the other States’. Agitations are most likely to face police or party cadre outrages. Even junior left front partners are not spared.
Legal hassles against Kaushik Ganguly, a teacher of the University of Calcutta who was arrested and brutally tortured in 2002 under allegation of Naxal links, are still going on. A few thousand hapless people framed with fictitious charges have been passing through years of interminable agony. Promulgation of no special security rules has been needed for the purpose.
A front page news item published in The Statesman (2 June) reported ~ quoting a senior IB official of West Bengal ~ that “top CPI(Maoist) leaders have sought assistance from all human rights organizations in the State” for setting up “pressure groups” in the city. A well known human rights activist having close contacts with front ranking Maoist leaders is acting ~ goes on the report ~ “as a linkman between CPI(Maoist) and human rights organizations.” The ploy is, needless to say, the same ~ put rights bodies under fire.
Chhoton Das, the general secretary and ten others of the Bandi Mukti Committee ~ a human rights body ~ were arrested and severely beaten by the police on May 3 at the Ranaghat Court area during their programme demanding release of all political prisoners.
The latest in the row is an attempt of the police to intimidate ~ after being informed from ruling party political quarters ~ five lady students of Matangini Mahila Samity in the Jadavpur area who were
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known to have questioned the recent land acquisition drive of the government at Singur and Nandigram. Being challenged by the rights activists that included some Jadavpur University teachers and students, who were manhandled by the party backed locals, the police had to back off. They failed in their mission to pick the ladies up and place them behind bars for an indefinite period as they did in an earlier case.
For allegedly putting up Maoist posters at the Bagha Jatin railway station on 23 March, the police arrested five ladies of the Nari Mukti Sangha who are still languishing in judicial custody.
Successful or not, attempts are endless. One may recall in this context what happened in Nandigram. State government’s bid to push through the hypothesis of extremist insurgency in the troubled area was foiled by the CRPF, saying that there was nothing to suggest that Maoists were ever there. The National Human Rights Commission also refused to buy the theory of any Maoist attack. Yet another alleged scheme in Nandigram also came ~ to much discomfort of the organizers ~ a cropper when a group of young men masquerading as Maoists were subsequently identified as cadres of the dominant ruling political party.
Response
Perpetration of reckless State coercion ~ whether at the central or at the provincial level ~ without addressing the causative economic, social and political issues is indeed a misplaced target.
The Expert Group asks the authorities to recognize Naxalite movement as a political movement and not merely as a law and order issue and urges for a political settlement. They suggest withdrawal of Salwa Judum, projected so far ~ in propagandist hyperbole ~ as an outcome of people’s upsurge from Chhattisgarh. The Supreme Court also questioned legal validity of the Salwa Judum activities. They pointed out that it was illegal to arm civilians and allow them to kill.
The Group finds no reason why the government’s Status Paper should seek to pronounce that “there will be no peace dialogue by the affected states with the Naxal groups unless the latter agree to give up violence and arms”, when they have been either conducting or are willing to conduct peace talks with the Naga rebels, ULFA and J&K insurgent outfits.
* * *
Report of the Expert Group does not appear to have impressed the mind set of the ruling powers to any significant extent. They are in no mood to relent. While China has ~ in the face of growing agitation from the dislodged people and reduced area of agricultural land ~ withdrawn quite a few of their SEZ based industrialization projects, India is going ahead with brouhaha and seems to have gained legitimacy of sorts.
“While suicides of landholders does attract public attention if not government response, the fate of the landless poor, mainly SCs and STs, who meet the same situation by offering their children in bondage or allow trafficking of their daughters into the flesh market, is less well known and less documented, though it is as tragic if not more” – goes the observation of DCAEE. Fate of other under-privileged sections, irrespective of caste and religion, is not much different from that of SCs and STs.
In an article “Predatory Development” Prof. Amit Bhaduri, who was a member of the Expert Group, writes – “The ideology of progress through dispossession of the poor, preached relentlessly by the united power of the rich, the middle class and the corporations colonise directly the poor, and indirectly it has begun to colonise our minds… If this process of growth continues for long, it would produce its own demons. No society, not even our mal-functioning democratic system, can withstand beyond a point the increasing inequality that nurtures this high growth.”
Govt gropes in the dark over tribal stir
Shyam Sundar Roy
MIDNAPORE, Nov. 19: The state government seems to be groping in the dark to solve the fortnight-long Lalgarh imbroglio which has disrupted normal life in Jhargram, Lalgarh, Binpur and Belpahari blocks and partially affected some areas in the adjoining blocks of Midnapore West.
The state home secretary, Mr AM Chakraborti, along with the director general of police, Mr AB Vorah and IG (western Range) Mr Kuldip Singh, today held a meeting with the leaders of six adivasi associations, including the Sara Bharat Jakat Majhi-Madowa Juan Gaonta, at Midnapore Circuit House seeking their support to restore normalcy in these blocks of Jhargram subdivision.
The meeting was held at a time when the chief of the Gaonta, Mr Nityananda Hembram, was facing punishment for agreeing to call off the agitation without prior permission from the full Majhi-Madowa body. The state home secretary said: “The government won’t apply force to restore normalcy in Lalgarh and its adjoining areas. We want to solve the issue by holding talks with the agitators.” When asked whether they have any plans to hold discussions with leaders of the Police Santras Birodhi Public Committee (PSBPC) or to meet their demands, the home secretary said that it has not yet been decided whether they would meet them or not. But, about their demands, he said that some of them have already been taken care of.
In reply to a question, he refused to disclose the identity of those behind the 2 November landmine blast as “it is still not clear yet”. However, the minister for paschimanchal unnayan parishad, Mr Susanta Ghosh, while speaking to reporters earlier, indicated that the Maoists are behind the Lalgarh stir. In reply to a question, the minister denied reports of poor development activities in the area and claimed that Rs 14 crore meant for development work in five districts could not be used by his department owing to the advent of monsoons. About the alleged police excesses in Lalgarh, the home secretary said that they have not received any complaint yet.
Interestingly, the five-member state women commission team, led by Mrs Jasodhara Bagchi, who held their annual meeting to enquire about women’s grievances in Midnapore town on Monday did not visit the injured women at Chhoto Pelia. When asked whether they have any plan to visit the tribal hamlet, Mrs Bagchi told reporters that the affected women have not informed them about their plight.
Bulldozers roll, but not in Lalgarh
PRONAB MONDAL AND NARESH JANA
A bulldozer removes the trees used as roadblocks on the way to Jhargram town. Picture by Sanat Kumar Sinha
Nov. 18: The administration began removing roadblocks around Bengal’s Jhargram town but stayed away from nearby Maoist stronghold Lalgarh a day after tribal leaders ag- reed to the move at a peace meeting.
This is the state’s first initiative to clear the blockades angry tribals had set up to prevent police raids in Lalgarh and surrounding areas after a Maoist mine blast on November 2 narrowly missed the chief minister.
The West Midnapore district authorities deployed bulldozers to remove tree trunks from the road at Kalaboni that branches off National Highway 6. Traffic from Calcutta can now make it to Jhargram town from the highway.
Trees placed on the road connecting Jhargram with Bandwan in Purulia were removed at Dahijuri More. But the road continued to be blocked in at least two other places.
Officials led by Jhargram deputy magistrate Shasanka Shekhar Roy were gheraoed by a group of tribals on this road when they went to Magura, some 4km from Dahijuri, this evening. Roy and Binpur police station officer-in-charge Kushal Mitra left their vehicles behind and walked back to Dahijuri.
“We will talk to the agitators tomorrow and persuade them to help us withdraw the roadblock,” said additional district magistrate R.A. Israel.
Around 3,000 tribals armed with bows, arrows, spears and axes took out a procession challenging the move to clear roads in Belpahari, only around 4km from Jharkhand and a Maoist hotbed.
Five Santhal outfits led by the Bharat Jakat Majhi Marwa had yesterday agreed to remove the roadblocks everywhere except Lalgarh at a peace meeting in the district headquarters, Midnapore.
“It is a movement for our rights. Who are they (the Marwa leaders) to decide whether the roadblocks should be withdrawn?” asked Padmalochan Mahato of Aguibill village.
Sidhu Soren, the secretary of the People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities, said: “Our movement will continue till all our demands are met. We have added two more to earlier 11: the administration will have to pay for the treatment of Mohan Tudu, who was injured when police applied force to lift the blockade on Sunday night. They will also have to repair or replace 30 cycles damaged that night.”
Among its other demands are the release of all tribals arrested from the region in the past 10 years and an apology by the superintendent holding his ears for the police action after the November 2 blast.
In Calcutta, chief secretary Amit Kiran Deb said the home secretary would visit Midnapore town on Thursday to hear the demands.
Bringing back normality in the area, however, may prove tougher than removing tree trunks. With vast swathes cut off from the administration, the Maoists are having a free run and instigating villagers.
A member of the Bengal-Jharkhand-Orissa regional committee of the CPI (Maoist), who is camping in the area, said: “If the police use firearms against the protesters, we will strike back.”
Rakesh (name changed on request), one of the 13 members of committee, said: “We are guiding the deprived tribals of Lalgarh and taking care of them. What has the government done for them in three decades?
