[Naxalite Maoist India] Victims of Maoist Witch-Hunt Detained and Tortured in Prison

The ongoing witch-hunt to brand marginalized communities in the state of Jharkhand as 'violent insurgents' has reached the doorstep of two more innocent tribals. They were father and son, a farmer and a young college student.

When questioned both denied any connections with the Maoists stating that "we have never seen or spoken to them." Their appeals, however, fell on the deaf ears of the state police. They were placed in a lock up for over 45 hrs. They were abused and beaten.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKPvl-vBV4g


Jetha Manda and his son Birsa Tutti of Deyo village of Kunti district, Jharkhand (naxalite affected area) were arrested and beaten by the police on February 1, 2012, for the "alleged crime" of aiding and abetting the insurgent group known as the Maoists by serving food to them.

The arrest caused uproar in the village. The people were growing increasingly tired of the state and police oppression and called a village meeting known as a Gram Sabha where the villagers decided to join hands, speak out and protest. Around a 100 men and women of the village walked to the police station. They demanded that Jetha and Birsa be freed. They had the law on their side, which clearly states that No accused can be in police custody for more than twenty four hours without an inquiry being done. Community Correspondent Amita Tutti who made a video on the violation says that the inquiry was only done much after the stipulated 24 hours during which Jetha and Birsa had already been beaten mercilessly and heinously.

When Amita subsequently questioned the constables about the accused being kept in custody, the police constable replied that "they have been brought in only for enquiry" and that "rules that are written on paper cannot possibly be followed in practice". It was almost two days later that the two broken men were released.

Such detentions are a common in Jharkhand were thousands of people are being held illegally.

Community correspondent says: Amita Tutti is a 25 year old social worker from Setavara village in Kunthi district. She is a single woman who belongs to the Munda tribal community. She has dedicated her life to working for tribal rights and works as a Block Co-ordinator with an NGO named Jharkhand Jungle Bachao Andolan.

Whenever villager been taken by the police, Amita organizes other women in the village to collectively rush to the station to question the constables. She has seen approximately 100 villagers been taken to the police station and beaten up as they were suspected of being naxalites themselves or supporting the naxlites in any way. A Gram Sabha is organized so the villagers themselves can try to find out if the victim is guilty.

She says, "Due to this unfair and brutal harassment towards innocent villagers, youngsters are bound to hold guns in their hand and fight against this injustice. If this harassment stops, Sevatara will be a better place for us."

Amita says that it was the people's efforts that freed both the father as well as the son. Today they are no longer harassed but the trauma of that incident still prevails.

For more information visit :

http://indiaunheard.videovolunteers.org/amita/victims-of-maoist-witch-hunt-detained-and-tortured-in-prison/

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 6/11/2012 12:35:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Zameer Ke Bandi / Prisoners of Conscience - Documentary India, 1978)

The Documentary by Anand Patwardhan features interviews with leftist cadre and leaders who were arrested and tortured during the emergency.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHFaEybyvNA

June 26, 1975 is remembered as a black day for Indian democracy. On this day, 36 years back, the then Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi, declared a state of national emergency, thereby granting her extraordinary powers to rule by decree; which was promptly followed by launching a massive crackdown on civil liberties and on all political opposition.

An important historical record of this dark period in India's post-independence political history, Anand Patwardhan's "Prisoners of Conscience" documents the State of Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi from June 1975 to March 1977.

During the Emergency the media was muzzled, over 100,000 people were arrested without charge and imprisoned without trial. Cases of custodial torture, beatings and death were a plenty. Repression was also unleashed on defenceles people - workers, peasants and middle class - outside of jails.

But political prisoners existed before the Emergency, and they continue to exist after it was over. Today, the common people of India witness a state of 'undeclared emergency' as the Indian state holds tens of thousands of political prisoners behind bars, often for years without trial, and employing an arsenal of infamous and heavily criticized draconian acts, some of the most repressive of which are the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), the Public Safety Act (PSA) in Jammu and Kashmir, the Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act (CSPSA), the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA), the colonial era Sedition Law, et cetera.

For more information on "Zameer Ke Bandi"/"Prisoners of Conscience", please visit the official website : http://www.patwardhan.com/films/prisoners.htm

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 6/11/2012 12:29:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] The Changing Dynamics of Labour Markets in Urban India

Uptake of systems like Amazon's `Mechanical Turk' in India


By Ajay Shah

I have long been aware of Amazon's `Mechanical Turk', a mechanism through which tasks are farmed out to a large bank of humans. Each human worker has full flexibility on how many hours are worked and when. From the customer's point of view, Amazon supplies an API and access to a very large pool of humans who can perform small tasks. The median wage is $1.4 or Rs.80 per hour. In effect, Amazon has created a large market through which workers can find work, and firms can find workers to perform well defined tasks.


In a recent issue of The Economist, I was surprised to discover (a) that Amazon's Mechanical Turk has 0.5 million workers and (b) that roughly a third are from India. That's roughly 150,000 persons in India who are plugged into Amazon's Mechanical Turk. We don't know how many hours/week are spent in doing labour supply, but it's still a lot.
There are a few other such systems also. Here are links for exploration: oDesk, CrowdFlower, Elance, Amazon's Mechanical Turk.

These mechanisms add up to a whole new world for the functioning of the labour market. For first world customers who would like to connect up to cheap labour in India, our traditional view was that there had to be a man in the middle - a Datamatics or a TCS or an IBM. What these new systems seem to suggest is that for a certain class of tasks, it is possible to disintermediate the Datamatics or TCS or IBM.

For many individuals in India, the flexibility of working from home without rigidity about how many hours are supplied, and when, these systems could be a big win. At present, many households do not have computers and broadband connections, which is an important impediment. But this is also a constraint that is being rapidly eased through 3G, LTE, etc. These developments, put together, could become a whole new chapter in the story of India's connecting up to globalisation.

Source :

http://ajayshahblog.blogspot.in/2012/06/uptake-of-systems-like-amazons.html

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 6/11/2012 12:04:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Afghanistan : The Taliban’s High-Tech Urban Strategy

By Ron Moreau , Sami Yousafzai  | May 28, 2012 1:00 AM EDT

Qari Jamal has returned safely from a reconnaissance mission in Kabul. Short, thin, and immaculately dressed, the fresh-faced 25-year-old relaxes in a house near the Afghan-Pakistan border and tells how he toured the city with his digital camera, looking like an innocent civilian as he scouted sites for future Taliban attacks. "The work is both easy and difficult," he says. "We have to photograph and survey the area, get the exact GPS coordinates, and note the daily movements of the security forces guarding the installation, without getting caught." Polishing his glasses on his long, spotlessly white shirttail, he mentions one of the targets he and other undercover Taliban have been casing near NATO headquarters: the Ariana Hotel—a CIA operations center, Jamal calls it. "This is a most attractive target for the fedayeen," he says. He's talking about suicide bombers.

The young Afghan belongs to a dangerous new breed of Taliban militants. He grew up in a city, not in a mud-hut village in the backcountry, and he got his education not only at a madrassa but also at a public high school in Pakistan, and then at a college where he majored in information technology. His beard is neatly trimmed, and he doesn't even carry a gun. Instead, he says, his weapons are a MacBook computer, a clutch of mobile phones, and an array of IT gadgets, from digital cameras to webcams and GPS devices. Citified techies like him are playing an essential role in helping the guerrillas to reshape their strategy with attention-grabbing surprise assaults in places that previously were spared from the heaviest fighting.

