MLIN [Sept.-Oct., 2007]: Nuclear Deal, Hyderabad Blasts, Bihar Floods, Women’s Tribunal and More (text)

["CPI \(ML\) Intl Liaison Office" <cpiml_elo@xxxxxxxxx>]

ML International Newsletter
September-October 2007

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An update on news and ideas from the revolutionary
left in India. 
Produced by: Communist Party of India
(Marxist-Leninist) Liberation international team 
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Website: www.cpiml.org
Email: cpimllib@xxxxxxxxx and cpiml_elo@xxxxxxxxx

Table of Contents

1)      Stop the Anti-India Nuclear Deal!
2)      CPI (ML)?s September Campaign Against the Nuclear
Deal
3)      CPI (ML) Condemns Hyderabad Blasts
4)      Land Struggle in Andhra Pradesh
5)      Battling Floods and the Nitish Government?s
Callousness
6)      Manusmriti Prevails in Mayawati?s Sarvajan Raj
7)      Women?s Tribunal Puts the UPA Government in the
Dock
8)      Tata?s ?Titanic? Bulldozer in Southern Tamil Nadu

US-India Nuclear Deal

Stop the Anti-India Nuclear Deal!

- Editorial, ML Update, 28 August ? 3 September 2007.

Combat Anti-Communist Hysteria!
Intensify the Indian People?s Struggle against US
Imperialism!
 
Unable to answer the specific objections to the
Indo-US nuclear deal voiced primarily by the Left, the
Indian ruling classes and the corporate media are
trying to tackle the debate by whipping up a veritable
anti-communist hysteria. Even as George Bush is
described as India?s best friend, and the nuclear deal
with the US as the greatest victory till date for
Indian diplomacy and the ultimate recognition for
India?s ?emerging power? status, communists are once
again being dubbed pro-China and pro-Pakistan! The
desperation of the ruling classes is not difficult to
understand ? they have been caught red-handed
mortgaging the country?s strategic autonomy.
 
Manmohan Singh would like us to accept him as the
greatest defender of India?s independence and believe
that the deal is a wonderful bargain which will spawn
enormous economic benefits for the country without in
any way compromising his government?s ?independent
foreign policy?. In the year of Bhagat Singh?s birth
centenary we do not need to learn about ?independence?
from Manmohan Singh. A man who still cannot open his
mouth in England without expressing his gratitude to
his former colonial masters and who wants us to accept
George Bush as India?s best friend has no business
lecturing us about independence. And as Prime Minister
of India, he cannot be allowed to mortgage the
country?s strategic autonomy to his ?best friend?! 

We are being told that the new 123 Agreement with the
US will go a long way in meeting India?s growing
energy demand by significantly increasing the quantum
of nuclear energy generation. But should we not take a
close look before taking this ?leap?, especially when
we have our own bitter experience of a previous 123
Agreement on nuclear cooperation with the US?
 
Yes, in 1963 in the wake of the border war with China,
?non-aligned? India was seduced and arm-twisted by the
US to sign a nuclear cooperation agreement. The terms
of the 1963 treaty look far more benign today compared
to the stringent conditions that are written into the
present agreement. There was no question of India
granting eternal supervision rights on all her
civilian nuclear facilities. Nor was there any
India-specific law like the Hyde Act to govern the
operation of that agreement. Yet following India?s
1971 friendship pact with the Soviet Union and the
1974 nuclear test, the US terminated fuel supplies for
the Tarapur plant and unilaterally suspended the
operation of the treaty which eventually lapsed in
1993.
 
We can forget and ignore this experience only at our
own peril. Today governed by the Hyde Act (true, the
123 Agreement does not mention the Hyde Act but it
does not hide the fact that as far as the US is
concerned domestic US laws will prevail and that
includes the Hyde Act in particular), the terms of the
123 treaty are loaded unmistakably heavily in favour
of the US and the geo-political situation of the world
too are likely to permit it  to further manipulate the
operation of the already unequal treaty and blackmail
India?s weak rulers to wrest high economic and
political prices. In the narrow context of energy
security and sufficiency, India will thus fall prey to
US-controlled energy-dependency relying increasingly
on imported nuclear reactors and imported nuclear
fuel. And in the wider and deeper context of the
future of India and her international role, the
country will become increasingly vulnerable to
imperialist manipulation and intervention on virtually
every question of strategic significance.
 
Those who claim that the US has gone out of its way to
accommodate Indian concerns in the current deal are
either naive or are telling a plain lie. The
?accommodation? of Indian interests and concerns is
limited to certain linguistic ex-pressions, like the
catchword ?consultation?, an empty euphemism for
American unilateralism.
 
We can never be a party to such deceptive wordplay
when it comes to defending the vital interests of the
people and the country in the face of mounting
imperialist offensive. The opposition of the patriotic
Indian people and all revolutionary communists and
democrats to the deal and to India?s growing strategic
subservience to US imperialism is firm, consistent and
total. The Communist Party of India ? Marxist [CPI
(M)]?s talk of pressing only the ?pause? button till
its concerns are addressed (the passage of the deal so
far and the rapid development of the underlying
context of India?s strategic partnership with the US
is enough indication as to how such concerns have been
addressed and accommodated by the United Progressive
Alliance [UPA]) smacks, on the contrary, of its
characteristic centrist vacillation and parliamentary
opportunism which has historically prevented the party
from offering any decisive opposition at every major
juncture.
 