“Many of our cadres from the two neighbouring states (Jharkhand and Orissa) have arrived through the Jharkhand-Belpahari border to save the poor tribals from police atrocities.”
In Midnapore town, Mamata Banerjee’s supporters began a sit-in outside the district magistrate’s office.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081119/jsp/bengal/story_10131572.jsp
Maoists turn saviours
Biswabrata Goswami
BINPUR (Jhargram), Nov. 19: Just as the weak rays of the sun struggle to break through the dense forest areas here, a few tribal youths from nearby villages come to the Sonajhura forest near Kantapahari to meet their ‘leaders'. The youths are all from tribal communities, but their ‘leaders' are not and they remain inaccessible to any outsider here.
It was later learnt from local people that these ‘leaders' comprising five or six people, including a woman, are all Maoist cadres. The ‘first morning’ meeting was convened by one of their prominent squad leaders Ramkrishna alias Ramu. Ramu was earlier leader of the Jamboni squad, but recently he took charge of one of the Maoists’ Lalgarh squads.
A few months ago, this very scene was not familiar to the locals. But, this time around, the Maoist cadres are being treated as saviours by the tribals and so, these youth have come forward to assist them to wage war against police ‘atrocities’ and state ‘oppression’.
What was evident amidst conversation with tribals here is that despite a positive political, institutional and financial commitment to tribal development from the government side, there is presently a large scale displacement and general decline in the community. A major section of tribal youths have been displaced from their own culture, speak Bengali, sing Hindi songs and watch popular television serials now.
An interaction with the tribal youths and senior tribal people at different villages of Lalgarh, Binpur, Silda and Dahijuri has revealed that they very much resent the frequent police atrocities. These young people have no connection with the so-called elite Adivasi people who have already been ‘de-classed' from their own tribal society after establishing themselves with help of government aid. These elite Adivasis have done little to uplift the younger generation.
Frustrated, these youths have found the Maoists as saviours who can protect them from police atrocities and oppressions. The attraction to the Maoists gained pace soon after the police torture on tribal women at Choto Pelia village following the landmine blast near Salboni on the chief minister’s convoy.
“Maoist cadres have laid a trap to attract the tribal people and they have primarily succeeded in their job. After learning about the widening cracks in the tribal unity, they have started attracting the tribal youths and they have already formed village committees successfully. In the name of the ‘Janasadharan’, the Maoists were behind the tribal leaders in launching this movement first, but with the passage of time, they have taken over the movement,” said Mr Babu Bose, general secretary of the Jharkhand Jana Mukti Morcha.
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=6&theme=&usrsess=1&id=231664
Now, Bankura follows Lalgarh line of action
BANKURA, Nov. 19: Three zonal CPI-M leaders were struck by arrow in the troubled areas of Sarenga in Bankura late this evening. The leaders were on their way back home to Sarulia after attending a party meeting. The leaders ~ Mr Ranjit Hembram, former panchayat samiti sabhapati and two other zonal leaders, Mr Ramu Duley and Mr Tulu Hembram ~ were accompanying a police contingent to Nakhrapahari where the tribal organisations of Bankura had obstructed the Bankura-Midnapore state highway placing tree trunks on the road. The leaders were rushed to Sarenga block primary health centre and the condition of two were stated to be critical. The tribals staged a demonstration in Mejia brandishing weapons for hours. Bharat Jakat Majhi Marawa, a tribal outfit, started the agitation in the south Bankura villages today to protest against alleged police atrocities meted out on the tribals in neighbouring area of Lalgarh.
At around 10 a.m. a crowd of about 2,000 villagers armed with bows, arrows, axe and spears brought out four separate rallies from Khoer Pahari, Nekra Pahari, Tanti Danga and Karbhanga. They started shouting slogans against the police and blocked roads connecting Chandrakona in West Midnapore with Sarenga, Bankura. A large contingent of police led by the ASP, Bankura Mr Sishram Jhajharia reached the spot but could not do anything apprehending retaliation if an attempt was made to forcibly disperse the agitators. The blockade was cleared after 3 p.m. from Nekra Pahari and Tanti Danga but the villagers refused to clear the road in Khoer Pahari and Karbhanga. The tribals also sent deputation to the Mejia BDO to submit a charter of their demands. Around 2,000 villagers from nine tribal villages in Mejia brought out a rally causing a traffic snarl on the busy NH-60 around 11 a.m. They gheraoed the BDO, Mr Avik Das, for an hour. n SNS
Rage spreads to Bankura
Terms set for Lalgarh talks
OUR BUREAU
A procession of the tribals in Bankura’s Mejia. Picture by Gour Sharma
Nov. 19: The tribals’ agitation in West Midnapore today spread to neighbouring Bankura with armed villagers blocking the highway connecting the two districts in Maoist-infested Sarenga.
The Santhal organisation Bharat Jakat Majhi Marwa placed trees on the road to express solidarity with the agitation against alleged police atrocities in Lalgarh, 45km away.
Leading a rally at Khoer Pahari, Sibaprasad Murmu alleged that the police often arrest innocent villagers after branding them Maoists. “So we have decided to paralyse the administration here, as in Lalgarh.”
Among other things, the Bankura protesters wanted all night raids to stop.
Sushil Soren of Tanti Danga said the agitation would be intensified from Friday if the Lalgarh stalemate was not resolved.
A large police contingent stood watching till 2pm fearing a backlash if force was applied to remove the blockades.
Talks yielded results around 3pm. Five hours after the blockades were put up, they were lifted from Nekra Pahari and Tanti Danga. But the road continued to be blocked at Khoer Pahari and Karbhanga.
“We told the villagers that the problem (in Lalgarh) was not related to Bankura and they should not disturb peace here. We also promised to look into their allegations like police high-handedness and arrest of innocent people. However, night patrolling cannot stop as the area is a known Maoist belt,” said superintendent of police Vishal Garg.
In the evening, three CPM leaders who had gone to persuade the tribals to withdraw the blockades were beaten up.
In another part of Bankura, armed tribals marched to the office of the Mejia block development officer and submitted a charter of demands similar to that in Sarenga.
The People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities, which is leading the protests in Lalgarh, today invited the administration for talks on November 21 but set conditions. The meeting has to take place at Dalilpur and the West Midnapore superintendent of police must attend it.
The committee wants the SP to hold his ears and apologise for the police raids and detentions since the landmine blast on November 2.
“We will step up our movement in other parts of the district if the SP doesn’t come for the talks,” committee secretary Sidhu Soren said.
The district police, however, could not assure the tribal leaders about the SP’s presence. “They (the police) wanted to know what was the guarantee of his security in Dalilpur. We told them it was their headache. They told us a group of 25 top Maoists were camping in Dalilpur,” said Soren.
SP Rajesh Kumar Singh said: “It won’t be a wise decision to go there. We want to avoid untoward incidents. They can hold talks in any place like the Lalgarh police station, the block office or the local school.”
However, home secretary Asok Mohan Chakrabarti said in Midnapore town that the government was ready to hold talks anywhere, “be it Midnapore, Jhargram or Lalgarh”.
In Midnapore town today with the state police chief, Chakrabarti met representatives of six Santhal organisations led by the Majhi Marwa.
“Many of the demands are just but it is also important to find out who all are exploiting the grievances. We will not tolerate terrorism in the name of a movement,” the home secretary said after the meeting.
The committee branded the six Santhal outfits that helped the administration remove blockades from Jhargram yesterday and attended today’s peace talks traitors. “They betrayed us by helping the administration,” said Sidhu.
Cop who quit rebel heartland
OUR CORRESPONDENT
Das at home. (Surajit Roy)
Malda, Nov. 19: The additional superintendent who quit his police job after being shifted to Maoist hotbed Lalgarh said he did so on being unable to convince “seniors about the ground realities”.
Sisir Das was allegedly told to set up a camp inside a forest at night, which he said was unsafe for the entire team in the absence of proper groundwork.
In the wake of the tribal uprising to protest against “police atrocities” after a Maoist blast targeting the chief minister, Das, the North 24-Parganas additional superintendent (headquarters), was shifted to Lalgarh on November 8.
He was apparently told to take charge of the police camp at Kalaimuri for two days. After five days in the camp, he got in touch with West Midnapore superintendent Rajesh Singh to ask how long he was expected to stay there.
Singh ordered him to move into the forest in Pirakata that very night. “I agreed to move, but I wanted to move during the day as the area was unknown to us,” Das said. “The route through the forest could be riddled with landmines. It would have been suicidal to move blindly at night. But I failed to convince my superiors about the ground realities.”
He was subjected to several “whips” and his superiors’ “foul behaviour” as a result.
Back home in Malda, Das, 38, would not answer when asked if he quit because of the fear of Maoists. “I have resigned and have not yet decided what to do next,” he said.
Das had stood seventh in Madhyamik 1987. He appeared for his HS from Ramakrishna Mission Narendrapur and studied physics in Calcutta University before standing second in the West Bengal Civil Service examination of 1997. He opted for the police service.
Das lost his wife soon after marriage.
Lalgarh was not his first posting in a trouble spot. He was in Nandigram during last year’s violence and had been shifted to North 24-Parganas only about six weeks ago.