As brutal as the Taliban's leaders can be, they're not stupid. After two years of losing ground to the Americans in the countryside, they've concluded that splashy operations against urban targets have big advantages over attacks in rural areas: they generate more local and international publicity, require fewer fighters, and give the insurgents the appearance of being stronger than they may actually be. "This year 70 percent of our focus will be on the cities," says a Taliban commander in Ghazni province who has seen the latest strategic plan for urban warfare from the Taliban's ruling council, the Quetta Shura. "That's the best way to put pressure on the government and the Americans, and to show them that we are as strong in the cities as we are in the countryside."

The deadly new campaign has already begun. Immediately after President Obama's latest surprise visit to Afghan President Hamid Karzai in Kabul this May, a team of Taliban suicide bombers attacked a residential compound where Americans and other foreigners were living on the outskirts of the capital. Seven Afghans were killed in the assault. The previous month, guerrillas wielding machine guns, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, and small arms had seized two high-rise construction sites in Kabul and opened fire on NATO headquarters, the Afghan Parliament, and the American and several other embassies. The attack mirrored a similar operation the insurgents launched against the U.S. Embassy and the NATO command last September.

Most other news outlets have attributed practically all of the recent attacks in Kabul not to the mainstream Taliban but to the Haqqani Network, an allied but distinct insurgent group. Those reports have it wrong, Taliban sources insist. Senior Taliban commanders boasted to Newsweek of those attacks at the time, and some expressed frustration that the Haqqanis were given credit. Lutfullah Mashal, the spokesman for Afghanistan's National Directorate of Security, confirms to Newsweek that the recent attacks in the capital were carried out by regular Taliban under the direction of Hajji Lala.

That's the code name used by the Taliban's seniormost commander in the capital, Mullah Hayatullah—the mastermind of the new urban strategy, according to Jamal and other Taliban sources. A logistics expert who keeps a steady stream of money, arms, and explosives flowing steadily into Kabul, he's also the Taliban's chief of operations on the eastern front and the Quetta Shura's shadow governor of Kabul. Lala's bloody résumé doesn't end there. Mashal says he was probably behind the assassination of former Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbani, the chairman of Karzai's High Peace Council.

As if that weren't enough, he's also believed to have orchestrated the assassination of another High Peace Council member, Arsala Rahmani, on May 13. Rahmani had been the Taliban's deputy education minister before the fall of the regime in 2001, and before his death he was said to maintain close ties to his former associates. The Taliban's chief spokesman, Zahibullah Mujahid, has denied that his group had any part in either killing, but senior Taliban sources tell Newsweek that the militants are determined to eliminate anyone, whether on the Kabul side or within their own ranks, who promotes peace negotiations between the insurgency and Karzai's administration. The Taliban made an exception of sorts for talks with the Americans in Qatar, in hope of winning the release of senior insurgent commanders from Guantánamo Bay, but they abruptly broke off the dialogue in March, calling it "pointless."

Instead, Taliban leaders have set out to transform and revitalize their war against Karzai and the Americans, assembling dozens of technologically sophisticated young militants like Jamal to help make it happen. The young wizards use their specialized skills to perform all sorts of essential duties, not only gathering and transmitting intelligence but facilitating communications and maintaining electronic security as well. They're particularly valuable in urban reconnaissance. As experienced city dwellers they know how to blend in, checking out potential targets, ambush sites, and escape routes without attracting attention where an ordinary village-bred guerrilla couldn't help being conspicuous.

More than that, however, they know how to put together meticulously detailed information about streets and buildings, using tools the old-style Taliban never dreamed of, like Google Maps, GPS, and video. Urban reconnaissance teams are now working in several major Afghan cities, says Jamal. "Almost every day our mujahedin are walking the streets of Kabul, Kandahar, and Mazar-i-Sharif, taking photos, drawing maps and gathering information," he says. "Our teams are checking daily the security at embassies, hotels, and even guest houses where foreigners stay."

Some team members will drive around town with dashboard-mounted webcams, collecting images of sensitive neighborhoods, government buildings, and military facilities and transmitting them to Jamal and other remote operators. All this data helps insurgent commanders to plan and organize their attacks like never before. And when the shooting stops, the reconnaissance teams will return to the scene with cameras to do post-operation damage assessments in order to improve planning for future attacks. "IT is making things easy for the mujahedin," Jamal says. "The technology was made by infidels, but Allah has turned it into a very positive and useful tool for jihadists."

The militants keep finding new uses for the foreigners' tools. They use email and even Internet chat rooms to send intelligence wherever it's needed. The Internet has revolutionized the insurgents' training system as well. The techies are able to set up real-time instruction sessions, where Taliban master bombmakers demonstrate their techniques via webcam as students watch from mud-brick houses hundreds of miles away. "We don't have to all gather in one place," Jamal says. "Now we can switch on a webcam and teach one man, a group, or groups, sitting in different places, how to make IEDs and other explosives." The webcam classes can be less dangerous, too: there's no need for militants to gather in large numbers for training or strategy sessions, exposing themselves to the risk of armed drone attacks.

But the Americans have some new technological tricks of their own. Among the most visible is a network of hundreds of U.S. spy balloons known as aerostats. Insurgents say the big stationary blimps have severely hampered their ability to get around undetected. More than 100 feet long and packed with surveillance cameras and electronic eavesdropping equipment, the airships float tethered above cities, U.S. bases, and strategic highways. "These balloons are very dangerous," says Jamal. "The photos and videos they take have led the enemy to our mujahedin's hideouts." He says he and his colleagues have tried to figure out ways to thwart the eyes in the sky, but so far without success. All they can do is keep to the shadows and hope to hide themselves in crowds.

Jamal says he's intensely security-conscious. In case he's ever arrested and his computer is seized, he disguises his digital folders and files. Under innocuous-sounding labels like "Pashto Poetry," "Pashto Dance," and "Jokes," he keeps sensitive and incriminating information such as detailed maps of the neighborhood around the U.S. Embassy and contact information for fellow militants. "If a policeman opens my laptop, he will think I'm not serious—just a lover of music, dancing, and jokes," he says. In real life, he says, he despises such frivolities: "We believe that music makes Muslims lazy and neglectful of their Islamic obligations and values."

Cities are rife with such temptations. Nevertheless, one of the chief reasons behind the Taliban's strategic shift has been the lack of any plausible alternative. Since the U.S. military surge began two years ago, the guerrillas have been mostly driven out of their former southern strongholds. One senior Taliban commander in the south says the Americans' night raids and drone attacks have all but demolished the insurgents' rural infrastructure. "They [the Taliban] don't have the manpower to put up a big fight in the countryside," says an Afghan intelligence officer who requested anonymity to speak. "So now their main target will be attacking and terrorizing the cities."

Even so, the new urban campaign has angered many of the Taliban's surviving commanders in the countryside. They say inordinate amounts of money and resources are being funneled to operations in Kabul while the longtime rural insurgency goes begging. "There is too much money available now to fund attacks in the cities," complains an angry insurgent commander in the east. "I hear they are paying $1 million to buy safe houses in Kabul." It's not just the money, he says; it's everything: "Requests for planning urban operations get approved months before our requests for the funding of rural offensives."

That's not the only sore subject. The insurgency is split from top to bottom over whether the Taliban should start talking to Karzai. Some senior commanders privately support reaching out to Kabul to see what kind of peace deal can be struck, despite Mullah Mohammad Omar's unbending opposition to dealing with Karzai. The Taliban's supreme leader has repeatedly denounced the Afghan president as a traitor and an American stooge. This past March Maulvi Ishmael, the former head of the insurgency's military committee and a powerful southern commander, was arrested at gunpoint by Taliban militiamen for allegedly daring to sponsor unauthorized peace talks between local Taliban officers and representatives of Kabul's High Peace Council. There are even unconfirmed reports that in April he was hanged from a tree in Helmand province for his transgression.