The cumulative impact of the ideological illusion sown
all these years by the CPI (M) and the CPI regarding
the ?independent? nature of the Indian big bourgeoisie
and political concessions granted to the oldest and
biggest party of the Indian ruling classes at various
junctures, can now be seen and felt so clearly. We
have all along been accused by these two parties of
underestimating the so-called anti-imperialist
potential of the Indian big bourgeoisie as we still
characterise India as a semi-colonial society and the
Indian big bourgeoisie as comprador, collaborationist
or dependent. Our insistence on giving primacy to
anti-feudal, anti-imperialist struggles and our
consistent emphasis on communist ideological
independence and the independent political assertion
of the working people have all along been ridiculed by
them as a line of adventurism and isolationism. The
principled ideological-political identity of the
communist movement has been allowed to get blurred and
compromised all too often by them in the name of
secular unity with bourgeois parties. The result is
now evident for all of us ? when the CPI(M) and CPI
leadership finally draw the line at the nuclear deal,
they find themselves ridiculed and disowned by the
very sections of the liberal opinion that have all
along applauded their pragmatism!
 
The corporate media is an important mechanism through
which the ruling classes manufacture and impose
(articulate and sell, if you will) their ideas ? the
ruling ideas, as the Communist Manifesto put it. We
should not therefore be surprised to see the terms of
the dominant discourse on the deal in the ?mainstream
media? in India ? they only reflect the basic class
nature of our society and polity. But recent times
have often shown how the discourse of the ruling
classes has been challenged and rejected by the people
through their own struggles. We know what happened to
the ?India Shining? campaign of the Bhartiya Janata
Party (BJP) or how the people of this country are
responding to the SEZ Act passed unanimously by
Parliament. Let the BJP shed its pseudo-nationalist
pretension and expose along with the Congress its
shared subservience to imperialism. Genuine
communists, democrats and patriots must close ranks
and intensify the battle against imperialism and its
desi collaborators in the face of all odds. The people
of India will never forgive the imperialist
collaborators who are mortgaging the country to obtain
certificates of good conduct from American Presidents.

US-India Nuclear Deal

CPI (ML)?s September Campaign Against the Nuclear Deal

- CPI (ML) Statement.

No to Nuke deal, No to Strategic Partnership with
America                         
 
For National Sovereignty and Dignity,       
Against Manmohan?s Surrender to America!

Join CPI(ML)?s September Campaign from Kanya Kumari to
Kolkata,
Massive Protest Rallies against Joint Naval Exercise,
on September 4
 
Patriotic Student-Youth and Cultural Activists March
to Delhi on September 28
 
On September 4, when Manmohan government starts Joint
Naval Exercise with America, in the same Bay of Bengal
towards which once America?s dreaded 7th Fleet had
moved to subjugate India in 1971, it will truly be the
beginning of a new era, saying final farewell to our
long cherished values of the freedom struggle
espousing sovereignty and independent path of national
development. India will not remain the same after the
conclusion of Indo-US Nuclear Deal and the
consummation of the Strategic Partnership with
America, the enemy number one of the world people.
 
This unequal treaty will mean joining American
bandwagon, sending Indian troops when demanded, to
fight America?s war against 'terror', an euphemism for
Americans? naked pursuit of imperialist loot and
domination while forcing India not to forge any ties
beneficial for its interest but disliked by US for
whatever reason. India will no more remain the proud
leader and friend in need in the eyes of third world
countries, but an ally and junior partner of the
butchers of Vietnam and Iraq, the Americans.
 
Internally it can only mean mortgaging India to the
Americans, endangering our national security by
deepening American penetration into our internal
national life, wasting our scarce resources for the
benefit of American business specially their war
industry, the ever growing neo-liberal offensive
resulting in the islands of billionaires amidst the
ever expanding ocean of pauperization, famines,
starvation deaths and suicides. With American forces
standing on our shores in their civilizing mission,
Indo-US strategic partnership can only mean constant
threat for our democracy and peoples movements.
Joining American bandwagon in its 'crusade' against
'terror', a quid pro quo for barbaric American
aggression in the middle- east, is obviously
facilitating dangerous import of international
terrorism to Indian soil. With communal fascist forces
waiting in the wings, it is fraught with serious
consequences for democracy and secularism in our
country. 
 
Thus, tying the fate of this great nation with US, the
rulers are endangering our sovereignty, democracy,
secularism and the battle for social equality. They
are pushing our motherland on this disastrous path of
subservience and misery in their selfish sectarian
vested interests, however the patriotic people of
Indian will not accept it as their fate accompli. They
will not let go in vain the battle of millions of our
martyrs who sacrificed their life for a sovereign,
peoples? democratic India.
 
CPI (ML) invites all patriots who love India, to join
hands in this great war against US imperialism and its
domestic collaborators. CPI (ML) has organized a month
long campaign in September starting with protest
demonstrations and rallies in all major coastal cities
along the Bay of Bengal, the sight of the Joint Naval
exercise. The first phase of the campaign will come to
an end on September 28, the concluding day of the
Birth Centenary of Shaheed-E- Azam Bhagat Singh, when
thousands of student-youth and cultural activists will
converge to Delhi to express their resolve for an
uncompromising and unrelenting battle against US
imperialism and the treacherous Manmohan regime.

Press Statement

CPI (ML) Condemns Hyderabad Blasts

- CPI (ML) Statement. 

CPI (ML) strongly condemns Hyderabad serial blasts and
expresses deep sorrow and grief over the killing of so
many innocent people in the blast. Demanding stern
action against all those responsible for this
dastardly act, Com. Dipankar Bhattacharya, General
Secretary CPI (ML), appealed to the people to maintain
unity at all costs and defeat the nefarious designs of
those who want to disrupt peace and communal harmony.
He said that killing of so many innocent people in
Mecca Mosque blast only 3 months back and now the
serial blasts are ample proof that Raj Shekhar Reddy
Govt. has failed to protect the life of the citizens
in the state, however prompt and skilled it may be in
killing the agitating peasants. He alleged that
policies of United Progressive Alliance (UPA)
government are responsible for the growth of
terrorism.

Land Struggles

Land Struggle in Andhra Pradesh

- D. P. Bakshi, Liberation, September 2007.