‘Realities’ forced Lalgarh cop to quit
OUR CORRESPONDENT
Sisir Das with his niece at his Malda home on Wednesday. Picture by Surajit Roy
Malda, Nov. 19: Sisir Das, the additional police superintendent who had put in his papers last Monday while on duty at Lalgarh, West Midnapore, said here today he had taken the step after he failed to convince his superiors about the ground realities there.
Lalgarh tribals cut of the roads into their area following what they termed forcible detention of innocent men and children following the November 9 blast in the area triggered by the Maoists right after the convoy of chief minister, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and union steel minister, Ramvilas Paswan’s convoy had passed after the inauguration of the Jindal Steel plant at Salboni.
Das had alighted from the Gour Express from Sealdah today at 6.20am and took a cycle-rickshaw back his home at Malanchapally, 2km away.
Sitting at home, Das was reluctant to say whether he had resigned from the force for fear of tackling the Maoists in the forests of Lalgarh or because of the treatment meted out to him by his seniors. As soon as the tribals of Lalgarh began the blockade, Das who was the additional police superintendent (headquarters), North 24-Parganas, was transferred to Lalgarh on November 8. He was ordered to take charge of the police camp at Kalaimuri there for two days.
However, despite being asked to stay for two days officially, he had to spend five days at the camp. After that he got in touch with the police superintendent of West Midnapore, Rajesh Singh. He said Singh ordered him to move inside the forest about two kilometres into an areas called Pirkata and establish a camp there.
“I had agreed to move to Pirkata, but I had just wanted to move with the men in the daytime as the area was unknown to us,” Das said. He said there was every possibility of the route through the forest being set with land mines by the Maoists. He had felt that unless it was ensured that the area was not strewn with the mines, it would have been suicidal to move blindly at night.
He had only one proposal; that the route the police would take should be sanitised first. However, Das said his mistake was that he had failed to convince his superiors about the ground realities. He added that he had to tolerate “whips” and bad behaviour from his seniors, which he could not take any longer.
“I have resigned and I have not yet decided on what to do next,” Das said.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081120/jsp/bengal/story_10136985.jsp
BITE THE BULLET
Corporate chieftains at the just-concluded World Economic Forum’s Indian Economic Summit in New Delhi used their considerable leverage to convey the impression that the government and the Reserve Bank of India are not doing enough or moving quickly enough to address the seizure in credit markets, particularly the lack of availability of bank credit. Whether it is suppliers’ credit, trade finance, working capital from banks or external borrowings, the rising demand for credit from commerce and industry is simply not being met, say the chief executives of India Inc. The finance minister, P. Chidambaram, suggested the normal adjustment process of a slowdown, whereby companies reduce prices until consumption begins to pick up again. He also said that India Inc. should bite the bullet and cut prices, rather than cut production or lay off employees. But the chief executives argued vehemently that they had been doing just that for months; it was the government, they said, that had to provide the necessary push to ensure adequate liquidity, ample credit delivery and a reasonable interest rate.
The RBI has responded to the liquidity crunch by undertaking a series of measures, starting mid-September this year. It raised interest rates on non-resident Indian deposits substantially, eased the restrictions on tenor, size and price for external commercial borrowings, substantially cut reserve requirements for banks (both the statutory liquidity ratio and the cash reserve ratio), and even allowed banks to lend to mutual funds. The central bank also eased lending norms for specific sectors — real estate, exporters, and small and medium enterprises — while the government released funds from the farm-loan waiver to banks, in addition to fresh capital infusions into several banks. Finally, the central bank also allowed a dollar swap line: in other words, opened a dollar line of credit for companies. What is astonishing about these measures, apart from their breadth, is the speed at which they were undertaken. And, of course, the government announced its willingness to do what it takes to get the economic engine up and running again. But will all this prove to be enough to get credit flowing again? Perhaps not.
For it is not liquidity that matters, but leverage, making bankers look at risk differently in current conditions. First, they have begun to assess industrial and business houses on a consolidated basis, rather than as individual companies within the group. Second, to the total debt, they also add the credit equivalent of all off-balance-sheet liabilities of the entire group. Third, banks take into account whether promoters have used their own equity as collateral — as they have in many cases. Several groups have been found to have leverage ratios of seven times net worth, if not more; prudence requires that leverage be kept below two times net worth. De-leveraging applies not just to American and European companies. And no policy or government action can deal with that.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081120/jsp/opinion/story_10133414.jsp
UNDER THE GAZE OF THE FORTRESS
There is more to the tribal agitation against police excesses in Lalgarh than meets the eye, writes Sreyashi Dastidar
Every place that earns the description, ‘remote’, also earns the right to a certain mystery. The remoteness may be a gift of the administration’s policies or the lack of them. But in Lalgarh, as in some other parts of western Bengal, the mystery has come to be associated with one word, ‘Maoists’.
A sense of something elusive has surrounded Lalgarh since three boys and four men were arrested on November 4 from the area, in connection with the Salboni blasts that could have killed Bengal’s chief minister. The day after, policemen from the Lalgarh thana assaulted a group of women from the Chhotopelia village, seriously injuring one of them in the eye. Overnight, the Lalgarh villages were put out of reach of the nearest district town, Jhargram, and of the local police station by digging up roads or placing tree-trunks across them. Within a few days, the tribal agitation had made the administration sit up and take note. The reasons, of course, had less to do with the spontaneous outrage expressed by a wronged people than with the smelling of a Maoist rat.
The tribal-dominated cluster of villages in Lalgarh is an area in turmoil. The unrest has spilled over to Jhargram town and the district headquarter of West Midnapore. But it is not a familiar picture of political agitation that greets someone making his way to Lalgarh from Jhargram. No loudspeakers blaring out grievances against the administration, no marches spewing anti-establishment slogans, and no leaders trying to use the media to send their message across. It was only after the movement of the People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities gained enough momentum that one or two axe-wielding roadblock teams were spotted, or young men on motorbikes carrying word of their agitation beyond the borders of tribal villages. For the rest of the time, the movement spoke, quite eloquently, through the clandestine placing or removal of roadblocks, posters stuck on trees or crude placards, or the odd photocopy of a hand-written charter of demands that the police-administration was expected to meet for any scaling down of the agitation.
The people behind the ‘people’s movement’ took some finding. They had made their presence felt only when the police or administration tried to breach their fortress. On Monday in Kantapahari, however, they came in large numbers, from hundreds of villages, to attend a meeting called by the Committee. The meeting itself was a discovery of sorts; one was indeed supposed to take place, but in Lalgarh’s Dalilpur Chowk. There were speculations that Maoist squad leaders, supposedly remote-controlling the movement from the forests of Belpahari and Jharkhand, would be attending it. On reaching Lalgarh, it was clear that the meeting, assuming there was one, had been wrapped up long before the appointed hour. What Lalgarh was preparing for instead was a public meeting on the schoolground in Kantapahari.
It was this school that Buddhadeb Patra and Goutam Patra — the boys picked up by the police on November 4 — went to. The headmaster, Asim Ganguly, a genial man who wore a despondent look now, said that the school had been all but closed for the last ten days because hardly any of their 833 students and 16 teachers could turn up, with a virtual bandh in the area every day. The Madhyamik Tests were round the corner, and he saw little chance of them being held in any school in the area. But it was a just cause that the Committee was fighting for, so he would try to fix a date for the tests once the agitation was over.
About 300 yards from the headmaster’s room, a generator started off, and one of the first words that came out of the loudspeakers powered by it was a note of caution for the assembled journalists. They were to confine themselves to the school-building and to the road separating it from the grounds, and keep their cameras shut. Journalists and photographers complied with a readiness that was telling. I remembered roadblocks near Jhargram made of the thinnest of branches that would require no more than a kick or shove to be moved aside. Yet, not one was removed, either during the day or at night.
The props for the meeting were a long table with a dozen or so chairs, flanked by posters listing the demands. Interestingly, the posters were written in blue, a marked departure from the red used so far. People were coming in by two and threes, a steady trickle that flowed into the grounds and headed straight for the far end, behind the table and chairs, where the bare field gave way to a thicket. As more and more people gathered, the congregation seemed to recede deeper into the woods. After the initial instructions and the calling out of names, the generator was turned off. It was a strange spectacle, like a green room left open to the audience before the actual play began. Only, the audience was too far to get a clear view of things; besides, no one could say for sure whether the actual play was the one going on now or was about to follow.
In the Hari-mandir nearby, a village elder was reading from the Gita: “There is no goodness in this material world; everything is sinister.” At Deepak Pratihar’s house, his pregnant wife, Lakshmi, narrated how she was kicked and thrown to the ground by the police the day they arrested Deepak. He said that the the police targeted him because he was affiliated to the Jharkhand Party (Aditya), which is opposed to the CPI(M). It is common in these parts, before the polls, to round up opposition party workers and arrest them. In an incident a couple of years ago, when a group of villagers were held for making trouble in the BDO’s office, the CPI(M) supporters were segregated and later released, while the rest were put through unsavoury modes of interrogation. If the CPI(M) has been pushed to a corner now, Maoists or no Maoists, few in Lalgarh are complaining. If the Garbeta (East) MLA, Susanta Ghosh, has said that the CPI(M) knows which medicine to apply for an ailment like Lalgarh, then the people too claimed to know ways of showing him who was the patient and who the physician.
