Maoists and the kidnappings

Indian Maoists are basically people, whose teenage Robin Hood fantasy has gone out of control. The wish to be like Indian version of hot looking Che Guevara and Fidel Castro has been taken to an extreme level by a few people. Unfortunately,  Mao, whose name they use rather proudly was not particularly attractive looking, and their activities too have gone in the path of becoming uglier and more and more unattractive in past few years, and especially past few months with all those civilian kidnappings.

If one reads the history of their so called movement, and wants to put it in a crisp and rather blunt manner, it reads like this- 'a bunch of middle class/upper middle class youth who wanted to destroy the intellectual and economic hegemony of their own class over the poor. They went to the poorest and the most ignored by the state and told them in the most articulate language that the armed struggle against the government was the only answer to all their problems. It was more like asking them to choose between a ballot paper and a gun. A good number of them did choose the gun because that means immediate power and as a result we have this huge mess called Indian Maoists which is nothing but the brain child of Indian Middle Class, against which it is supposed to work'

Any movement is about how well the movement leaders project themselves to the mass of people they want to utilise to meet their goals. The target group in case of Maoists were poor, ignored and in most cases exploited tribals of India. Imagine the way a tribal would look at the young, soft spoken, educated, city dweller who sits besides him and listens to all his problems with full attention as opposed to the government and forest officials who have nothing but contempt for him. Maoists gave their target group the first thing they wanted the most- attention and respect. In return they got the attention and respect of their target group. Now it was time for Maoists to speak and tribals to listen. They spoke to them about their exploited situation and how they own the forest and the natural resources, and only if they assert their right forcefully they will get it. What they have to do is to get rid those government people from their area and then they become the de facto rulers of their area.

Possibility of use of force against someone is a most alluring thing for human beings. Anyone can fall for it. The tribals did. They did start clearing the area of any government system and it worked. The city dwelling Maoists were proved right and the 'movement' spread.

What was government doing while all this was happening - Government was either sleeping or it was busy raking in or helping business people to rake in money from the forest and land resources. Worst of all, it intensified it's harassment of tribals.

It is important to understand that the Maoists are nothing but another race of power hungry politicians whose main aim is to reach South Block. The crucial difference is that they can kill their opposition much faster and without much immediate consequence than a regular politician can. I prefer the regular politicians to Maoists because I still have a chance to remove the former with the power of my vote and I see a much more stronger chance of improvement in him/her than a soldier like, gun wielding Maoist. So the regular Janata should rethink again if at all they have any sympathy for these Robin Hoods.

The government should WAKE UP! You cannot exploit the natural resources on which people have been sitting for generations by simply shooing them away. They have right to opinion as to what happens to their land and the forest and they should be involved in it. It is time to seriously go back to the cliched 'public participation'. A reformed land acquisition process and sharing of profits with people for sustainable development is something we are already running late on. A serious rethinking of the forest laws and reforming the colonial monster called 'Forest Department' which played an important role in alienating the people from the forest and from the state is necessary.

One thing is sure- the Maoists are on their way out. The movement would die soon but if we don't carry out the reform process mentioned above it would crop up in a different form. It is time to act fast.