The firing on peasants agitating for land reform at
Mudigonda (Khammam) in Andhra Pradesh is an indication
of the scale, militancy and revolutionary potential of
the land issue in Andhra Pradesh. Successive
Governments have tried to declare the question of land
reform to be dead ? but the unfinished and betrayed
promise of land reform is a spectre which keeps
haunting those in power. Andhra Pradesh in particular
has been witness to vigorous land struggles at
different junctures. Land reform was a major electoral
plank of the Congress and land had a prominent place
in the early talks of the Y S Rajasekhar (YSR) Reddy
Government with the Maoists. Sensing that the land
question was gradually capturing the central stage of
Andhra Pradesh (AP) politics, CPI (ML) Liberation had
intensified its mobilisation on the issue, and held
conventions at Hyderabad, Rajamundry, Vijaywada, and
many other rural centres in the coastal districts on
the question of ?land and democracy?. Land struggles
at the grassroots began to intensify. 

CPI (M) had been in an alliance with the ruling
Congress, but in the panchayat polls in June-July
2006, had chosen to ally with the Telugu Desam Party
(TDP) instead, after the Congress refused to allot
zila parishad posts in Khammam and Nalgonda districts
to the CPI (M). In April 2007 CPI (M) launched their
state-wide Bhoomiporatam (land struggle) ? initially
in the big cities and towns for house sites for the
urban poor and then in the rural areas. CPI also
joined the campaign later.
 
This struggle was widespread and received an
enthusiastic response. However, it centred mostly on
house sites in urban areas and government, forest, and
assigned land in rural areas (avoiding any
confrontation with feudal forces or kulaks). When the
red flag was hoisted or huts were built on captured
land, there were clashes with police. In the course of
this movement more than 10, 000 people were arrested
and 1100 cases registered.

Against this repression, a protest campaign was
organized in mandal and district headquarters. A relay
hunger strike ensued, followed by an indefinite hunger
strike by CPI - CPI (M) leaders from 21st July onwards
in Indirapark at Hyderabad, demanding the release of
land struggle activists, withdrawal of all cases and
speedy implementation of land distribution. In support
of this hunger strike, picketing was organized
throughout the state at mandals and districts. CPI
(ML) Liberation as well as other Marxist-Leninist (ML)
forces also offered their solidarity. There were
brutal lathicharges by the police on the picketers at
many places, and the hunger strikers were threatened
with force feeding. The hunger strike site was
attacked by police and forcibly dismantled. Against
this attack, an AP bandh call for 28 July was issued
by the joint Left forces including CPI (ML) Liberation
and other ML groups.

It was during this bandh that the police indulged in
unprovoked firing on the struggling masses at
Mudigonda (Khammam), in which 7 land struggle
activists and one bystander were killed. Against this
heinous killing, all the Left forces including the ML
groups launched state-wide protests in the form of
demonstrations, effigy burning of YSR, and continuous
road blockades for 3-4 days. 

CPI (ML) Liberation demanded the resignation of Y S
Rajasekhara Reddy, the suspension of the District
Magistrate (DM) and Superintendent of Police (SP) of
Khammam district, withdrawal of all cases of activists
of land struggle, and the setting up of an autonomous
Land Reform Commission. 

The firing at Mudigonda has once again brought home
the lesson that the struggle for land, liberty and
democracy cannot be separated. In this era of reversal
of land reform, the ruling class in states like AP,
Bihar and Tamil Nadu are talking of land reform as
part of its overall political strategy to cope with
growing agrarian struggles. The challenge for
revolutionary and Left forces is to turn the tables on
the ruling class by intensifying land struggles of the
rural poor beyond any populist and token reforms. This
will be the best tribute to the martyrs of Mudigonda.

The Ranga Rao Land Committee Report
The land question has been crucial in Andhra Pradesh
right from the beginning, and militant land struggles
by the revolutionary wing of the communist movement
have forced different state governments to enact
several land legislations allowing for distribution of
different categories of land among the landless poor.
Some of the legislations include the AP (Telengana
area) Tenancy and Agricultural Lands Act 1950, the AP
(Andhra area) Tenancy Act 1956, the AP (Telengana
area) Abolition of Inams Act 1955, the AP Land Reforms
(Ceiling on Agricultural Holdings) Act 1973, the AP
Assigned Land (Prohibition of Transfer) Act 1977, the
AP Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Act 1982, the AP Rights
in Land and Pattadar Passbook Act 1971, and the AP
Occupants of Homesteads (Conferment of Ownership) Act
1976. But such legislations themselves could not
ensure distribution of land among poor and establish
their control over the land. Rather, illegal
occupation of land meant for poor by feudal forces has
become the order of the day. 
In this backdrop CPI (ML) Liberation intensified the
agrarian struggle in East Godavari, Krishna, Vizag and
other coastal districts as part of a campaign for
implementation of existing land laws through people?s
initiatives. In this process more than 3000 acres of
land had been captured from different illegal
occupants and distributed among poor who could retain
their control over land through their organized might
and bitter struggle. Similarly other ML groups and
left forces also organized land struggles in different
parts of the states.

After the change of regime in 2004 from the
Chandrababu-led TDP to the YSR-led Congress, the
question of distribution of land among the landless
poor was raised during the sensational ?peace talks?
with the Maoists. In this context YSR Reddy
constituted a Land Committee under the chairmanship of
Konaru Ranga Rao (Minister for Municipal
Administration and Urban Development) in December
2004. This Committee submitted its report to the
Government in December 2006 and which was made public
on 27 May 2007.

Meanwhile it was revealed that CM Y S Rajasekhara
Reddy himself as well as his family own and control
hundreds of acres of land illegally. Reddy, after
initial denials, finally had to accept the charge with
a plea that it happened due to his family members?
ignorance of laws. He made a dramatic declaration that
he was ready to surrender all excess land to the
Administration to distribute among the poor.