For a section of the people, the police are an extension of the CPI(M). For the others, mostly women from the more interior tribal villages, the police’s political colours are irrelevant. Policemen are those who attack, rape and kill. The fact that the assault of women by the police has emerged as a bigger issue in the present agitation than the illegal detention of men show that tribal women have suffered the excesses of the police for far too long.
But Lalgarh’s relationship with the police has not always been strained. Police camps like those in Kalaimuri, Dharampur and other places, which have been asked to be withdrawn immediately, were regarded with much pride by villagers when Ajay Nanda was the SP in 2003-04. But subsequent postings have steadily eroded the image of the force, turning it from protector to aggressor. It is no surprise that the punishments pronounced on the policemen by the agitators — holding their ears and apologizing, and crawling with their nose to the ground, all the way from Dalilpur Chowk to Chhotopelia Chowk — put humiliation above physical torture.
At the same time, it is difficult to believe that the simple, poverty-ridden villagers would suddenly muster the courage to issue threats and ultimatums to a force before which they have only learnt to bend low. Also intriguing is the precision and coordination with which the agitation is being directed and controlled, although there is apparently no supreme leader. Add to these the strategic appearance of posters bearing the words, “biplabi (revolutionary)” or “shashastra andolan (armed struggle)”, and the suspicions about ‘another’ force become difficult to ignore. Why is it that the Bharat Jakat Majhi Marwa is acknowledged to be the representative body of Lalgarh’s tribals, while its peace attempts are repeatedly foiled by the ‘people’?
Some have detected a Maoist ‘pattern’ in the Salboni blast. The masterminds would have caused a bigger blast if they had really wanted to kill the VIPs, goes their theory. The blast was the “action” meant to bring out a “reaction” from the administration that could be used to trigger off a larger armed movement. But this takes away attention from the twin terrors of government apathy and police excesses that have been the fate of this region.
Back at the meeting ground, some women from Bahardanga village had gathered on the edges of the open field, waiting for some more to arrive. One of them was saying, “I hope they come fast. If you don’t attend this meeting, you better not think of attending another.” Talking to the women is not easy; they have been trained in the art of silence. Two men came to me and started discussing how the media were putting a Maoist tag on the movement without reason. “So why aren’t you letting us speak to the arrested boys, and go into sensitive villages like Banshber?” I asked. “Why, you did go to a village, and you were sitting and talking to people at the Hari-mandir, weren’t you?” came the answer. Nothing, I realized, went unnoticed here.
The generator came back to life, and the gathering was asked to sit down in front of the table, men to the left and women to the right. The meeting began. While the movement had so far refrained from pointing fingers at the ruling party, a clear anti-CPI(M) edge marked this meeting. At the end, a few more demands were added to the existing eleven. One was that the money and cycles stolen from the Committee by CPI(M) goons in Garbeta on Sunday should be returned immediately.
The journalists and photographers were allowed to come inside the grounds and film and photograph these proceedings. But among the faces behind handycams and cameras, some were distinctly unfamiliar. Nothing must go unrecorded.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081120/jsp/opinion/story_10132431.jsp
Tatas told to disclose pact, but under seal
KOLKATA, Nov. 19: The state information commissioner today asked Tata Motors to submit on 24 November, under sealed cover, a copy of its agreement containing the undisclosed portion of details of the aborted Singur small car project, it was learnt.
Mr Arun Bhattacharya, state information commissioner today heard Tata Motors officials, leader of the Opposition, Mr Partha Chatterjee, Mr Subrata Gupta, MD, West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation in this connection.
While Mr Chatterjee again pleaded to the commissioner that Tata Motors and WBIDC should now make public the undisclosed parts of the pact between the state government and Tata Motors as the Tatas have abandoned the Singur small car project, Tata Motors lawyers submitted a letter stating that since Nano was designed to be marketed both within and outside the country, its drawing and design should not be disclosed.
The commissioner has fixed the final hearing on 28 November.
Tata Motors also moved court praying for a stay order so that the undisclosed portion of the agreement signed between WBIDC and Tata Motors stays confidential.
Mr Chatterjee had earlier met Mr Arun Bhattacharya demanding that Tata Motors should divulge the undisclosed information about the proposed small car project of Tata Motors in Singur. At that time Mr Chatterjee submitted to the commissioner a set of 15 questions on the agreement.
He had sought disclosure of the exact clauses in the contract between the Tata Group of Industries and the state government or its relevant offices, the extent of land acquisition, and how much money the Tatas would be paying for the land. What kind of tax or rebate benefits would be provided to the Tatas by the state government, and what would the share of investment by the Tata group, financial institutions, and state and Central government liabilities in the form of developing infrastructure, he had asked. He had also asked how many people were going to be employed in the short- or long-run and what their rate of income was to be.
Mr Chatterjee said today: "We did not ask about the design of the small car, nor for any information that may help their rival groups. We only asked about the basic information on behalf of the people whose land has been acquired." n SNS
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=1&theme=&usrsess=1&id=231616
21 get life for CPM leader’s murder
Statesman News Service
KOLKATA, Nov. 19: Twenty one persons ~ all CPI-M cadres ~ were sentenced to life imprisonment by the additional district and session judge of Arambag first fast track court today in connection with the murder of a CPI-M leader at Arambag in Hooghly two years back.
The accused were earlier convicted by the judge under Sections 148, 149, 302 and 448 of the Indian Penal Code . All of them have also been asked to pay a fine of Rs 25,000 each.
According to reports, a CPI-M Auxiliary Group (AG) member from Burundi village in Arambag, Juhur Ali, was dragged out of his house and then lynched by a group of local CPI-M supporters on 25 May, 2006.
It was alleged that infighting within the CPI-M had led to the murder. The victim’s family claimed that their kin had to pay with his life for launching a war against corruption within the party. A relative of the victim subsequently lodged a complaint with the police against 21 people including a local CPI-M panchayat member, Asgar Ali. All the accused were arrested within a few days.
The accused were tried in the court of Mr Goutam Sengupta, additional district and session judge of the Arambag First Fast Track Court.
After the judgement, the advocate of the accused, Mr Swapan Ghosh, said he would move a higher court challenging the verdict.
The victim’s son, Mr Alim Ali, who was present in the court, said: “My father was killed for opposing corruption within the party. I would have been happier had the accused been given capital punishment.”
Mr Mozammel Hossain, CPI-M Arambag zonal committee member, said: “There was no infighting. The murder was not a political one. It took place because of a village dispute.”
Five hurt in CPM, Bhumi Raksha committee clash
Statesman News Service
SILIGURI, Nov. 19: Five persons were injured in a clash between the CPI-M and Bhumi Raksha Committee (BRC) activists at the Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority's (SJDA) proposed new township site at Kawakhali in Siliguri this morning.
The clash broke out over a tussle for getting contract of bed material supply for use in the road-infrastructure development works at the site.
Of the five injured, three are Bhumi Raksha Committee members, while the rest two belong to the CPI-M camp. The injured BRC members ~ vice president Mr Jugal Kishore Sarkar, Mr Ashim Sikdar and Mr Pappu Roy are currently admitted at the North Bengal Bengal Medical College and Hospital in Siliguri. According to police, the clash between the BRC-backed Kawakhali Porajhar Welfare Society and the CPI-M backed TKBPC Land-losers Association occurred around 10 a.m. over the former dumping bed material by lorries for the township road. Both these bodies are actually syndicates formed by the Kawakhali land-losers for the supply of construction materials in the township work.
According Mr Jugal Kishore Sarkar of the BRC, the pro-CPI-M supplier group suddenly attacked them without any provocation while they were overseeing the supply of materials at Kawakhali this morning.
As alleged in the BRC's FIR at the Matigara police station, the Kishak Sabha's Matigara-I local committee secretary Mr Bablu Sarkar, members Mr Suren Das, Mr Keshav Singh, Mr Liton Saha and the CPI-M 13 No. branch committee secretary Mr Adhir Barman were involved in the attack.
The CPI-M backed suppliers’ syndicate has refuted the charges and lodged a counter FIR accusing the BRC of instigating violence this morning. The FIR was lodged against the BRC secretary Mr Harashit Biswas, vice president Mr Jugal Kishore Sarkar and member Mr Gouranga Mazumdar.
Acting upon the complaint, the Matigara police arrested Mr Suren Das of the Kishak Sabha. The arrest sparked off an agitation by the CPI-M camp, which resorted to a roadblock on the Medical College Road at Kawakhali from 3 p.m. demanding Mr Das's release. The roadblock was continuing till the filing of this report.
The CPI-M district secretariat member Mr Jibesh Sarkar said that the violence at Kawakhali this morning was uncalled for. The SJDA chairman and the state urban development minister Mr Asok Bhattacharya also condemned the incident and said that police have been instructed to take appropriate action against those guilty.
The BRC on the other hand would hold a meeting with the local Congress leaders tomorrow to decide its future course of action.
DM denies Forest Rights Act violation
Statesman News Service
SILIGURI, Nov. 19: The DM Jalpaiguri, Ms Vandana Yadav, has refuted the charges of Forests Rights Act (FRA) violations by the administration in the Dooars as been alleged by the ‘National Forum of Forest People and Forest Workers’ (NFFPFW) ~ a NGO representing the forest dwellers.