The guerrillas are at odds among themselves over whether Ishmael merited such a fate. "He cheated me and Islam and got the punishment he deserved," says Mullah Bismullah Akhund, a Ghazni-province subcommander who supported Ishmael before the arrest. Others see the situation very differently, arguing that his imprisonment—or worse—has weakened the insurgency and damaged the morale of guerrilla fighters who were loyal to him. "His arrest has directly impacted our offensive in Ghazni, disappointed each Talib, and sown confusion in our ranks," says the eastern commander. "If the leadership arrests him, then why not arrest those talking to the Americans in Qatar?" At present, of course, the question is academic, since both the Taliban and the Americans say no one is talking in Qatar these days.

The Taliban's new urban strategy seems unlikely to fully offset the guerrillas' evident weakness and disarray in the countryside. It's true that the militants' high-profile suicide attacks will probably deepen the Afghans' sense of insecurity and intensify their fears that the Kabul government is too weak and incompetent to protect them. But rising violence in the cities won't add to the insurgents' popularity among the urban population. And by ruling out peace talks with Kabul, the Taliban is offering only more bloodshed to the war-weary people of Afghanistan.

Source : http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/05/27/afghanistan-the-taliban-s-high-tech-urban-strategy.html

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 6/11/2012 11:59:00 AM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Women SHG's protest Central Kitchen Scheme

NASHIK : Claiming that the central kitchen scheme of the state government for mid-day meals in schools was aimed at helping the capitalists, Nandu Aher of the women's self-help group (SHG) Mahila Bachatgat Sanghatana demanded that the idea be scrapped in the interest of poor women who earned their daily bread through the scheme for the last ten years.

Representatives of SHGs active in Nashik tehsil (both rural and urban) held a day-long dharna in front of the collectorate demanding scrapping of the central kitchen scheme. "The state government, after successful implementation of mid-day meal scheme through SHG's, has now created space for capitalists.

It was evident from the tender floated and the terms and conditions, which demanded 1,500 sq feet of land and Rs 10 lakh as deposit. This will render jobless nearly 5,000 women in Nashik city alone as the central kitchen system is meant for urban areas. We have demanded that the scheme should be scrapped," Aher said.

Presenting the memorandum to collector P Velrasu, the women said they were shocked when NCP leader Supriya Sule asked them to look for other avenues when they raised the issue.

Source : 

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-05-17/nashik/31748346_1_central-kitchen-mid-day-meal-scheme-shgs

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 6/11/2012 11:56:00 AM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Villagers appeal to Maoists to help them in Bihar

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DikxvOh2KMc Villagers of Gaya district in Bihar, who have long suffered atrocities by goons in the area, have turned to Maoists, to seek help. Disillusioned with the passive approach of district administration, Reena Devi, a widow in chowangai village said that she was subjected to atrocities by goons.The Naxals have fought for decades in a swathe of central and eastern India, including many resource-rich regions, where tension runs high between poor farmers and industrial developers.

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 6/02/2012 10:50:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Jharkhand to start mining in Ho tribe's homeland

The Clear, Hold, Develop strategy of Operation Green Hunt is in full swing in the state of Jharkhand. Clear the forests/tribals and Develop Open Cast Mines.

Jharkhand mulls mining in Ho tribe's homeland

TOI has documents showing that the Jharkhand government has sought and received applications for mining in more than 500 sq km of the dense forests -- home to the Ho tribe that the Union government wants to bring development to. Around 95 sq km of the forest is already leased out for mining.

Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh pushed and got a Rs 150 crore special package to develop roads, community centres, hospitals, schools, provide jobs and set up CRPF camps in the heart of the dense forest that has remained an impenetrable zone for the administration - with the government finding several 'lost' villages just recently.

But much of this could become redundant if the Jharkhand government's plans come true with almost the entire green patch wiped clean with coal pits dotting the landscape and a few Ho villages left spattered around. Of course, it would also be then flooded with a new world of contractors, labour and all the paraphernalia of the mining industry.

At the moment, some of the leased out mines are not operational and most of them lie on the eastern fringe of the sal forests. But once all the proposed mines become operational, the forest, which is also a critical elephant terrain, could be fragmented beyond recognition.

The Union environment ministry had previously given clearance for Chiriya mines inside the Saranda forests despite internal views against the move and now SAIL has come back for more.

Source :
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-06-01/india/31958588_1_mining-industry-saranda-forests-sq-km

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 6/02/2012 10:45:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Innocent Jharkhand Tribals At the Mercy of A Violent State

Call to Action: Xavier asks the people who are watching his video to Call District Collector ,K Srinivasan on 09472710699/06582256422 and say that they have watched this video published on 30/05/2012 and are aware of the oppression of adivasis and innocents that goes on under the pretext of 'security'. They are to inform the Respected District Magistrate that such violations are unacceptable, undemocratic and must not continue. He(The DM) must look into the matter personally and look to bring about a change.

http://indiaunheard.videovolunteers.org/

 




About the Video: From his waist down to his feet, his body bears testimony in black and blue of police brutality and torture in the third degree. It's the body of Barnabas Bodra, a young Munda tribal from the village of Sitiburu in West Singhbum, Jharkhand. He is one of the over 6000 tribals who have been locked up and brutalized in the prisons of Jharkhand on unsubstantiated suspicions of being a 'Naxal' or of just being sympathetic to the violent Naxal insurgency that plagues the jungles of Jharkhand.

After three unending days and nights of mental and physical abuse, Barnabas thinks he is lucky that he is not among 550 innocent adivasis who have already been killed by the armed forces of the state since 2009.The government continues to deny the existence of the 'comb and search' witch-hunt through adivasi land. It terms 'Operation Green Hunt' as a media fabrication. What Barnabas has witnessed and experienced differs significantly from the government's take on the issue.

On the night in the question, Barnabas was asleep after a hard day's work at the field, next to his wife and infant child. Close to midnight, he awakened to the sound of the door to his house coming apart. Before he realized what was happening, armed police officers were manhandling him, shouting into his ear and accusing him of illegal possession of fire arms and of aiding the insurgent movement.

He tried to protest but the lashings of the police lathis had already started falling on his hips and legs. The police started taking apart his house, going through his meagre possessions, destroying his granary, leaving an entire household torn and frayed.

Barnabas was taken not to the local police station but to the District Police Headquarters where the police persisted in their efforts to torture a confession out of the man. He was subjected to further beatings. He was kept without food for over 24 hours. When he was finally given food on the second day of his imprisonment, he claims that it was so full of salt that he threw up every bit of whatever little he had managed to eat. He was never produced before a magistrate as the law would require of a person being held in a police lock-up for more than a day. The alleged firearms were never found. It still took almost three days and efforts of the villagers of Sitiburu who had been pleading all the while for Barnabas' release to return his freedom back to him.

Barnabas' story is a common one in the so-called 'Red Corridor' of India, the adivasi jungle land that is rich in minerals and resources which the state industrial-military-corporate complex have set their greedy eyes on. Community Correspondent Xavier Hamsay from West Singhbum, district, Jharkhand who produced his first IndiaUnheard on Barnabas, says, "The continuing greed and oppression of the state has alienated adivasis. An alienated minority can tend to think that violence gives them a way to force their unheard voices and demands all the way past the deaf ears of the government. But they are people caught in a disillusion and more importantly, they remain a minority.But when the all-powerful state resorts to violence, it is a disturbing trend. Today, the adivasis of Jharkhand are afraid of their state. They sleep in fear."