Findings of the report 

The Ranga Rao Land Committee Report is an exhaustive
report of more than hundred pages with 12 chapters and
having nearly 100 recommendations of immediate steps
to speed up the implementation of land reforms. 

What did the Report reveal? We summarise its findings:
  
The land issue continues to be the single most emotive
issue in rural AP. 75% of the rural population derive
their livelihoods wholly or partly from land. Land is
still a pivotal asset in terms of both income and
employment, around which socioeconomic privileges or
deprivations revolve. Despite efforts of the
governments, only a small percentage of the poor are
land owners. A host of issues dog the land reforms
agenda. To cite a few examples: 
In India, around 87% of land holders among Scheduled
Castes (SCs) and 65% among Scheduled Tribes (STs)
belong to the category of small and marginal farmers
(as per the agricultural census of 1991). 64% of SCs
and 36% STs are agricultural labourers as against 31%
of others (Census of India, 1991).

In between 1961 to 1991 (at an all-India level) about
1 lakh (100, 000) people of SC background lost land
ownership. Of the people able to work only 12 % of SC
background held land in 1991 (as compared to 23% in
1961). Agrarian labourers from SC background increased
from 57% in 1961 to 72 % in 1991. The average holding
of SCs decreased from 1.19 hectares in 1975 to 0.83
hectares in 1995. For STs it declined from 2.33
hectares in 1975 to 1.44 hectares in 1995
(Agricultural Census Report). 

In the context of AP, SCs who represent 16% of the
state?s population control only 7.5% of operated area.
Government land distributed to SCs was only 22% of the
total Government land. 

India loses 1.3% of economic growth annually as a
result of disputed land titles which inhibits the
supply of capital and credit for agriculture (due to
faulty and backward land administration). In many
districts, the forest revenue border remains
unresolved for years together. Loss of control of
tribals over land in scheduled areas is an alarming
trend despite the stringent land transfer regulations.
In Telengana thousands of acres of Inami lands are
still unsettled. 50% of lands in coastal areas are
given on lease and almost 100% of lease is informal.
Land purchasers of lakhs of acres of patta land
through plain paper transactions (75% of whom are
poor) are not recognised as legal owner of the lands.
Both these phenomena have contributed significantly to
the downward curve in agricultural productivity in AP.

Despite the fact that 42 lakh (4, 200 000) acres of
land have been assigned to the landless poor since the
1960s, a significant percentage of the said land is
not in possession of the poor. What are the reasons
for this state of affairs? The public hearing
conducted by the Land Committee revealed evidence of
lands which are assignable but not assigned; land
assigned on paper but physical position not shown;
lands in occupation of the poor for ages but patta not
given; and ineffective implementation of Assigned Land
(Prohibition of Transfer) Act, 1977. There are huge
tracts of lanka land situated in the upper and lower
streams of the Godavari and Krishna river basin. These
lands are operated through ?societies?. Most of the
societies are either defunct now or being managed by
big landlords. Encroachers are increasing and some
societies are even alienating these lands to third
party. 

Two separate laws govern rural land tenancy in AP, one
for the Andhra area and the other for the Telengana
area. The Telengana Act is more radical as it
prohibits the creation of new tenancy relationship and
creates a class of protected tenants who have the
right to purchase the land they work.

The purpose of land reforms was the rational use of
land resources with equity, based on three key
elements ? abolition of intermediaries, ceiling on
land holdings, and tenancy reforms. The first of these
could be implemented with relative success to the
extent of doing away with zamindari and inamdari
systems, but the lot of poor was not significantly
addressed.

Despite specific directions of the Supreme Court for
disposal of endowment land (temple land) the auctions
are held in secret and sold to private parties for
small amounts of money, and the same is the case with
endowment land given on lease. In all the Telengana
districts, thousands of hectares of inam land under
the occupation of poor without titles came to the
vested with the Government after the abolition of
Inams.

Though the protective land transfer law prevents
transfer not only from tribal to non tribal but also
among nontribals in the schedule areas, yet thousands
of acres of land have illegally passed into the hands
of nontribals. The nontribal population holds 48% of
the land. Every year more and more lands are passing
into the hands of nontribals, and if not checked
sharply, very soon the tribals may not have any lands
at all.

Within the existing policy framework there is an
opportunity to ensure one acre of land for every poor
person in AP.

Some Relevant Facts:
On record the government has assigned more than 4
million acres of land to nearly 3 million poor people.
But in real life far less is under cultivation in the
hands of the poor. 
Similarly 1.13 lakh acres of Bhoodan land has been
distributed among 43 thousands poor people. But the
real life picture is the same as the above.

As on March 31, 2002, the state has distributed 5.2
lakh acres of ceiling surplus land to 5.4 lakh poor
people. But in many cases the lands are not in
possession of the poor or they are yet to get pattas.
In addition, the state has not yet fully implemented
its ceiling laws to confiscate surplus land and make
it available for distribution. More than 9 lakh acres
of inam land have been settled among 3.41 lakhs of
people. But these figures do not reflect the real
extent of inam land. 

In the context of several anomalies and shortcomings
in the process of implementation of land reform in AP
and in view of the urgency of speeding up the process,
the Land Committee advocated a series of
recommendations.

Recommendations of the Land Committee 
The Report has suggested 104 recommendations. 41
recommendations are related only to transfer of tribal
land in schedule areas while 15 recommendations are
related to land distribution. But how should we look
into these recommendations?

The recommendations can be categorised as follows: 
Measures of administrative reform or restructuring of
the mechanism for implementation
Speeding up the judicial process to settle
land-related disputes
Amendment of existing laws to plug the holes
Involving civil society ? NGOs, unions, etc.