Reacting to the NFFPFW allegation (published in The Statesman on Wednesday) that the administration has arbitrarily raised the number of Forests Rights Committee (FRC) members from 15 to 19, Ms Yadav said that the same has been done very much as per the provision of the FRA.
“A FRC is required to verify and settle the claims made by the forest dwellers on the lands under their occupancy. Since the government departments have the relevant records pertaining to the forest properties, how could the FRC have performed its task without the concerned government officials being a part of the body,” the Jalpaiguri DM said.
She also refuted the charges that the forest dwellers in Dooars were being compelled to submit the ‘claim forms’ to local forest rangers. “As per the FRA, the claim forms should be received by the secretary of a concerned FRC and we are strictly adhering to that in Dooars,” Ms Yadav said.
Adding on the issue further, the Jalpaiguri DM alleged that: “A particular NGO was misleading the forest dwellers in Dooars over the implementation of the FRA and was trying to instigate confrontation with the administration.” She however, refused to name the NGO in question. It may be mentioned that the NFFPFW had alleged that administration-backed miscreants were targeting its forest dweller members in Dooars for raising voice against the FRA violation by the government officials. The NGO also referred to an instance wherein two of its activists were allegedly assaulted in front of the Chilapata forest range office on 11 November.
“I would not like to comment on allegations. But since they have apparently filed a written complaint, let the police investigate the matter and act as per law,” the DM said.
Stir against “police excesses” spreads to Jhargram
Special Correspondent
KOLKATA: More areas were cut off from West Bengal’s Paschim Medinipur district on Thursday as tribal villagers felled trees and set up roadblocks demanding that the police stop “excesses” during raids to track down those responsible for the November 2 blast in the region. Maoists are known to have a presence there.
Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee had a narrow escape that day as a powerful IED went off moments after his convoy passed through Kalaichandi. The agitation by the locals, which began more than a week ago in the Lalgarh area, spread to Jhargram. Processions were taken out by protesters, some armed with bows and arrows. Roadblocks were set up on roads leading to the sub-divisional town. Large parts of Lalgarh, where roads have been dug up, remain inaccessible.
Later in the day, there were signs that the protests in the Jhargram area would be called off, following a meeting there between the local administration and a section of the tribal leadership, which was assured that its demands would be considered sympathetically.
Moves were made to clear some of the roads in the evening, but the protesters offered resistance in certain areas. There is no improvement in the situation at Lalgarh, according to reports reaching here.
The protests are being spearheaded by the “Bharat Jakat Majhi Marwa Juan Ganta,” which has called for the release of all tribals arrested in connection with the blast. It has also demanded that the police administration at Lalgarh apologise for the “excesses” committed on the locals.
The Maoist leadership has already claimed responsibility for the blast.
http://www.hindu.com/2008/11/14/stories/2008111456591300.htm
Mamata plays tribal card, joins Lalgarh agitation
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Express News Service
Banerjee equated Nandigram and Singur with Lalgarh and said: “The Lalgarh agitation is a movement of the people. We support it and our dharna will continue at the DM office until a peaceful solution is reached in Lalgarh, Salboni and other areas. Why is the government not calling an all-party meeting, involving the tribals, to resolve the issue.”
She added that the makeshift stage near the DM office will remain there and her party leaders will continue the agitation.
She slammed the state government and claimed that lack of development works and poverty has caused trouble in tribals areas. “The CPM-led government has brought only hunger to the tribals. There has been no development in the Lalgarh-Salboni belt. Instead, the situation has deteriorated over the years,” said the Trinamool leader.
“Instead of addressing the needs of the people and finding a solution to the problem, the administration has adopted the policy of divide and rule among the tribals. This has led to a flare-up. The police should punish the guilty but why are innocent people being arrested,” she added.
The Trinamool chief noted that the CPM gets the maximum number of seats from the three Maoists-affected districts and alleged that both Maoists and CPM are hand in glove. “If there are so many anti-CPM Maoists in this area, then how can the CPM win all seats in West Midnapore, Purulia and Bankura. The CPM and the Maoists are the same,” she said.
Banerjee said the time has come to oust the CPM because there is no end to the party’s atrocities. “Be it Nandigram, Singur or Lalgarh, the state government is torturing the common people. Conviction of CPM leaders in Tapasi Malik’s murder case shows they are murdering innocent people in the state. They should be removed from power,” she said.
State Transport and Sports Minister Subhas Chakraborty criticised Banerjee for her supporting the Lalgarh agitation. “ Some forces are trying to create chaos in the state. I condemn those endorsing the agitation,” he said.
Paswan blames state for Salboni blast
The Union Minister for Chemicals, Fertilisers and Steel, Ram Vilas Paswan criticised the West Bengal police for failing to prevent the blast on his convoy at Salboni on November 2.
“So many dignitaries were moving in the convoy but the blast could not be prevented. It was a failure of both the local and the higher administration,” said the minister.
He, however, endorsed the efforts of the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee government to handle the situation. “I believe the chief minister has taken the right steps after the blast,” he said.
Page 1 of 4
Source: Office of the Registrar General, India
West Bengal
DATA HIGHLIGHTS: THE SCHEDULED TRIBES
Census of India 2001
The total population of West Bengal at 2001 Census has been 80,176,197. Of
this 4,406,794 persons are Scheduled Tribes (STs) constituting 5.5 per cent of the total
population of the state. The state has registered 15.7 per cent decadal growth of ST
population in 1991-2001. There are total thirty eight (38) notified STs in the state.
Population: Size & Distribution
2.The Santal represents more than half of the total ST population of the state
(51.8 per cent). Oraon (14 per cent), Munda (7.8 per cent), Bhumij (7.6 per cent) and
Kora (3.2 per cent) are the other major STs having sizeable population. Along with
Santal, they constitute nearly 85 per cent of the state’s total ST population. The Lodha,
Mahali, Bhutia, Bedia, and Savar are the remaining STs, and having population of one
per cent or more (Statement-1). The rest of the STs are very small in population size.
Statement-1: Population and Proportion of Ten Major
STs, 2001 Census
SL.
No.
Name of the
Scheduled Tribe
Total
population
Proportion to
the total ST
population
1 All Scheduled
Tribes 4,406,794
100 %
2 Santal 2,280,540 51.8
3 Oraon 617,138 14.0
4 Munda 341,542 7.8
5 Bhumij 336,436 7.6
6 Kora 142,789 3.2
7 Lodha 84,966 1.9
8 Mahali 76,102 1.7
9 Bhutia 60,091 1.4
10 Bedia 55,979 1.3
11 Savar 43,599 1.0
3.The STs in the state are predominantly residing in the rural areas (93.9 per
cent). Among Lodha, Savar, and Bedia more than 95 per cent are residing in the rural
areas. Contrary to the overall situation among the majority of tribes, Bhutia has recorded
the highest 34 per cent urban population. The Mahali (10.2 per cent) and Kora (9.9 per
cent) are the other STs having comparatively higher concentration in urban areas.
4.ore than half of the total ST population of the state is concentrated in the four
districts namely Medinapur, Jalpaiguri, Purulia, and Barddhaman. Of the remaining
districts, Bankura, Maldah, Uttar Dinajpur, and Dakshin Dinajpur have sizable ST
population.
Page 2 of 4
Source: Office of the Registrar General, India
Sex Ratio
5.As per 2001 Census, the sex ratio of total ST population in the state is 982,
which is higher than the national average for STs (978). The state also has recorded a
higher child sex ratio (0-6 age group) of 981 as compared to the aggregated national
figure (973) for the STs.
6.The sex ratio among Bhutia (999) is the highest among the major STs. But the
child sex ratio (951) is low among them. Bedia has recorded the lowest sex ratio of 962.
The situation is just the reverse among Bedia.
Literacy & Educational Level
7.Among all STs, 43.4 per cent of the population has been returned as literate,
which is lower than the national average (47.1 per cent). The male literacy rate of 57.4
per cent and female of 29.2 per cent, show a gender disparity in literacy. Of the ten major
STs, Bhutia with 72.6 per cent overall literacy, 80.2 per cent male and 65.2 per cent
female literacy respectively, is well ahead of others. Savar are at the other extreme
having 26.3 per cent overall literacy and 16 per cent female literacy rate (Statement-2).
Statement-2: Literacy Rate among Ten Major STs
Literacy Rate (above 7+ years) SL.
No
Name of the Scheduled
Tribe Total Male Female
1 All Scheduled Tribes 43.4 57.4 29.2
2 Santal 42.2 57.3 27.0
3 Oraon 43.4 55.4 31.0
4 Munda 41.0 54.0 27.7
5 Bhumij 45.6 61.6 29.1
6 Kora 43.4 58.4 28.2
7 Lodha 34.8 46.8 22.5
8 Mahali 41.1 55.6 26.3
9 Bhutia 72.6 80.2 65.2
10 Bedia 48.4 61.7 34.6
11 Savar 26.3 36.4 16.0
8.Total of 51.7 per cent of the STs in the age group 5-14 years have been
attending any educational institutions. Of the ten major STs, Bhutia has recorded the
highest 77 per cent and Savar the lowest 35.5 per cent of their respective population
attending educational institutions.
9.In West Bengal, merely 8.4 per cent of total literates among STs are having
educational level above matriculation. The Bhutia with 26.1 per cent are well ahead
among the major STs in this regard.