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 6/02/2012 10:39:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Chidambaram changes his plans : now wants immediate Army Deployment

Chidambaram floats new plans to fight 'losing battle' against Maoists

India is fighting a losing battle against Naxalism, urgent measures are required to turn the tide, and the attitude of some state chief ministers is not helpful in anti-Maoist operations.

This emerged from a closed-door meeting chaired by Home Minister P. Chidambaram and attended by senior officials of the ministry, the Intelligence Bureau (IB) and heads of central paramilitary forces. Home secretary R.K. Singh was also present at meeting, held in the minister's conference room last week.

Chidambaram was candid in his assessment that states like Orissa, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand were not cooperating in the fight against Naxalism and their chief ministers were not helpful. Even Bihar CM Nitish Kumar had his political compulsions in not taking on the Naxals, the home minister said, expressing his frustration at not being able to get his forces to carry on the anti-Naxal operations effectively.

Ministry sources said that with rising casualties among security forces, fewer men were being deployed for the anti-Maoist operations.

The minister was keen on the idea of bringing in the army in the Naxal-affected areas. He felt that patrolling duties and securing vital installations could be handed over to the army while the paramilitary forces and state police could carry on the operations. While the officials have been told to prepare a note for the cabinet committee on security, it is unlikely that Chidambaram's proposal will get support from Defence Minister A.K. Antony.

Those who were privy to the deliberations said among the suggestions were having a director general (law and order) posted by the MHA to the states for such operations since many state DGPs have cited reservations on certain operations against the Naxals if they are not cleared by the CM.

The idea may stem from having a senior official on the ground to supervise anti-Naxal operations.

But given the resistance from the states to his proposal of a National Counter Terrorism Centre, it is unlikely that Chidambaram's new ideas will find favour from regional satraps in the states.

Source : 

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/chidambaram-anti-maoist-operations-naxalism/1/189751.html

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/22/2012 11:43:00 AM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Om Puri lauds Maoists, calls them fighters

Veteran Bollywood actor Om Puri, who drew flak for his controversial comments against parliamentarians, landed himself in another row by calling naxals "fighters not terrorists".

The 61-year-old actor who is here to shoot for Prakash Jha`s 'Chakravyuh', said naxalites were fighters who did not trouble the common man.

Puri said that naxalites kidnapped Sukma district collector, Alex Paul Menon, because he supported the social system against which they are fighting.

"They (naxals) are not terrorists because they don`t resort to irresponsible acts of terror by planting bombs on streets. Naxals are fighters who fight for their rights. They don`t harass the common man and the poor," Puri told reporters here last evening.

It is not for the first time that the actor has landed himself in trouble.

He was slapped with a privilege motion after making derogatory remarks against politicians at Ramlila maidan during Anna Hazare`s campaign for Jan Lokpal in August last year only to apologise later.

Source :
http://zeenews.india.com/entertainment/and-more/om-puri-lauds-naxals-calls-them-fighters_111616.htm

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/22/2012 11:36:00 AM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Kabir Kala Manch - Why Are They Underground?

In this video renowned filmmaker Anand Patwardhan, Ratna Pathak Shah, IPS Sudhakar Suradkar and CPI's Prakash Reddy talk about Kabir kala Manch and what their songs mean to them.

Jai Bhim Comrade a documentary film by Anand Patwardhan on the continuing atrocities inflicted on Dalits and on their resistance to this through poetry and music, recently won a National Film Award. On the 19th of April the government of Maharashtra further honoured the National awardees, and Anand Patwardhan received Rs.51,000 for Jai Bhim Comrade.



A different fate is currently being faced by members of the Kabir Kala Manch (KKM) who feature prominently in the film Jai Bhim Comrade. While Deepak Dengle is in prison, many other members including lead singer-poets Sheetal Sathe, Sagar Gorkhe, Ramesh Gaichor and Sachin Mali and a few others have gone underground after threats from the police. All are all charged with being Naxalites and the ATS is using an uncritical media, like the Indian Express, to plant regular allegations against KKM. Even these allegations do not accuse the KKM of any violence, but is dependent on guilt by association.

It is not so long ago that Dr. Binayak Sen was similarly charged and jailed for close to 3 years before the Supreme Court intervened to grant him bail. Binayak Sen had by then become an international cause célèbre. It was hoped that his release on bail would put a brake on the targeting of innocent civilians for the mere "crime" of taking up the cause of the poor.

The attack on KKM shows that this is not the case and consequently many Indian citizens have decided to initiate a Kabir Kala Manch Defense Committee.Anand Patwardhan will donate the Rs.51,000 he received from the government of Maharashtra towards this committee and will be amongst the several speakers at the Press Conference.

Visit http://kabirkalamanch.wordpress.com for updates.

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/22/2012 11:22:00 AM

[Naxalite Maoist India] CMAS evicts Savarna colonizers from 30 Acres of Tribal land

The CMAS has ejected Savarna Colonizers from Avarna lands for now, but is this campaign sustainable ?

Maoist backed organisation occupies non-tribal land

KORAPUT: Renewing their land grabbing spree, the Maoist-backed Chasi Muliya Adivasi Sangh (CMAS) forcibly occupied non-tribal land at Bandhugaon block on Sunday.

Sources said the CMAS organized a meeting at Kumbhariput which was attended by hundreds of activists with their traditional weapons. Following the meeting, the Sangh by occupied over 30 acres of non-tribal land in the area by putting red-flags around it. Even the Sangh ploughed the occupied land claiming it to be their own to which the non-tribals have taken by deceit.

"These land belong to us which the non-tribals had taken by deceit from our forefathers. We have occupied these lands and have started ploughing them," said a CMAS activist who had attended the Sangh meeting.

Since 2009, the Sangh has forcibly occupied over 3,000 acre of non-tribal lands in the area citing it to be their own. Sources said non-tribals of the area are panicked over the recent development in the area.

Source :

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-05-14/bhubaneswar/31700271_1_koraput-and-malkangiri-districts-cmas-chasi-muliya-adivasi-sangh

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/22/2012 11:17:00 AM

[Naxalite Maoist India] 29,000 AK-47's procured for Anti-Maoist Operations

AK-47s continue to be the preferred assault weapon for the country's paramilitary forces deployed to neutralise terrorists and Maoists at the frontiers and in the hinterland.

Over 29,000 pieces of this Russian-origin rifle were imported by forces like CRPF, BSF and NSG over the last three years, leaving behind, by a large margin, other sophisticated assault weapons procured from the US and Israel.

The inventory of the assault weapons procured for security forces, including ITBP, CISF and Assam Rifles, during 2010-2013 show that while 29,260 pieces of the 'AK' series were procured, only 17,609 units of other weapons in this category like X-95 and SIG were imported.

While the Central Reserve Police Force, deployed extensively in the country for anti-Naxal operations procured 18,000 AK-47s, the Central Industrial Security Force guarding Indian airports got 7,921 pieces and the Sashastra Seema Bal securing borders along Nepal and Bhutan got 2,719 units.

The Sino-India border guarding force Indo-Tibetan Border Police procured 620 pieces of these 'Avtomat Kalashnikova' (AK) rifles.

"The AK series rifles are still the best in terms of use and adaptability for Indian security forces personnel. Be it any domain of combat operations like anti-Maoist or counter-terror operations, this weapon has delivered good results," a senior security official said.

With the advent of new technology and new dynamics of combat, the country's security establishment has also imported other modern variants of assault rifles.

So while the CRPF got 6,382 pieces of X-95 for its troops in Maoist operations, the elite National Security Guard (NSG) got 675 pieces of the Swiss-make SIG assault rifles.