To cite a few samples of the recommendations:
The government shall design and take up an intensive,
continuous and comprehensive training and
capacity-building programme for all the revenue
officials at various levels to reinforce their
pro-poor perspective and deepen their understanding of
pro-poor land enactments. 

Government shall request the High Court to constitute
a special bench for a time-bound disposal of land
related cases.

Provision shall be made in the Act to reopen such
cases of land ceiling, which have been decided on
fraud, and which are at the primary tribunal stage. In
cases where the courts have already passed orders,
action may be taken to file a review petition.

Assignment proposals in the case of government land
should be approved by the Gram Sabha.

Selective Silences 
The basic flaw in the jumble of proposed
recommendations is the absence of any thrust and
focus. At face value it appears as if the
recommendations have addressed each and every aspect
of the problems of implementation of the land reform
drive, but actually not a single step has been
suggested which can actually address the real issues
which have blocked implementation. How did such an
exhaustive report miss such a crucial aspect? Because
the report, while revealing some important gaps in
implementation has also attempted to conceal some
other crucial aspects.

For instance, the Report has maintained studied
silence on land struggles in AP, on the landless poor
involved in this struggle and organizations who are
leading this struggle. Further, the report did not
make any attempt to identify the forces which act as
the major stumbling block in the path of any
meaningful land reform. Any recognition of the
emerging nexus of feudal forces-neo rich and corrupt
officials and politicians in blocking land reform is
totally missing in the whole range of recommendations.

The Report overlooks the deep-rooted links of
Administration and judiciary with the interests of
feudal forces and neo-rich in rural society. In the
absence of such recognition, the proposals of
restructuring the administration and giving a
proactive role to the judiciary would only further
strengthen the vicious cycle rather than ensure land
for the landless.

The report totally avoids the question of the active
and effective role that is played by people, in
particular the rural poor who are the target groups
for distribution of land. In the name of people, it
mentions just the Gram Sabha and NGOs as
representatives of ?civil society? and represents the
rural poor as helpless and ignorant who deserve the
pity    of Government, its administrative structure
and its laws.

The YSR Government?s refusal to set up an autonomous
Land Reform Commission exposes the fact that the Land
Committee Report was meant to be populist eyewash. But
the rural poor of AP have laid bare the shameful fact
that land reform laws enacted in the early years of
Independent India and in the wake of the Telengana
movement are yet to be implemented on the ground.

Struggle During Massive Floods

Battling Floods and the Nitish Government?s
Callousness 

- Dhirendra Jha, Liberation, September 2007.

Dateline Darbhanga: A brief account of the
flood-relief work by CPI (ML) in Darbhanga
Darbhanga is the worst hit in the current floods in
Bihar. The people of Darbhanga lost their homes, and
were forced to take shelter in the Mithila University
campus, on embankments and higher places under the
open sky - open to the furious rains and the vicious
sun. Leaders and cadres of our party spent the days
reaching out to people who needed help - using boats
or even swimming in the murky waters to do so. They
pressurised the administration to arrange for boats,
polythene, chura, jaggery, khichdi and so on. 

31 July
The first political protest against the floods was
held by CPI (ML) in the face of a heavy downpour.
Following this demonstration, a memorandum was
submitted to the District Magistrate (DM). We informed
the DM that wherever and whenever volunteers would be
required, our party would be happy to provide them.
Our comrades took pains to distribute whatever food
and polythene was provided, and helped to arrange
treatment for the sick. Meanwhile, the Chief Minister
(CM) chose to visit Mauritius ? and this was taken by
people to be the height of callousness and contempt
for the flood-affected people of Bihar. Thanks to the
CPI (ML) campaign, this became a burning issue among
the people of Darbhanga. 

3 August: Protest at the Chief Minister?s Visit  
Eventually, the Chief Minister was due to visit
Darbhanga. Initially his itinerary included just one
stop at the Commissioner?s ? and no plan to interact
with the flood-affected. We held a militant
demonstration of the flood-affected on this occasion,
raising slogans: ?Nitish Kumar go back to Mauritius!
Institute a judicial enquiry into the neglect of
preparations to cope with the floods! Apologise to the
people of Bihar for your callousness towards the flood
victims!? Hearing of the protest, the CM?s programme
was hastily shifted to the Guest Hall of the Postal
Training Centre (PTC), and arrangements were made for
his helicopter to land directly in the campus itself. 

CPI (ML) continued with the plans for the protest at
the Collectorate. CPI ML) also organised for the
flood-affected from neighbouring areas to gather at
the PTC campus. Flood victims managed to enter the PTC
campus despite the police barricading. As soon as the
helicopter landed, a procession ? with over 1000
people ? began to march. The gathering surrounded the
main gate of the PTC and raised slogans. In view of
the tense situation, the CM sent for a delegation. A
CPI (ML) delegation led by Comrade Laxmi Paswan met
the CM and submitted a written memorandum. The CM made
a statement that many parties were playing politics
over the floods but the CPI (ML) was the only party to
submit a detailed written report of the flood
situation.                                 

Gherao of the Commissioner and DIG 
As soon as the Chief Minister left, and the Collector,
DIG and other top officers reached the Collectorate,
the protestors gathered at the Collectorate gheraoed
them. Eventually the Administration was forced to
announce that flood relief materials would immediately
be distributed amongst the flood victims who had been
waiting in vain for relief at Basantpur panchayat in
the Bahadurur block for the last three days. Only then
was the gherao called off. Despite the fact that most
roads and means of contact had been cut off, more than
1000 people took part in the protest at the
Collectorate. 