Page 3 of 4
Source: Office of the Registrar General, India
Work Participation Rate (WPR)
10.In 2001 Census, 48.8 per cent of the ST population has been recorded as
workers, which is close to the aggregated national average for STs (49.1 per cent). Of the
total workers 65.7 per cent has been returned as main workers and 34.3 per cent as
marginal workers. WPR at 43.7 per cent among females is slightly lower than males (53.8
per cent). Gender disparity, however, is paramount in the category of main workers; 78.3
per cent males and 49.9 per cent females have been returned as main workers. The
percentage of female marginal workers is more than twice than that of male (Statement-
3).
Statement-3: Distribution of Total, Main & Marginal Workers among STs
T/M/F Total Workers
( Percentage to
Total Population)
Main Workers
( percentage to
Total Workers)
Marginal
Workers
( Percentage
to Total
Workers)
Total 2,149,255
(48.8%)
1,412,133
(65.7%)
737,122
(34.3%)
Male 1,195,480
(53.8%)
936,302
(78.3%)
259,178
(21.7%)
Female 953,775
(43.7%)
475,831
(49.9%)
477,944
(50.1%)
11.Among the major STs, Savar has recorded the highest WPR at 53.4 per cent,
while it is lowest among Bhutia (36.3 per cent).
Category of Workers
12.Industrial category wise, of the total ST main workers, 23.7 per cent have been
recorded as cultivators and 45.1 per cent as agricultural laborers.
13.The Mahali are ordinarily involved in non-agricultural activities with only 5.3 per
cent of their main workers in cultivation and 19.6 per cent as agricultural labourers.
Marital Status
14.The distribution of ST population by marital status shows that 50.6 per cent is
never married, 43.1 per cent currently married, 5.4 per cent widowed, and 0.8 per cent
divorced /separated.
15.The Santal has recorded the highest one per cent of their total population as
divorced/ separated, while it is the lowest among Oraon (0.5 per cent), (Statement-4).
Page 4 of 4
Source: Office of the Registrar General, India
Statement-4: Percentage of ST Population by Marital Status
SL.
No
Name of the
Scheduled Tribe
Never
married
Currently
married
Widowed Divorced/
Separated
1 All Scheduled
Tribes 50.6 43.1 5.4 0.8
2 Santal 49.9 43.4 5.7 1.0
3 Oraon 54.3 40.4 4.8 0.5
4 Munda 50.9 43.1 5.2 0.7
5 Bhumij 49.3 43.9 6.0 0.7
6 Kora 49.9 43.6 5.8 0.8
7 Lodha 50.3 43.8 5.2 0.7
8 Mahali 48.2 45.7 5.2 0.9
9 Bhutia 53.6 40.9 4.7 0.8
10 Bedia 49.3 45.4 4.6 0.6
11 Savar 48.0 46.4 4.9 0.8
16.For all STs, 2.6 per cent of the female population below 18 years – the
minimum legal age for marriage – is ever married. Of the ten major STs, Savar has
recorded the highest 3.5 per cent of their females as ever married, which is well above
the state average for STs. On the other hand among Oraon and Bhutia only 2 per cent of
females are ever married below the stipulated age.
17.The ever married males below 21 years – the stipulated age for their marriage
– constitute 2.1 per cent of their population. Of the ten major STs, Mahali have recorded
the highest 2.9 per cent ever married males, while it is the lowest among Bhumij (1.7 per
cent).
Religion
18.Of the total of 4,406,794 ST population 74.6 per cent are Hindus, followed by
6.1 per cent Christians, 1.8 per cent Buddhists, and merely 0.4 per cent Muslims.
--------------------------------------
The Jharkhand Tribal Movement
The 19th century rebellions have been attributed to the twin consequences of illegal deprivation of tribal lands and the reduction of the tribals to a state of poverty and indebtedness.
The first ever revolt against the landlords and the British government was led by Tilka Manjhi, a valiant Santhal leader in Santal tribal belt in 1771. He wanted to liberate his people from the clutches of the unscrupulous landlords and restore the lands of their ancestors. The British government sent its troops and crushed the uprisings of Tilka Manjhi.
Soon after in 1779, the Bhumij tribes rose in arms against the British rule in Manbhum, now in West Bengal. The Bhumij were always conspicuous as a turbulent people. Whenever the authorities made any attempt to settle the jungle Mahals, the Bhumij rose in open revolt. This was followed by the Chero tribes unrest in Palamau. They revolted against the British Rule in 1800 AD. Hardly seven years later in 1807, the Oraons in Barway murdered their big landlord of Srinagar west of Gumla. Soon the uprisings spread around Gumla. The tribal uprisings spread eastward to neighbouring Tamar areas of the Munda tribes.
THE TAMAR REVOLT
The landlords were given extraordinary powers and the authority to evict the tenants, dispose of and sell their property, and even seize their persons without recourse to the court of law. The tenants had no documentary evidence of their rights.
Signs of tribal unrest became evident. In 1789, there was an insurrection in Tamar, which was put down by the military, but disturbances followed again in 1794 and 95. Police outstations were now introduced who joined hands with the powerful landlords to further worsen the state of the Tribals. Further insurrections followed in 1811, 1817 and 1820. The Hos in Singhbhum were growing restless and came out in open revolt in 1820 and fought against the landlords and the British troops for two years. This is called the Larka Kol Risings 1820-1821.
The Kol Insurrection was the biggest uprising against the British empire (Dec1831 to Jan 1832) which united the Oraons, Hos, and Mundas in a frenzied but short-lived outburst. They had decided that not a single foreigner should be left alive in their land. In every village, the Suds(Hindus) and the dikus were murdered, plundered and their houses were burnt down. By the end of January, the rebels were in control of the Chotanagpur as the British were not expecting such an upheaval. It was not until March that the rebellion could be suppressed.
THE SANTHAL REBELLION: 1855-57
The Santhals occupy the third place among the major tribes of India. Santhal Paraganas form the largest political unit if this tribe.
The Santhal rebellion was one of the more pronounced instances of tribal resistance to the growing deterioration in their conditions. 4 factors were primarily seen as instrumental in its eruption:
1. Exploitation by moneylenders
2. The misery caused by their wicked and immoral system of allowing personal and hereditary bondage for debt.
3. The corruption of the police in aiding the moneylenders.
4. The impossibility for the Santhals of obtaining redress from the courts.
Rising prices, deteriorating financial conditions, bonded labour all loomed in the background while two brothers Sidhu and Kanhu kindled the revolution with their tale of divine inspiration. In it, they were instructed to kill and end all the diku rule themselves. The beginning of the movement was marked by peaceful submission of petitions and grievances. A few spontaneous murders of moneylenders and traders occurred. Soon, the tribals picked up the only weapon he possessed and knew to operate, the bow and the axe. They soon went on a rampage killing police officers, moneylenders, railway attendants and the Zamindhars. The brothers were in command of the entire operations. In a last desperate measure, the brothers led an army of 30,000 Santhals to Calcutta to petition the Governor-general.
In a fierce engagement between the British and some 4,000 Santhals on 15-7-1855, the latter ultimately lost the battle after their leaders Sidhu and Kanhu were wounded with bullets. Later, 12 Santhal villages were set on fire by Captain Sherwill. And again a cluster of 15 villages were destroyed. There was a year long hard fought battle which witnessed 10,000 – 15,000 deaths, mostly Santhals. The British had crushed them.
Owing to the mutiny of 1857 and the Santhal rebellion itself, a few temporary administrative reforms were introduced. These were quickly nullified and the tribals soon found themselves in the same old boat. Many other fractured and small rebellions took place under various leaders which did not yield any positive result like those under Bhagirat Manjhi, Dubia Gosian and the Kerwar movement and the Sardar Agitation.
THE BIRSA MUNDA MOVEMENT: 1895-1900
This was the last of the heroic tribal movements of the 19th century in the Chotanagpur plateau. The mundas had been living in the Chotanagpur plateau for more than 2000 years and are one of the most ancient settlers in this land.
The revolt essentially started as an economic one like many other tribal revolts but soon turned into a political one. They fought against the British who openly supported the exploiters namely the Zamindhars and money lenders who took advantage of the corrupt British and Indian officials. In 1856, there were in Bihar 600 Zamindhar dikus holding land ranging from a portion of a single village to even 150 villages each.
The introduction of rent for the land, a concept hitherto unknown to the tribals, infuriated them. Then there was collection of taxes for just about any reason. The British courts, unfamiliar with the tribal language had to depend upon the local interpreters to act as middle men. These people were only too pleased to help their powerful landowners. Thus, the tribals could not get justice from any direction and led them to believe that it rest upon themselves to rid the place of dikus.
The dikus, unable to comprehend the social and political organization of the tribals simply dismissed them and replaced with limbs of modern governmental machinery. Worst of all, the tribal customs, practices and superstitions were dismissed lightly. Another important reason for the revolt was of course, the concept of Beth Begari, or what is known today as Bonded labour.
General poverty led many of the Mundas to leave their ancestral homes and shift to work in the Assam tea plantations and their earnings were spent mostly on liquor.