X-95 

"There have not been many assault weapons that suit the Indian conditions and the forces. Also, the role of the internal security forces is essentially to combat and not assault. So, a specialist counter-terror force like NSG also uses sub-machine guns like MP5 and Glock pistols for fighting from close quarters," a NSG official explained.



The security forces, through the Union Home Ministry, procured the AK-47s from Bulgaria while the X-95s are procured from Israel.

Among the other weapons that these forces procured during the same fiscals are MP-5 guns from Heckler and Koch (Germany), Carbine machine guns (Storm) from Beretta (Italy) and Glock Pistols from Hong Kong and Austria.

Source : http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/over-29-000-ak-47s-procured-for-paramilitary-forces-213293

Related News


CRPF gets Israeli Assault Rifles to combat Maoists 

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/crpf-gets-israeli-made-assault-rifles-to-fight-maoists/1/158962.html

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/22/2012 11:10:00 AM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Rs 8,500 cr for roads in Maoist Districts approved

US$ 2 Billion package for connecting 6,000 habitations in 78 Maoist-hit districts.

The Centre has initiated the process to connect all tribal habitations and villages in border districts with roads under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY).

The Union Cabinet, at a meeting on Thursday, also approved a Rs. 8,500-crore special package for connecting 6,000 habitations in 78 Left wing extremist-affected districts and entrusted the Union Ministry of Rural Development with the job of preparing the estimates for the two projects.

Panchayati Raj and Tribal Affairs Minister Kishore Chandra Deo underlined the problems of the tribals who lived in scattered habitations of less than 250 people, and hence were still deprived of road connectivity.

The Cabinet directed Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh to conduct a survey to establish the number of such habitations in all the Schedule V areas that needed to be covered, and prepare the estimate for taking a final decision on extending this basic facility to the tribals living in remote forests and hills.

Similarly, the Cabinet was sympathetic to the problems of the people residing in villages in border areas that Union Road Transport and Highways Minister C.P. Joshi batted for. The Ministry of Rural Development will study all the 362 border blocks located along Pakistan, China, Nepal, Bangladesh and Myanmar.

Mr. Ramesh has ordered a survey to establish the number of villages under the two categories, and the money that would be required to construct roads under the PMGSY, the allocation for which has been raised to Rs. 24,000 crore for the current financial year.

To cope with the problem being faced by over six States, which have completed their PMGSY targets, the Ministry of Rural Development is evolving new guidelines to put PMGSY II in place, to provide them funds which have, obviously, been stopped.

The Ministry of Rural Development intends to address the concerns of Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Nagaland and Rajasthan, by allowing upgradation of rural roads on a cost-sharing basis. While the Centre favours a 50:50 sharing arrangement, the States were willing to meet 25 per cent of the expenditure, and want the Centre to foot the remaining 75 per cent of the cost.

In contrast, Bihar was allocated funds after a gap of two-and-a-half years, after resolving the irritants that had stalled the sanction of projects and resources. In the first tranche, Rs 915 crore has been provided for construction of 1,900 km of roads in seven LWE districts of Aurangabad, Gaya, Jehanabad, Arwal, Jamui, Rohtas and Nawada.

For the remaining 31 districts, the Ministry is likely to sanction the proposals received for constructing 1,350 roads and 96 bridges, totalling 3,840 kms, at an estimated cost of Rs. 2,440 crore.

Accepting Mr. Ramesh's rider, no Central agency will be engaged in the construction of rural roads. Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has agreed to appoint engineers to strengthen the State rural roads works department.

Source :
http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-05-18/news/31765599_1_maoist-hit-rural-roads-naxal-hit-districts

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/22/2012 11:00:00 AM

[Naxalite Maoist India] The Jhina Hikaka Abduction Story - NDTV

Season III of Truth vs Hype begins with an exclusive investigation into the abduction of Jhina Hikaka, the tribal MLA from Odisha's backward and Naxal - affected Koraput district.

Was Hikaka abducted so that the Naxals could free their colleagues, or did a secret deal go wrong between Odisha's ruling party and a group described as a Maoist front organisation? From his mountain hideout, one of Odisha's most wanted outlaw's confirms the explosive truth behind the shaming of an elected MLA.

Watch the Video on the NDTV Website

http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/truth-vs-hype/truth-vs-hype-jhina-hikaka-the-inside-story-of-an-abduction/231392

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/12/2012 12:02:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] India's Anti-Maoist Campaign - Defence Report

India's Anti-Maoist campaign faces training deficiencies, threatens Army strength 



By Jonathan Dowdall, Brussels, Belgium – 4 May 2012


A programme of planned offensives waged by India's Maoist insurgents, including the 23 April high-profile kidnapping of a senior government official, are increasingly overwhelming India's under-trained and under-equipped security forces.

"Overall, the situation is grim due to systemic failures in training and procurement for these forces," Medha Chaturvedi, a Research Officer at the New Delhi-based Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, (IPCS) told DefenceReport.

Between 10 thousand and 40 thousand armed cadres operated by the loosely organised Communist groups, known as "Naxalites," currently oppose New Delhi rule. They are often supported by local political and militia forces and are estimated to directly govern an area equivalent to 40 thousand square kilometres (25 thousand square miles).

According to official figures, fighting between Naxalite guerrillas and state security forces has killed at least four thousand people since 2007. In the same time period, almost 10 thousand attacks were attributed to Naxalite activity.

That campaign has also focused on assassinating government officials.

The 28 April killing of a district official in the central Indian region of Telangana has led police officials to issue a directive warning all government officials and public representatives to avoid travelling through Naxalite territory.

With the Indian Army recently being called on to back-stop hard pressed police units, sources say the anti-Naxalite struggle also threatens to drain the military preparedness of the world's largest all-volunteer army.

Regional analysts like Medha Chaturvedi describe the dense jungles of the Eastern Indian States as being an accelerant to insurgency, allowing Naxalite forces to operate with impunity despite the deployment of up to 50 thousand security personnel to oppose them.

Successful anti-Naxal operations in these states, they say, have been few – in between periods of Maoist domination.

Tackling the Maoist insurgency is the task of paramilitary formations such as the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF). Augmented by local state units, the CRPF regularly undertakes operations against Naxalite C2 (command and control), conducting search and destroy missions deep in jungle territory.

Counter-Maoist expert Varun Vira calls these operations a "military centric response." They are supported by military hardware such as drones and helicopters and span wide areas. During 2009 and 2010's Operation Green Hunt in Chhattisgarh state, some 20 thousand troops participated.

Yet, these forces lack the expertise to effectively locate and destroy Naxalite fighters.

"The biggest threat is the number of vacancies for trained counter insurgency operations personnel," Chaturvedi explained. Lacking advanced operational expertise, CRPF and other local formations are often ill-suited for coordinated jungle operations.

This is not for lack of equipment. The Indian Homeland Security budget for 2012 is an estimated USD 12 billion (GBP 7.4 billion), with the fight against Naxal-terrorism assigned USD 1.5 billion (GBP 1 billion).

An Indian defence sector source also confirmed to DefenceReport that Indian paramilitary forces have recently purchased at least six military mine resistant ambush protected (MRAP) vehicles this year – the first order of its kind and a significant capability boost to Indian counter-insurgents.

However, such resources are under-utilised due to a lack of training.

A former senior ranking officer in the Indian Army also told DefenceReport that there are critical skill gaps within anti-Naxalite forces.

There are gaps in training when it comes to applying force against hostile armed opponents, and with respect to handling communications and identifying and avoiding Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs), the former officer explained.

When contacted by DefenceRport, the CRFP declined to comment on its training schemes in Eastern India.

Penetrating the Maoist jungle

In response to these challenges, the Indian Army has been called upon to back-up overwhelmed local forces.

