‘The Naxal problem is not just a security issue’

October 7, 2008

Nandini Sundar, professor of sociology, Delhi School of Economics, and historian and writer Ramchandra Guha have filed a petition to stop the Chhattisgarh government from supporting and encouraging the Salwa Judum, a people’s movement to counter the Naxalites.The state government has denied that the Salwa Judum was a state-sponsored movement. The Supreme Court has disapproved arming the Salwa Judum, and the case continues.

According to a report by Human Rights Watch, caught in a deadly tug-of-war between an armed Maoist movement on one side, and the government security forces plus a vigilante group called Salwa Judum on the other, civilians have suffered a host of human rights abuses, including killings, torture, and forced displacement. The violence has destroyed hundreds of villages and uprooted tens of thousands of people from their homes.

The armed movement by Maoist groups spans four decades and 13 states across India. They purport to defend the rights of the poor, especially the landless, Dalits and tribal communities.

Sundar’s book Subalterns and Sovereigns: An Anthropological History of Bastar traces the expansion of the colonial and the post-colonial state in Bastar, central India, between 1854 and 2006. The author’s account of the region is at once the outcome of an intellectual as well as personal encounters with the region and its politics.

Sundar spoke to Rujuta Paradkar about the policy and politics adopted by the government of Chhattisgarh, the Salwa Judum and “the way in which people fall through the cracks of the democratic process”.

source:- rediff

 

 

Letter from Earth!!

To,

Whom so ever concerned.   

From, 

Earth,

D/o World,

Universe.

Respected sir/madam,

In my dairy pages i have seen lots and lots of kings who ruined my peace for their personal pride. I have also seen many people who followed violent route in the name of social justice, whether they achieved justice through it?i am not sure. With these i have seen lots and lots of natural disasters.

But inspite of my experience with violent incidences i am very much disturbed these days. I was very happy when people became more and more educated, they even thought about my origin , they questioned me and challenged me. I had the feeling that violence will totally end because of these intelligent people. But it has become exactly opposite!as people are becoming more and more educated(?) they are losing their patience, communal harmony is missing, slightest reasons that should have taken humorously are turning out into communal clashes that is costing many of my children.
Only politicians who are totally communal speak about secularism! Previously atleast people were uneducated , they would listen to wise words and corrected their mistakes. But now people think they are educated ,which they are not in reality,and they have become deaf.

I am afraid about my future, i am fed up of these blood stains on me which i fear i cant clean by myself. So through this letter i kindly request any one on or outside the earth to clean me if possible or atleast avoid these type of incidences in future god oblige.

Thanking you,

yours faithfully,

EARTH

Independence for Kosovo or further entrenched empire?

recieved via mail

Sunday February 17th was declared the day of Independence for Kosovo. Sections of the population, waving U.S. imperialist flags displaying what could be seen to the naive a wonderful day when an ‘oppressed people’ succeeded in a heroic ‘liberation struggle’. A small piece of land, rugged, mountainous, strategic.. this is the land of Kosovo.

 

Since the 1999 NATO blitzkrieg and invasion of what is left of the federation of Yugoslavia, Kosovo has become a territory under foreign western imperialist military rule. Kosovo remains under UN ‘administration’ so to speak, administering the NATO occupation forces for the interests of imperialism. Secession from Serbia, far from practising a new liberated state, in effect would reinforce the control of the NATO-UN occupation forces.

 

The 1999 NATO blitzkrieg and invasion of the remnants of Yugoslavia and Serbia followed a patern of events. The federation of Yugoslavia was born on the ashes of Hitlerite / Mussolini Fascism after a persistant resistance and a new era was proposed by the people of the region for a federation and to once again live in peace. At the fall of the USSR, the western imperialists (US, Britain, Germany, France and Italy at the helm), each armed with logistics, weapons and intelligence started to carve out for themselves spheres of influence by using reactionary secessionist movements as part of a campaign to destabilise Yugoslavia. Once again, people who lived side by side for generations in peace where thrown into reactionary war and turmoil!

 

Imperialism, a force for progressive change?

 

With the region once again colonised and the ‘new states’ in economic despair, the puppets on the Balkans began a series of crime, from depopulating the countries of its youth to slave in the west for half the salaries of the indigenous workers and permitting a network of military bases.

 

Kosovo is occupied by one America’s largest military bases, Camp Bondsteel. Bondsteel was built on contract to the Pentagon by Halliburton. Camp Bondsteel is considered to be “the largest and most expensive army base since Vietnam.” with more than 6000 US troops. There are 25 kilometres of roads and over 300 buildings at Camp Bondsteel, surrounded by 14 kilometres of earth and concrete barriers, 84 kilometres of concertina wire and 11 watch towers. It is so big that it has downtown, midtown and uptown districts, retail outlets, 24-hour sports halls, a chapel, library and the best-equipped hospital anywhere in Europe. There are suggestions that it could replace the US airforce base at Aviano in Italy.

 

 

Why Kosovo for occupation and Camp Bondsteel?

 

Kosovo is an historic region of Serbia, the latter of which is a key Russian ally in the heart of the Balkans. With Serbia directly occupied by British and US imperialism and the 17th February 2008 rubber stamping of this accumulation of events, the US imperialists are sending a direct warning to Russia that NATO is serious of contention and that no power will ever replace the US as a super power ever again. One thing is for sure, western imperialism and its armed force NATO is marching eastwards to the border against a Russia which has generally recovered from its political and economic crises.

As this news reaches us of ‘Independence’ for Kosovo, we wait to see the response of Russia.

 

Resistance from below

 

By the time the news spread of US and western imperialist rubber stamp of a consolidated empire in the Balkans, resistance in the region poured onto the streets with attacks on the US embassy in Belgrade. Across the region protests led by anti imperialist and other left forces took to the streets, consciously stating opposition to NATO and western imperialist occupation. Whilst masses took to the streets and opposition statements flooded the Internet, the biased British and western media filled the airwaves with images of reactionary, groomed and nurtured pro imperialist ‘protesters’ waving US flags. These forces stand in stark contrast to the Palestinian and other masses who fight the principle enemy of imperialism on a daily basis and through bitter struggle realise that imperialism can never play a progressive role.

 

We stand with the masses of the region including the anti imperialist repressed sections within Kosovo and support their fight against the principle enemy of imperialism. We look forward to the day when a new society can flourish on the ashes of imperialism and reaction!