Though at first the struggle commenced by attacking the land-lords, later it was directed against the ruling British authorities and the Christian missionaries, as the Christian missionaries over emphasis on conversion irritated the Mundas. They now helped only the tribals who had converted and oppressed the non-converts and with the aid of the authorities, perpetuated atrocities against them. This resulted first in the Sardari Larai (1890).
The hero of the revolt had been Birsa Munda, who on account of piety, virtuous life and reputation for possessing psychic powers which enabled him to have communion with God, came to be known as Birsa Bhagwan. His followers came to be known as Birsite Bhagats. He believed that the Mundas will be able to regain their lost kingdom with the annihilation of the enemies. He then wanted to establish Birsaite Raj in which he would be the King. He had, by now, a firm belief that he was a divine incarnation fit to lead his people.
The core of Birsa’s message had initially been social and religious. He called upon the Mundas to uproot superstition, abjure animal sacrifise, cease taking intoxicants. Birsa Munda continuously infused the tribals with a sense of their destiny with many of the ancient myths that lay embedded in the popular consciousness.
He advised people to not to obey the police, the magistrates and the landlords and to boycott the ‘beth begari sytem’. He spoke against unlawful land acquisition and tried to unite his people against the diabolic exploitative triad of zamindhar, foreigner and traders.
In 1895, Arson and arrow firing against the Christian missionaries and few police stations started in an epidemic scale under the leadership of the Birsa. There were secret meetings held on the hill tops where they would plan their next attacks which would be carried out sincerely by the Mundas. 3-4 revolts later, the police got a tip off on the next location and surrounded the Dombari hill. The arrows were met with the bullets, yet surprisingly the toll was not alarming. Then, the police systematically arrested the disciples of Birsa, who had by now absconded into the thick of the forests.
The Mundas were galvanized into martial fury and carried out their revolts with great courage and determination. The results were, however, the same whenever the tribals fought the mighty British: they were crushed. Birsa was captured, released and finally recaptured after his forces suffered a terrible crushing by the British army in 1900. With his death, the Birsa movement slipped into oblivion but he had succeeded in giving them a solidarity which was missing before. Again, some temporary measures were taken.
THE TANA BHAGAT MOVEMENT: 1915-1920
The next major tribal movement was the Tana Bhagat Movement organized by the Oraons from 1915 – 1920. The movement took its origins at the hands of Jatra Bhagat and Hanuman Oraon. Like all else, it was anti-Zamindhari, anti-missionary, anti-British. The main features of the movement were:
1) Self government
2) Abolition of Rajship
3) Perfect equality between man and man
4) No rent payment.
It then merged with the mainstream national movement, firmly Gandhian by then. The enemies and reasons were retained from the previous rebellions. They refused to pay rent to the non-tribal Landlords as land was a gift from God to the tribals. They then, went on to participate in the civil disobedience movement of 1930 by refusing to pay rent. This did not quite provide fruitful results, largely due to the peculiarities of their situation.
FROM ETHNICITY TO REGIONALISM:
From the 1920s, the focuses shifted from small, sporadic tribal uprisings to party politics led by an urbanized intelligentsia.
The foremost objective was to expel the ‘dikus’ from the Chotanagpur and Santhal Paraganas, to recover ancestral tribal lands that had been forcibly alienated. Allied to this primary imperatives was the demand for a larger share in the revenue generated from this territory. Finally, the tribals wanted recognition of their special historical status recognized within the Indian union by the reservation of jobs and places in the administrative structure.
In 1915 the Chotanagpur Unnati Samaj was started for the socio-economic development of the tribals. This organisation had also political objectives in mind. When the Simon Commission in 1928 came to Patna the Chotanagpur Unnati Samaj sent its delegation and placed its demand for a separate Jharkhand State for self-rule by the tribals. The Simon Commission however did not accede to the demand for a separate Jharkhand State.
The demand for Jharkhand had its genesis in the Adivasi Mahasabha. In 1939 Jaipal Singh was invited to come to Ranchi from Darjeeling to join Adivasi Mahasabha. He came and joined the Adivasee Mahasabha and was elected its President. After the independence of the country, the Adivasee Mahasabha was given the name of Jharkhand Party. Jaipal Singh remained the President of the Jharkhand Party from 1939 to 1960.
JHARKHAND FOR JHARKANDIS:
The new phase of the movement beginning with independence saw the pinnacle of the movement being reached. The Jharkhand party was born under the leadership of Jaipal singh. The tribals had been awarded the minority status in the constitution. The geographical entity of Jharkhand was sought to be broadened with the inclusion of 16 districts in Bihar, Orissa, and M.P. The Jharkhand Party grew stronger politically gradually but various Commissions examining the demands for a separate Jharkhand State rejected its demand one after another. In August 1947 the Thakkar Commission rejected it saying that it would not be to the advantage of the adivasees. In 1948 Dar Commission also examined the demand for a separate Jharkhand state but rejected it on linguistic grounds. Despite these reports of these Commissions going negative in nature, Jharkhand Party never lost sight of its ultimate target – a separate state of Jharkhand. It fought first General Election in 1952 and won 32 seats in the Bihar Assembly. In the second General Election in 1957 too Jharkhand Party won 32 seats and for two terms the party remained the leading opposition party.
Tribal politics in the 60s were molded by 2 factors: the fission of the party with congress and the introduction of agrarian issues. The conditions of the tribals did not see any marked improvement.
The party was soon split into several splinter groups each claiming to be the genuine Jharkhand party. Finally in 1973 Jharkhand Mukti Morcha was formed under the leadership of Sibu Soren. In 1986 All political parties carrying with themselves the name of Jharkhand gradually dwindled except the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha led by Sibu Soren, which was an alliance between the Mahtos and the Santhals. The demand for a separate state and repossession of alienated tribal lands were on top of its agenda apart from cultural revivalism.
CREATION OF A NEW JHARKHAND STATE
In a historic move both the houses of Parliament passed the Bihar Reorganisation Bill – 2000 during the first week of August and the President gave his assent to it a few days later. With this the stage was all set for the formal beginning of the governance of the new Jharkhand state from the 15th of November 2000. This witnessed the fulfillment of the long cherished dream of the people of Chhotanagpur and Santhalparganas for a separate state of Jharkhand. The new state comprised of 18 districts in Santalparganas and Chotanagpur.
The bloody revolts: The period of bloody revolts of the adivasees to protect their Jharkhand land took place from 1771 to 1900 AD. The first ever revolt against the landlords and the British government was led by Tilka Manjhi, a valiant Santhal leader in Santal tribal belt in 1771. He wanted to liberate his people from the clutches of the unscrupulous landlords and restore the lands of their ancestors. The British government sent its troops and crushed the uprisings of Tilka Manjhi. Soon after in 1779, the Bhumij tribes rose in arms against the British rule in Manbhum, now in West Bengal. This was followed by the Chero tribes unrest in Palamau. They revolted against the British Rule in 1800 AD. Hardly seven years later in 1807, the Oraons in Barway murdered their big landlord of Srinagar west of Gumla. Soon the uprisings spread around Gumla. The tribal uprisings spread eastward to neighbouring Tamar areas of the Munda tribes. They too rose in revolt in 1811 and 1813. The Hos in Singhbhum were growing restless and came out in open revolt in 1820 and fought against the landlords and the British troops for two years. This is called the Larka Kol Risings 1820-1821. Then came the great Kol Risings of 1832. This was the first biggest tribal revolt that greatly upset the British administration in Jharkhand. It was caused by an attempt of the Zamindars to oust the tribal peasants from their hereditary possessions. The Santhal insurrection broke out in 1855 under the leadership of two brothers Sidhu and Kanhu. They fought bitterly against the British troops but finally they too were crashed down.
Then Birsa Munda revolt broke out in 1895 and lasted till 1900. The revolt though mainly concentrated in the Munda belt of Khunti, Tamar, Sarwada and Bandgaon, pulled its supporters from Oraon belt of Lohardaga, Sisai and even Barway. It was the longest and the greatest tribal revolt in Jharkhand. It was also the last bloody tribal revolt in Jharkhand.
Moderate movements of 20th century: The 20th century Jharkhand movement may be seen as moderate movement as compared to the bloody revolts of the 19th century. Having the Chhotanagpur Tenancy Act 1908 to protect their lands, the tribal leaders now turned to socio-economic development of the people. In 1914 Jatra Oraon started what is called the Tana Movement. Later this movement joined the Satyagrah Movement of Mahatma Gandhi in 1920 and stopped giving land tax to the Government. In 1915 the Chotanagpur Unnati Samaj was started for the socio-economic development of the tribals. This organisation had also political objectives in mind. When the Simon Commission in 1928 came to Patna the Chotanagpur Unnati Samaj sent its delegation and placed its demand for a separate Jharkhand State for self-rule by the tribals. The Simon Commission however did not accede to the demand for a separate Jharkhand State. Thereafter Theble Oraon organised Kishan Sabha in 1931. In 1935 the Chotanagpur Unnati Samaj and the Kishan Sabha were merged with a view to acquire political power subsequently.
(c) Jharkhand Party: Political Movement: In 1939 Jaipal Singh was invited to come to Ranchi from Darjeeling to join Adivasi Mahasabha. He came and joined the Adivasee Mahasabha and was elected its President. After the independence of the country, the Adivasee Mahasabha was given the name of Jharkhand Party. Jaipal Singh remained the President of the Jharkhand Party from 1939 to 1960.