According to an early April report published by Delhi's Asian Age, the Indian Government has for the first time deployed Indian Army personnel to run a jungle warfare training school in the heart of Naxal-contested territory.

The Indian armed forces, which have an estimated USD 41 billion (GBP 25.5 billion) annual defence budget, are logically placed to counter the anti-Naxalite campaign.

However, there has recently been reason to doubt the effectiveness of such military support.

Local media reported that, in January 2012, a combined-arm seek and destroy operation by Indian Army Heron UAVs and MI-17 helicopter mounted forces in the Dantewada district of Chhattisgarh almost ended in disaster, when previously undetected Maoists nearly downed the assault team.

According to military sources, the cause of the scare relates to the inability of the Heron UAV's infra-red synthetic aperture radar to penetrate the thick jungle foliage of the Naxalite territory. The Indian Army recently announced plans to purchase an additional 50 of the Israeli made drones, at a cost of USD 220 million (GBP 136 million), to augment its existing fleet of 12.

Paramilitary forces are also accused of using excessive force during anti-Naxal operations.

Maoist sources in Chhattisgarh state say paramilitary forces undertook widespread looting during March 2012's "Operation Haka" and detained civilians without trial. DefenceReport was unable to reach Chattisgarh state officials for comment on these reports.

Indian Army's real internal security challenge

Naxalites are operating in some of the world's most impoverished and politically disenfranchised geographic regions. According to a 2009 Economist report, in the Naxalite-held Dantewada district, 1,161 villages have no medical facilities and 214 have no primary school while the average literacy rate is lower than 20 percent.

This, experts say, has given the Maoist insurgency a socio-economic motivation.

In addition, large amounts of the Government's USD 27 billion (GBP 17 billion) employment and socio-economic support dispatched from New Delhi is misappropriated at the state and district levels.

This, say experts, only serves to reinforce the Naxalite's violent methods and its broader anti-government message.

It is a political situation that has only served to complicate any potential strategic solution to India's internal security issues.

Additionally, as that strategic burden increases, Indian Army troops will not have counter-insurgency training to fall back on anytime soon, adding further cause for concern over the nation's internal security strategy – a weakness many would agree it shares with its regional neighbours.

Source : 
http://defencereport.com/indias-anti-maoist-campaign-faces-training-deficiencies-threatens-army-strength/

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/12/2012 12:23:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Tribals killed by Special Police Officers in Singram, Chhattisgarh

In Singaram village of Dantewada Chhattisgarh 19 innocent tribal were murdered by State appointed SPO's. The motive behind killings was to clear the land for mining corporations. The Vanvasi Chetna Ashram took the case to Chhattisgarh High Court, but has received no justice so far, instead it's office was bulldozed under CRPF supervision by the Government of Chhattisgarh. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZzhVurwnD0 On 8th January 2009, the Salwa Judum and police gunned down 19 villagers in Chhattisgarh claiming they were Naxals. Here is the villagers account of what happened. Kopa Kunjum, a tribal activist who brought this story to the fore was arrested on false charges of murder later that year. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0inAy1DvxVo Related Links http://kopakunjam.wordpress.com/ http://www.tehelka.com/story_main50.asp?filename=Ws300911Chhattisgarh.asp

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/02/2012 11:13:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] PMRDF-TISS inaugural function - Jairam Ramesh Speech

Union Minister for Rural Development Mr Jairam Ramesh elaborates on the GOI's strategy to win the hearts and minds of the rural population at the inaugural function of the PMRDF.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWeBJxDpTOw

Related Videos

PMRDF-Speech of Shri Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Hon'ble deputy Chairman Planning Commission
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E68yt0th-QE

PMRDF prog Shri V. Kishore Chandra Deo, Hon'ble minister for PR&Tribal Affairs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRVJq5Icmmo

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/02/2012 10:42:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Piercing the Veil of Illusion

By: RAMA BIJAPURKAR

It is time to let social scientists take the floor to understand the many maladies afflicting India

India has a deeply entrenched knowledge caste system. 'Science' is superior to 'arts', 'quantitative' better than 'qualitative'; oncology and computer science will benefit the country more than sociology or psychology. Economics is superior to other 'arts' because it is quantitative.

Consequently even the most pressing problems of national character and society and polity are sought to be solved by technofixes or higher GDP growth rate or understood by some set of quantitative indicators like vote shares or infrastructure outlay or poverty statistics using different measures.

Seriously addressing such problems, however, requires rising above the caste system and getting social science disciplines to urgently work on them, or else they will rot the foundations of the country. We need them to urgently put into the public discourse a deep understanding of the real nature of social problems our country is facing, their inter-linkages, seriousness, and possible solution spaces. Citizens need to think about these from their respective vantage points.
Social scientists already working on them must be given wider platforms that will amplify their messages. As one prominent business media person said reflectively at a function of the Bombay School of Sociology, "I have had several socialites and socialists on our channel but never really had a sociologist on it".

A few worrisome things are happening. The "if I have a hammer, everything is a nail" school of problem-solving must stop. The techno brigade believes that it can end poverty, identity politics and corruption with one technofix. The innovation brigade feel that they can solve unemployment, income inequality, and promote an economic powerhouse with support to commercialise innovation; and the corporate brigade feel that they can solve everything with market friendly economic reform, stimulating the consumption-investment cycle. As a housewife once said in a group discussion on health, "I know where to go if I have a problem with my heart or bones or stomach. But I really don't know where to go when I am just not feeling well." Who do we turn to when our country is just not feeling well?

Perhaps it is the changes in values that drive our thought and action which need to be understood, perhaps different institutions we have are working with different dominant logic and hence pulling in different directions, perhaps we are looking through the economy lens rather than through the lenses of society, people or national character at all our social problems and hence are not being able to solve them. We need to urgently seek out those who can discuss these issues in a conceptually sound, intellectually disciplined and broad based way and tell us what ails us as a people, a nation, a society, in our hearts and minds and lives. This is not a job that can be done by journalists, many of who bring brilliant abilities to synthesise but limited conceptual depth to such issues or by business leaders with unidimensional perspectives.

This isn't even a job that can be done any more by our politicians at the Centre who are typically 'one constituency as stock option' members of the family firm, and not people who have had a whole lot of grassroots experience and therefore, a well developed understanding and ability to read what aam janta is thinking and feeling. Elections for them are about mergers and alliances and about SMS messages and use of social media.

More worrisome is the veil of maya or illusion that is making a lot of things appear misleadingly different. It appears that we have a strong watchdog media that improves governance in politics and business. But is it well governed itself and not above partisan behaviour for certain considerations? This has never been studied and merits further and fuller debate not of ferocity but of depth.

Another forgiveable illusion is that we have made progress from the days when we our society was poor, unscientific and riddled with socially backward practices.

However we need to investigate, in a conceptually rigorous fashion, whether this istrue. The human sacrifice to appease Gods has given way to new forms of human sacrifices to appease media and the public — high profile jailing of bureaucrats or ministers, matter closed. Village panchayats are designed for balance, with various voices having to be represented, but not many modern institutions practice this. Having regulators is another illusion of progress. Do they serve their political masters or customers? How are they appointed and held accountable?

A board majority for independent directors is another maya. Many of them have not explicitly examined their role and position on trading off misdemeanours by management against superior profit delivery.

The kangaroo courts of the Maoists do have to be viewed and understood in terms of their similarity or difference with the lynch mob mentality of the media. Cronyism and patronage are back with a bang, but now cloaked in the veil of 'performance' but without parameters of what performance entitles one to what rewards.