SDO/DSP kept Hostage for Over Four Hours
Kansi village along with dozens of other surrounding
villages on the Darbhanga-Muzaffarpur Road have been
submerged for several weeks. But the Administration
has not made any arrangements for relief. Kansi,
incidentally, is the village of CPI (M) State
Secretary Comrade Vijay Kant Thakur, of which he has
been mukhia in the past. In this village, flood
victims led by CPI (ML) leader Neyaz Ahmad gheraoed
the visiting DM and warned that if relief was not
provided officials would be taken hostage. The next
day, the SDO and DSP came to the area to monitor the
road-repair work. 

Angry flood victims surrounded them in thousands and
took them hostage, declaring that they would not be
released until relief materials reached the
flood-affected. After four hours, boats arrived with
relief materials, and the officials were released. 

Compensation for Crop Loss 
>From 7-10 August, people held vigorous Ghera Dalo Dera
Dalo programmes in 12 blocks, with thousands of people
camping outside the administrative offices, with the
central demand of compensation to peasants for the
devastation of their crops. The administration is at
present giving compensation at the rate of 25 kilos of
grain and Rs. 200; we are demanding 100 kilos of grain
per family and Rs. 1000, with Rs. 500 more for those
who own cattle.                        

Relief and Medical Camps
Through our persistent efforts, we succeeded in
getting the administration to dispatch more than a
dozen relief boats to the worst affected villages.
Around 5 quintals of chura and 200 polythene bags were
distributed among people. AISA conducted medical camps
among the flood affected people for several days on
end, manned by doctors and students. They pressurised
the Civil Surgeon to provide medicines for the camp.
Till date more than a 1000 people have received
medical treatment at the camp. 

The District Administration called an all-party
meeting on 5 August, in which CPI (ML) submitted a
10-point charter of demands. In Samastipur, a medical
camp was organized for the flood victims, where more
than 500 people attended including the renowned
doctors of the city. Around 500 food packets with
matchbox, candles, biscuits etc. were distributed by
CPI (ML).

In many parts of rural Patna flood has caused great
havoc forcing poor people to starve and live in open
amidst rain as their mud houses have collapsed. On
July 25, the Patna-Gaya road was blocked by thousands
of flood victims, under CPI (ML) leadership, forcing
the administration and the local MLA to yield and
declare relief distribution from next day. Again under
the leadership of AIPWA, flood victim women came on
the streets and blocked Patna-Gaya road.

On July 30, a militant gherao of Punpun block by
thousands of flood victims forced the SDM to rush to
the block headquarters and declare relief distribution
from the next day. In Madhubani, a CPI(ML) team
investigated the police firing near Gumti No. 12 where
two persons were killed and many injured. CPI (ML)
activists observed protest day on August 4, burnt the
effigy of Nitish Kumar and organized huge mass
demonstration in Bisphi Camp Office Khairi Banka.

Dalit Struggle

Manusmriti Prevails in Mayawati?s Sarvajan Raj

- Ramayan Ram, Liberation, September 2007.

He is fulfilling his jatigat kartavya (caste
obligation).? ? that?s what the President of the
Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) Pratapgarh Unit said when
asked about the local Brahmin BSP MLA who had
harboured (in his own home) the killer of a Dalit
college student (reported in Tehelka, 25 August 2007).


The Manusmriti decreed that if a dalit were to recite
the Vedas, his tongue must be cut off, if he dared to
listen to a recitation of the Vedas, molten metal be
poured into his ears. Mythology tells us that Shambuk
had his head cut off for daring to recite the Vedas.
Ekalavya?s teacher demanded his thumb. Education, for
dalits in the age of Manu, was punishable with
humiliating mutilation ? then death.   

In the 60th year of Independent India, in the state
ruled by India?s first dalit Chief Minister, the
Manusmriti with its regime of ?caste obligations? and
brutal caste punishments seems to be alive and well. 

Chakrasen?s eyes held dreams of college and career.
According to the feudal goons of his village, his eyes
had no right to house such dreams. They didn?t just
kill him. They first punished his temerity by smashing
that eye that dared to dream of education.    

Lucknow, the capital of Uttar Pradesh (UP), sports
huge hoardings of a smiling Mayawati, assuring
dignity, security, rights and employment for dalits,
poor and women in the state. To dalits in UP, this
government appeared to be an answer to the unanswered
questions of centuries, as for the first time a Chief
Minister of dalit origin rode to power on her own
strength. Many dalit ideologues have already declared
governmental power to be the key to open all locks,
and in UP Mayawati?s miraculous makeover (Bahujan to
Sarvajan) was even theorised as a feat of
?social-engineering? forging dalit-brahmin unity to
bring dalits to power. 

However, the dreams of dignity fostered by the BSP
victory are receiving a rude shock as the roaring
success of ?Sarvajan? social engineering reaps a
bitter harvest. Let us travel some 150 kilometres away
from the state capital, in Bhadevra village of
Pratapgarh district, where lie the ruins of the
shattered dreams of Chakrasen?s family. 

Chakrasen graduated from Allahabad University this
year and also qualified for the state level
Engineering Entrance Examination. He was soon to join
an Engineering College in Noida. However a different
destiny awaited him in his own village. On August 1,
when he was out for a morning run, Santosh Mishra,
Akash Dubey and their friends caught hold of him, took
him some 2 kilometres away to Sudemau. There he was
tied up and beaten mercilessly, and his eyes gouged
out before he was killed. The brutal murder took place
at six in the morning, but the police registered a
report at seven in the evening, and that too under
pressure from outraged protestors. The police first
lodged the report under article 304 i.e. culpable
homicide not amounting to murder. It was only two days
later, when the incident had been reported in the
media, that Article 302 was added. To add insult to
injury, the local BSP MLA Ram Shiromani Shukla offered
Rs. 500 to Chakrasen?s widowed mother for his last
rituals that she refused.