The Jharkhand Party grew stronger politically gradually but various Commissions examining the demands for a separate Jharkhand State rejected its demand one after another. In August 1947 the Thakkar Commission rejected it saying that it would not be to the advantage of the adivasees. In 1948 Dar Commission also examined the demand for a separate Jharkhand state but rejected it on linguistic grounds. Despite these reports of these Commissions going negative in nature, Jharkhand Party never lost sight of its ultimate target – a separate state of Jharkhand. It fought first General Election in 1952 and won 32 seats in the Bihar Assembly. In the second General Election in 1957 too Jharkhand Party won 32 seats and for two terms the party remained the leading opposition party. In 1955 the Report of the State Reorganisation Commission came out. Here too the demand for a separate Jharkhand state was rejected. In the third general election in 1962 the party could win only 23 seats in the Bihar Assembly. Personal interests of the Jharkhand leaders started playing upper hands. The party merged with the Congress Party in 1963.
In the 4th General Election held in 1967 the party had a very poor show. It could win only 8 seats. The party was soon split into several splinter groups each claiming to be the genuine Jharkhand party. These were All India Jharkhand Party of Bagun Sumroi, Jharkhand Party of N.E. Horo, Hul Jharkhand Party of Justin Richard which further got fragmented and was called Bihar Progressive Hul Jharkhand Party led by Sibu Soren. Finally in 1973 Jharkhand Mukti Morcha was formed under the leadership of Sibu Soren. In 1986 All Jharkhand Students Union (AJSU) made its appearance on the political stage. In order to keep all these political parties in good humour, the Bihar Government brought out several Committees like Jharkhand Coordination Committee (JCC), a Committee on Jharkhand matters, Jharkhand Peoples Party (JPP) led by Dr. Ram Dayal Munda. All political parties carrying with themselves the name of Jharkhand gradually dwindled except the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha led by Sibu Soren.
Creation of a new Jharkhand State
KALYAN CHAUDHURI
IN a bid to expand its area of influence, the ultra-Left People's War (P.W.) has for some time been making concerted moves in the States adjoining Andhra Pradesh. In Orissa it made its first strike, that too with extreme ferocity, in Malkangiri district in the southern part of the State in early August. In late-night attacks on the Kalimela and Mottu police stations, P.W. cadre killed five police personnel, including two sub-inspectors, and injured 22 others. Two P.W. members were also killed.
The Kalimela police station was virtually destroyed in the exchange of fire, and P.W. activists looted its stock of arms and ammunition. Orissa Home Secretary Tarun Kanti Mishra told Frontline that about 200 armed cadre of the outlawed P.W. were divided in two groups. About 150 of them attacked the Kalimela police station, while the remaining 50 took part in the Mottu attack. Before striking, they cut off the telephone lines and blocked the roads leading to the two police stations. The encounter at Mottu lasted 10 hours. Officers of the third battalion of the Orissa State Armed Police (OSAP) deployed at Mottu, which borders both Andhra Pradesh and Chattisgarh, managed to send messages to their counterparts at Khammam in Andhra Pradesh, who rushed to their help.
The P.W. members who attacked the Kalimela police station were suspected to have crossed over to Orissa from Chattisgarh. Informed sources in the police said that the attacks were planned. Intelligence failure and support from the tribal people of the areas are considered to be the main reasons for the success of the P.W. operations.
The People's War Group (PWG) of Andhra Pradesh, which took the name People's War after its recent merger with the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Party Unity, is trying to establish itself along the border districts of Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and Chattisgarh. According to informed sources, it has already set up bases in five districts of Orissa - Malkangiri, Nabarangapur, Koraput, Gajapati and Rayagada - which border Andhra Pradesh. Moreover, the P.W. has declared the forested areas of southern and western Orissa 'liberated' zones.
Soumitra Dastidar and Kingshuk Roy, two film-makers who stayed with P.W. members for over a month in order to make a documentary on their activities in the areas close to the Chattisgarh-Orissa border, told Frontline: "Everybody in that region, including policemen and politicians, are aware of the increasing power of the P.W. The militants enjoy the support of the tribal people in the region, who pay tax to the underground organisation." They claimed that the P.W. had raised an 'army' and ran a parallel administration. The P.W. cadre include young tribal women, who are trained in not only wielding guns but in maintaining and running community kitchens and mobile medical units.
Alarmed by the burst of P.W. activities, the Orissa government is considering outlawing the outfit in the State. Chief Minister Navin Patnaik is reported to have asked the State police to study the activities of naxalite groups in the southern districts of Malkangiri, Gajapati and Rayagada, and in the northern districts of Mayurbhanj and Keonjhar. Informed sources said that the P.W. and other naxalite groups operating in Bihar and West Bengal were now attempting to form a corridor of stronghold running through Chattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Bihar and West Bengal to south Nepal, where the P.W., the Maoist Communist Centre (MCC) and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) hold sway.
The Orissa government has asked the Centre to accord it special category status. State Chief Secretary D.P. Bagchi met officials of the Ministry of Home Affairs in Delhi and submitted an action plan costing Rs.305 crores to combat the naxalite menace and highlighted the nature and extent of the extremist problem. Director-General of Police N.C. Phadi said that the State followed the approaches of Andhra Pradesh and Chattisgarh in fighting Left extremism.
Meanwhile, the OSAP has withdrawn its units from the naxalite-dominated villages and towns of Malkangiri district. The OSAP units will now be stationed only in the district headquarters town of Malkangiri. The police personnel deployed in the area are ill-equipped, and there is no infrastructure to ensure their protection. The withdrawal of the OSAP started soon after the P.W. militants distributed leaflets threatening more attacks on the police.
Of late, leaders of the major naxalite groups seem to have realised the need to develop close ties among themselves on the basis of a common ideology. They are trying to reconcile the warring naxalite factions and bring about a working relationship among the various groups in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Orissa, Jharkhand and West Bengal.
COURTESY: ALTERNATIVE MEDIA |
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The fact that a secret conclave was held on August 15 in Siliguri in West Bengal - various naxalite factions including the MCC of Bihar and the CPN (Maoist) attended it - indicates that the process has already started. The conclave, convened at the initiative of the MCC, felt that such meetings were essential to sort out the differences among the "revolutionary forces". It also re-emphasised the old tenets of the MCC's strategy - to take up the path carved out by the late naxalite leader Charu Majumdar, carry on with the peasant revolution, abolish class hierarchies and expand the 'liberated zones'.
Led by Charu Majumdar, the naxalite movement originated in West Bengal in the late 1960s under the banner of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist). The movement lost its momentum and faced a series of splits after the death of Majumdar in police custody in 1972. Currently there are at least 40 naxalite groups in the country. Among these, the P.W. (its main constituent, the PWG, was formed in 1975 by Kondapalli Seetharamaih) and the MCC still adhere to the concept of annihilation of class enemies. In recent years, the P.W. has managed to win the support of some people in the Midnapore district of West Bengal, bordering Jharkhand.
Outlawed in mid-1987 following the massacre of 42 Rajputs in Dalelchak and Baghaura villages of Aurangabad district in Bihar, the MCC has by now established its supremacy over other revolutionary groups operating in central and south Bihar. By the early 1990s it had undermined the administration of Bihar's southern district of Chhatra, Gumla, Palamau, Lohardaga and parts of Ranchi and Hazaribagh, all of which are now part of Jharkhand. At several places in these areas, the MCC runs a parallel administration - it collects taxes from officials and contractors, holds jana adalat (people.'s court) sittings to resolve disputes, both civil and criminal, and metes out justice in its own way
For several years, various naxalite groups in Bihar have been trying to forge a united front. There have also been meetings and informal agreements, some of them drawn up to prevent infighting within the armed squads. Occasionally, various groups carved out their own areas and promised to confine their activities to these territories. However, such agreements were seldom adhered to. Out of the three major naxalite groups that are active in Bihar, the CPI(M-L) Liberation decided to abandon underground activities and participate in the parliamentary process. The CPI(ML) Party Unity merged with the PWG of Andhra Pradesh. The MCC is now the most radical and militant in character.
The MCC was founded in the early 1970s in Bahragora (now in Jharkhand) close to Midnapore district. Although many naxalites in West Bengal were killed in police action during the 1970s, some of the leaders fled to Gaya and Aurangabad districts of Bihar and built their bases. What makes the MCC popular with the poor in the remote areas of Bihar and now in Jharkhand is the total collapse of the social and administrative systems at the local level. Earlier, the MCC had a good rapport with the PWG. However, the relationship soured after the latter's merger with the CPI(ML) Party Unity. The CPI(ML) Party Unity, which followed a policy of radical insurrection like the MCC, made a conscious bid to outplay the MCC at its own game. Actually, the internecine conflict between the naxalite groups has more to do with quarrels over turf than with ideological differences and political considerations.
However, despite all the attempts being made by the leaders to create a united front, on August 22, in Datmai village in Bihar's Masaurhi district, P.W. cadre killed six MCC activists, all of them Dalits. The reason for the attack was once again a dispute over territorial control. The Dalits of the village are known to be supporters of the MCC, their erstwhile leader being Gyanandan Yadav, who has since left the MCC to join forces with the P.W.
http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl1818/18180400.htm
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