Minority appeasement is back, but in an ad hoc way without the visible systemic rules that governed it earlier. We need to understand ourselves a lot better and deeper, our crisis of values perhaps, our morphing national character. We need to understand society, aspirations, anger, our ticking time bombs. And we need to give the floor to our social scientists ASAP.

source :
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/opinion/comments-analysis/time-to-let-social-scientists-take-the-floor-to-understand-the-maladies-afflicting-india/articleshow/12930597.cms

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 5/02/2012 10:26:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] To be or not to be Anonymous

There is no such thing as Anonymity on the Internet. You can remain anonymous only as long as no one is interested in knowing who you are. Once that changes it is not too difficult to determine the identity, location of individuals provided one has enormous resources at once disposal and sufficient power( i.e government agencies).

To err is human and all one needs to do is wait till the person choosing to be anonymous commits a mistake. Sadly, that is the nature of the Internet, every action of yours leaves an electronic trail than can be traced to a computer, mobile network and region.

To rephrase an old quote...

You can be anonymous to some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but nobody can be anonymous to all the people all the time.

Nobody has learnt this lesson better than our Hacktivist friends at Lulzsec who were unmasked last month and are now most likely to spend decades in prison.

As I have previously posted, Political Activists in India have been tracked over the Internet leading to their arrests and murders. Indian security agencies have been trained and are being assisted by foreign agencies in this effort.

A Police academy in Hyderabad has emerged as hotspot for carrying out this training, surveillance along with other surveillance centres in Nagpur, Ahmedabad and Chennai.

It is believed that One in four US hackers 'is an FBI informer'. The FBI and US secret service have used the threat of prison to create an army of informers among hackers all over the world.

In such a scenario it won't be surprising to know that many of the pro-maoist websites, groups are actually linked to security agencies in India and abroad and help them keep a tab on Maoist supporters and trap the occasional Maoist leader. 

Many of these website attract new sympathisers like a honey pot and leave them exposed to surveillance. 

Trust no website or person on-line. If you don't understand the Internet stay away from the Internet and people who spend time on the Internet. Kindly read this Disclaimer about visting this website.

This is just a reminder to readers of this website.

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 4/27/2012 11:24:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Cu Chi Tunnels - Strategies of the Vietcong

The documentary contains interviews with former guerilla fighters of the National Liberation Front (Vietcong) where they discuss the strategies used by them to defeat the World's most powerful conventional army - The US Army.

Cu Chi Tunnels - Documentary film on the Vietcong

The Cu Chi Tunnels, a Mickey Grant film, is the story of life underground told by the people who lived the experience. It is a story told by a surgeon, an artist, and actress, an engineer, and the few survivors of the guerilla band who left the tunnels each night to fight against an enemy of vastly superior strength.

Attached to the guerilla bands were Viet Cong documentary cameramen and camerawomen whose footage of the war from the Vietnamese point of view and of love, life and death in the tunnels has survived and is used in the film.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1919775245219225387

Know more about these tunnels at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cu_Chi_tunnels

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 4/27/2012 10:41:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] SATP releases fake map of Maoist affected Areas in India

A fake map exaggerating the Maoist presence in various states has been released by SATP.

In this map supposed to based on 2009 data, the entire state of Chhattisgarh is shown as Highly affected by Maoist activities including it's capital Raipur !

This is followed by a map based on 2011 data that claims sharp reduction of the Maoist affected areas.



This is nothing but propaganda to exaggerate the success of the government operations.Moreover none of these maps are to be taken seriously as nobody knows what the terms " Highly affected", "Moderately affected" and "Marginally Affected" constitute.

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 4/27/2012 10:24:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Indian Army men kill a dog for Breakfast in Dantewada, Chhattisgarh

The Army man can be heard shouting Operation Kutta is successful at the end. Somebody give these guys a medal !

Mr Chidambaram kindly supply your troops with some rations and meat, or I won't be surprised if they take to cannibalism in Dantewada.

On the one hand the mongrels of Dantewada / Bastar save the lives of hundreds of Paramilitaries by sniffing  out IED's and paramilitaries repay this favour by consuming more than 5000 of these dogs over the last few years ?

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bw1-8AMoBlM

This video was posted online in June 2010.

In this picture , CTJWC Director Basant Kumar Ponwar trains his 'students' in the techniques of IED detection

Brigadier B K Ponwar needs to change his dog training motto to " Mission Breakfast Nahin Banana".

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 4/27/2012 10:09:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Maoists justify abducton of Chhattisgarh collector Alex Paul Menon

Even as the second round of talks between interlocutors was set to begin at Raipur, outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist) circulated a three page note early on Friday morning, listing in detail their perception about the problems being faced by the tribals and incidents of alleged atrocities by the security forces in tribal Bastar region of Chhattisgarh.

A three page note "why we detained the collector", issued by CPI (Maoist) South Bastar regional committee secretary Ganesh Uike said they were forced to issue such a statement to set the record straight after a group of so-called intellectuals, supported by vested interests, unleashed a propaganda to whip up sympathy in favour of the Sukma collector.

"These people need to understand the reality on the ground and the manner in which the people are suffering state's repression and the role of district collector in it", Uike claimed alleging that it was during the tenure of Alex Paul Menon that a tribal youth Podium Mada was first tortured in police custody and later murdered. Later, this murder was passed off as a suicide in police custody, he alleged.

According to the Maoist release, another youth Podyam Sanna was picked up from his house at Pollampalli on February 11. Before the formation of Sukma district, police in erstwhile Dantewada district picked up a woman Soni Sodi from village Jabeli and subjected to third degree methods. But the district collector Alex Paul Menon did not utter a word when the then superintendent of police of Ankit Garg was bestowed with the President's police medal on Republic Day, it alleged.

Describing Chhattisgarh government's on-going "gram Suraj'-a village outreach programme-- as a farce, the Maoist leader alleged that such a campaign was being carried out at the behest of the World Bank. He said the CPI (Maoist) had earlier given a call for boycott of gram Suraj campaign. He also alleged that the government machinery, which also includes the district collector, were in fact trying to extend benefits to corporate houses by trying to hand over Bastar's rich natural resources to them.

Alleging that nearly 2000 villagers were languishing in jails of Dantewada, Jagdalpur, Raipur, and Rajnandgaon, Uike said 700 people were stuffed inside the Dantewada prison, which has a capacity to accommodate only 150 inmates. Besides, the rebels also alleged that the police had slapped false cases against a large number of people and the security were continuously violating human rights in the tribal areas.

Uike alleged that the security forces had launched an operation code named as "Operation Vijay " in Abujmarh in March this year and attacked the houses of villagers and destroyed their houses. He said the so-called intellectuals and others, demanding release of collector Menon, should first study whether the report submitted by the district collector at the meeting of "left wing extremism affected districts", organised by the Centre, was in the interest of the poor tribals of the region.

Source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Maoists-justify-abduciton-of-Chhattisgarh-collector-Alex-Paul-Menon/articleshow/12893876.cms

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 4/27/2012 09:52:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Essential Knowledge for Professionals

https://www.coursera.org

http://www.udacity.com

http://www.codecademy.com

The course on Applied Cryptography seems interesting... began on the 16th April

http://www.udacity.com/overview/Course/cs387/CourseRev/apr2012

& Game Theory too..

https://www.coursera.org/course/gametheory

Note : All courses are free... 

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 4/25/2012 02:04:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Making a leader - By Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw

A few words of advice from the Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw. For just about anyone...

Making a Leader 

Excerpts from a lecture on leadership and discipline

By SAM HFJ MANEKSHAW

The first, the primary, indeed the cardinal attribute of leadership is professional knowledge and professional competence. Now you will agree with me that you cannot be born with professional knowledge and professional competence even if you are the child of the prime minister, or the son of an industrialist or the progeny of a field marshal.