On August 8, an investigation team of All India
Students Association (AISA) and People?s Union for
Human Rights (PUHR) visited the spot and met the
members of the bereaved family as well as other
villagers. Till then none of the assailants had been
arrested, and the media in UP too had barely taken
notice of the gruesome crime. It was Khairlanji all
over again but this time in the dalit CM?s regime. The
BSP MLA in order to save his caste and kinsmen, had
not only kept the murderers in his protection, he had
pressurised the local administration not to arrest the
accused. Family members too were being threatened to
keep silent.

Why was Chakrasen eliminated? Recently, his
grandfather Shiv Murat (Chakrasen lost his father in
1992) was allotted a quota for distribution of ration
and kerosene in the village. Feudal goons made illegal
demands for ration and kerosene from the quota shop,
which Shivmurat refused to oblige. Obviously, being an
educated and self-respecting young man Chakrasen was
the main source of strength for the family in this
battle. His success in the B. Tech examination was the
last straw for the feudal forces. The thwarted feudal
goons led by Santosh Mishra told his grandfather
several months ago, ?You?ve educated your son quite a
bit, but it won?t be of any use to you? ? and
Shivmurat reported this death threat to the DM, the SP
and the local thana. 

Agnisen, Chakrasen?s brother, told our investigation
team that after the formation of Mayawati Government,
his family felt reassured that with ?Behenji? in
power, Mishra and his cohorts would not dare to
implement the threats. 

AISA activists encouraged the villagers to express
their outrage and protest in a novel way. On August
15, Chakrasen?s family and others in the dalit basti
did not hoist the tricolour. Instead, they hoisted
black flags on their homes ? as a mark of the darkness
which continued to dog the dalits even after 60 years
of freedom. This protest got a huge coverage in the
media, and only then did the administration came under
pressure. On the orders of the Police Superintendent,
Santosh Mishra was finally arrested - from none other
than the BSP MLA?s house where he had found shelter!
Later the other accused were also arrested.

Bhadevra has split wide open the reassuring myth of
dignity and security for dalits in Mayawati?s rule.
It?s time for dalits to demand a reply ? and to make
Behenji (Mayawati) and her BSP pay dearly for their
betrayal.  

Women?s Struggles

Women?s Tribunal Puts the UPA Government in the Dock

- Bhasha Singh, Liberation September, 2007.

?I was raped when I was sixteen and have been sexually
exploited by the rapist, an influential doctor, for
eight years since. For the past five years I?ve
battled to get an FIR lodged ? and in the process have
been jailed twice myself. In Modi?s Gujarat, women
have the choice of committing suicide or demonstrating
in the nude by Pooja Chauhan of Rajkot if their voice
is to be heard. But I?m determined to keep fighting.?
28-year old Shilpi Indra Mohan from Ahmedabad shared
her determination to resist women?s oppression in
Gujarat ? and she was not alone. On 8 August at the
Women?s Tribunal organised by the All India
Progressive Women?s Association (AIPWA) at Parliament
Street, women from 10 states took part, and shared
their experiences of resistance. They indicted the
governments in their respective states and at the
Centre on three major counts: violence against women,
increasing unemployment and economic insecurity, and
false promises of political empowerment. 

In the backdrop of celebrations of 60 years of
Independence, these women declared that in these 60
years, ruling establishments had only given them new
forms of oppression ? and any measure of freedom and
justice were to be had only through fierce struggles.
Above all they put the Manmohan Singh-led United
Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government in the dock for
its pro-imperialist new economic policy, for Special
Economic Zones (SEZs) which were robbing them of land
and livelihood, for communal violence, feudal
oppression, colonial and repressive laws like the
Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) and for
betraying its promise of 33% reservation for women in
Parliament. 

Savita Rani from Mori Karima village of Ludhiana
district in Punjab told her story of exploitation at
the hands of a chief of a local Dera. As a 27 year
old, she is responsible for her two younger sisters,
aged six and three. She told the gathered women and
the tribunal she was a widow, and a local Dera chief
attempted to exploit her sexually. When she refused he
had her beaten up and her clothes torn. Her little
sisters and brother were also threatened. ?Later when
I returned with angry villagers the Dera chief
electrocuted the boundary walls. The police refused to
help. It took a tough struggle to get an FIR filed.
The villagers were very supportive. Only when the
village sarpanch and the sevadar of the Dera came
along did the police eventually file my complaint. My
concern is for other vulnerable women who get fooled
and exploited by these conmen.? 

What was remarkable about the women who deposed before
the Tribunal was that far from wanting to hide their
faces and cower in fear, they were determined to fight
back and said that it was rather their oppressors who
ought to hide their faces in shame.    

Women from Bihar and Jharkhand recounted their
experience of struggles that showed how issues of
land, identity and dignity are inseparable. In both
states, women who contested and won panchayat polls
face persecution in the form of false cases. Pratima
Ingapi from Karbi Anglong spoke of how women in the
North Eastern states are subjected to custodial rape,
torture and fake encounters at the hands of the Army,
thanks to the Armed Forces Special Powers Act. 

Shobha Singh from UP spoke of the Shravasti gang rape
of Muslim women orchestrated by the Minister in
Mayawati?s cabinet, while Tahira Hasan of the
Tehrik-e-niswan spoke of her experience in taking up
the case of Farzana Khatun, victim of a communal gang
rape, in which the rioters and rapists were protected
by the Mulayam Government. Farzana, a beedi worker
from UP, spoke movingly of the tremendous economic
exploitation suffered by women working in beedi
factories. Sudha from Rajasthan spoke of the feudal
oppression suffered by dalit women forced to bear
night soil in Rajasthan. 

Historian Tanika Sarkar spoke to the gathered women of
the struggles of women of Singur and Nandigram against
land grab and SEZs. Uma Chakravarty, also a historian
and a member of the jury, remarked that many of the
cases heard here would not even be recorded by the
National Crime Bureau since getting an FIR filed is so
difficult. 

Women from most states spoke of how minimum wages and
equal wages were denied to them systematically, how
even under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act
(NREGA), employment for women is far from guaranteed,
and how women employed as health workers or voluntary
workers in anganwadi and similar schemes are denied
proper wages. This economic insecurity and joblessness
effectively makes women more vulnerable to domestic
violence, dowry harassment and so on. 

The jury included Shaista Ambar of the Muslim Women?s
Personal Law Board, Uma Chakravarti, Supreme Court
advocate Aparna Bharadwaj and Vrinda Grover, Prof.
Mary John and Prof. Anuradha Chenoy from JNU, and
Savita Singh from Delhi University. 

AIPWA General Secretary Kumudini Pati and President
Srilata Swaminathan addressed the gathering, calling
for an intensification of struggles of women against
the policies of successive governments that were aimed
at suppressing the women?s movement. The Tribunal
culminated with women enthusiastically burning an
effigy of Manmohan Singh representative of the many
weapons wielded by his Government against women and
the women?s movement.

Struggles in Industry

Tata?s ?Titanic? Bulldozer in Southern Tamil Nadu

- V Shankar, Liberation September, 2007.

Tata?s Titanium project in Tamil Nadu (TN) has evoked
unprecedented protests from the people of 10000 acres
of land earmarked in Tirunelveli and Tuticorin
districts. Several parties of both camps, the main
opposition All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam
(AIADMK), and also the ruling coalition partners are
up in arms. The Chief Minister had no other option but
to temporarily shelve the project until an eyewash
exercise of ?eliciting? public opinion was over. The
project conceived by the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam
(DMK) government was carried forward by the subsequent
ADMK government. Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was
also signed. But, the final nod was not given in the
face of stiff resistance from the people and also
because of Jayalalitha?s closeness to V. V. Minerals,
which engaged in illegal mining operations. The
shelved project has now been revived. In spite of
continuing war of attrition, both DMK and ADMK are not
hesitant to display their loyalty towards Tatas and
Colas.

The much bloated opposition from the DMK?s coalition
partners lacks any sharpness. They have not done
anything substantial to stall the project. It?s
obvious when they suggest the same to be run by the
government. For them, it is not a matter of principle
whether to have a Titanium project that is
environmentally hazardous and is bound to affect the
livelihood of tens of thousands of people; it is only
a matter of ?eliciting opinions? and ?scoring points?
over the other. CPI has contained itself by demanding
government take-over while the CPM is not demanding
anything more than a debate in the assembly.

The Tata management is adamant to go ahead with the
project. Only four states, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh,
Orissa and Tamil Nadu are suitable for the project.
Orissa is already into a controversy with Kalinganagar
and POSCO. Andhra Pradesh land grab has already taken
peoples lives. In Kerala, one plant is already run by
a PSU which is at the verge of sickness. Only Tamil
Nadu has a favourable political climate, as of date.
This is the attraction for Tatas. But, their
miscalculation is the scale of protest from the people
of relatively backward region.

Another casualty in the drama of ?eliciting? public
opinion is the worst impact of the project on the
environment that would endanger not only agriculture,
plants and species but also the livelihood of
thousands of people. The government is going ahead in
spite of caution by the Tuticorin district collector
and the TNPCB.

The Tata Steels have entered into a MOU with the
government in June to establish a 2500-crore Titanium
Dioxide Plant in the state. The project is to provide
employment for 1000 people directly and 3000
indirectly.

The project is to cover seven panchayats, 47 villages
and more than 20000 families. Most of them may
possibly be displaced once the facility is in place.
The company has sought permission to mine at a depth
of 6 to 9 meters in more than 10000 acres of land.
Around 7500 acres are said to be owned by 8929
individuals. The government is to procure and hand
over lands to the Tatas. The land price fixed by the
government is Rs 40000 ? 50000 per acre while the
people expect few lakhs (100, 000).

The corporate land grab is only one part of the story.
Worst is the accompanying drought, water scarcity,
unemployment, etc. There are many parallels in the
world. DuPont closed a Titanium Dioxide plant at
Oakley, California in 1997. Then, it was discovered
that soil and ground water was contaminated to cause
cancer in laboratory animals. Millions worth of law
suits are pending in US courts against DuPont that
produced ?dirty? Dioxin pollution. The Dioxins are
deadly and can pollute air, soil and water. Main
problem of Kerala PSU producing Titanium Dioxide is
the problem of establishing an effluent plant that is
highly expensive. People in Kerala have been fighting
against the untreated toxic pollutants being released
by the company.

Dioxide plants are discouraged in the West and are
being shifted to the East. DuPont has already shifted
many of its operations to the Latin American and Asian
countries. One need not be surprised if it had any
stakes as a ?technology provider? in the Tata?s
project.

Karunanidhi has come up with a theoretical framework
to defend not only the Tatas but the class of
capitalists by resorting to the Amartya Sen?s argument
that the GDP would not fall due to abandoning of
agriculture. Karunanidhi says that ?those creating a
crisis for industrialists and preventing them from
buying lands were ignoring people?s interests?. May
be, Karunanidhi is more crude than Sens and
Buddhadevs. Karunanidhi?s class nature has come out in
flying colours in the above statement. Relatively
backward southern districts Tirunelveli and Tuticorin
are being treated as dumping yard of ?dirty?
industries. Koodankulam Atomic plant is already
threatening the region. People of 50 km radius of
Koodankulam have already been notified to be evacuated
at anytime. Now, it is the turn of Titanium Dioxide.
Human beings in the region are being treated worse
than laboratory animals. Globalisation has not brought
any prosperity to the people but it has definitely
brought in death and destruction. Tata?s Titanium
Dioxide Project is a killer industry that should be
opposed. But, the perspective of the opposition is
also crucial. Comparatively, in this case, land grab
comes next only to the loss of livelihood and imminent
destruction.





      
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