Professional knowledge and professional competence have to be acquired by hard work and by constant study. In this fast-moving technologically developing world you can never acquire sufficient professional knowledge.

You have to keep at it, and at it, and at it. Can those of our political masters who are responsible for the security and defence of our country cross their hearts and say they have ever read a book on military history, on strategy, on weapons developments? Can they distinguish a mortar from a motor, a gun from a howitzer, a guerilla from a gorilla, though a vast majority of them resemble the latter.

Professional knowledge and competence are the sine qua non of leadership. Unless you know what you are talking about, unless you understand your profession, you can never be a leader.

The next thing you need for leadership is the ability to make up your mind and make a decision and accept full responsibility for that decision. Have you ever wondered why people do not make a decision? The answer is quite simple. It is because they lack professional knowledge and competence, or they are worried that their decision may be wrong and they will have to carry the can.

According to the law of averages, if you take ten decisions, five ought to be right. If you have professional knowledge and competence, nine will be right and the one that might not be correct will probably be put right by a subordinate officer or colleague. But if you do not take a decision you are doing something wrong. An act of omission is worse than an act of commission. An act of commission can be put right. An act of omission cannot. Take the example of the time when the Babri Masjid was about to be destroyed. If the prime minister, at that stage, had taken a decision to stop it, a whole community—180 million people—would not have been harmed. But, because he did not take a decision, you have at least 180million people in this country alone who do not like us.

What comes next for leadership? Absolute honesty,fairness and justice—we are dealing with people.We in India have tremendous pressures—pressures from the government, pressures from superior officers, pressures from families, pressures from wives, uncles, aunts, nieces, nephews and girlfriends, and we lack the courage to withstand those pressures. That takes me to the next attribute of leadership—moral and physical courage.

What is the moral courage? Moral courage is the ability to distinguish right from wrong and having done so, say so when asked, irrespective of what your superiors might think or what your colleagues or your subordinates might want. A 'yes man' is a dangerous man. He may rise very high, he might even become the managing director of a company. He may do anything but he can never make a leader because he will be used by his superiors, disliked by his colleagues and despised by his subordinates. So shallow—the 'yes man'.

I am going to illustrate from my own life an example of moral courage. In 1971, Pakistan clamped down on the province, East Pakistan, hundreds and thousand of refugees started pouring into India. The prime minister, Mrs Gandhi had a cabinet meeting at ten 'o clock in the morning. The following attended: the foreign minister, Sardar Swaran Singh, the defence minister, Mr Jagjivan Ram, the agriculture minister, Mr Fakruddin Ali Ahmed, the finance minister, Mr Yaswant Rao Chavan, and I was also ordered to be present.

There is a very thin line between becoming a Field Marshal and being dismissed. A very angry prime minister read out messages from chief ministers of West Bengal, Assam and Tripura. All of them saying that hundreds and thousands of refugees had poured into their states and they did not know what to do .

So the Prime Minister turned round to me and said,

"I want you to do something."

I said, "What do you want me to do?"

She said, "I want you to enter East Pakistan."

I said, " Do you know that that means war?"

She said, "I do not mind it is war."

I, in my usual stupid way said, "Prime Minister, have you read the Bible?" and the Foreign Minister, Sardar Swaran Singh in his Punjabi accent said, "What has Bible got to do with this?", and I said, "The first book, the first chapter, the first paragraph, the first sentence, God said, "let there be light" and there was light. You turn this round and say "let there be war and there will be war. What do you think? Are you ready for a war ? Let me tell you— it's the 28th of April, the Himalayan passes are opening now, and if the Chinese give us an ultimatum I will have to fight on two fronts."

Again, Sardar Swaran Singh turned round and in his Punjabi English said, "Will China give ultimatum?" I said, "You are the foreign minister. You tell me."Then I turned to the prime minister and said, "Prime Minister, last year you wanted elections in West Bengal and you did not want the Communists to win, so you asked me to deploy my soldiers in penny pockets in every village, in every little township in West Bengal. I have two divisions thus deployed in sections and platoons without their heavy weapons. It will take me at least a month to get them back to their units and to their formations.

Further, I have a division in the Assam area, another division in Andhra Pradesh and the Armoured division in the Jhansi–Babina area. It will take me at least a month to get them back and put them in their correct positions. I will require every road, every railway train, every truck, every wagon to move them. We are harvesting in the Punjab, and we are harvesting in Haryana, we are also harvesting in Uttar Pradesh. And you will not be able to move your harvest."

I turned to the agriculture Minister, Mr Fakruddin Ali Ahmed, "If there is a famine in the country afterwards, it will be you to blame, not me." Then I said, "My armoured division has only got thirteen tanks which are functioning." The finance minister, Mr Chavan, a friend of mine, said, "Sam, why only thirteen?" "Because you are the Finance Minister. I have been asking for money for the last year and a half, and you keep saying there is no money. That is why."

Then I turned to the Prime Minister and said, "Prime Minister, it is the end of April. But the time I am ready to operate the monsoon will have broken in the East Pakistan area. When it rains, it does not just rain, it pours. Rivers become like oceans. If you stand on one bank, you can not see the other and the whole countryside is flooded. My movements will be confined to roads, the Air Force will not be able to support me and, if you wish me to enter East Pakistan, I guarantee you a hundred percent defeat."

"You are the government", I said turning to the Prime Minister, "Now will you give me your orders?"

Ladies and Gentlemen, I have seldom seen a woman so angry, and I am including my wife in that. She was red in the face and I said, "Let us see what happens." She turned round and said, "The cabinet will meet this evening at four o' clock." Everybody walked out. I being the junior-most man was the last to leave.

As I was leaving, she said, "Chief, please will you stay behind?" I looked at her. I said, "Prime Minister, before you open your mouth, would you like me to sent in my resignation on grounds of health, mental or physical?" "No. Sit down, Sam. Was everything you told me the truth?" "Yes. It is my job to tell you the truth. It is my job to fight and win, not to lose."

She smiled at me and said me, "All right, Sam. You know what I want. When will you be ready?"

"I can not tell you now, Prime Minister", I said,

"But let me guarantee you this that, if you leave me alone, allow me to plan, make my agreements, and fix a date, I guarantee you a hundred percent victory."

So there is a very thin line between becoming a field marshal and being dismissed. Just an example of moral courage. Now, those of you who remember what happened in 1962, when the Chinese occupied the Thag-la ridge and Mr Nehru, the prime minister, sent for the army chief, in the month of December and said, "I want you to throw the Chinese out." That Army Chief did not have the moral courage to stand up to him and say, "I am not ready, my troops are acclimatised, I haven't the ammunition, or indeed anything." But he accepted the Prime Minister's instructions, with the results that the Army was beaten and the country humiliated.

This takes me to the next attribute: physical courage. Fear, like hunger and sex, is a natural phenomenon. Any man who says he is not frightened is a liar or a Gorkha. It is one thing to be frightened. It is another to show fear.

Finally, for leadership, men and women like their leader to be a man, with all the manly qualities or virtues. The man who says "I do not smoke, I do not drink, I do not (No, I will not say it), does not make a leader.


Edited extract from Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw's lecture at Defence Services Staff College, Wellington,November 11th 1998. Quoted in Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw: Soldiering with dignity by Lt Gen Deepinder Singh (Natraj Publishers, Dehradun, 2nd Ed, 2002)

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 4/25/2012 02:03:00 PM

[Naxalite Maoist India] Alex Paul Menon Kindnapping - Nandini Sundar

Take a different route

By Nandini Sundar - nandinisundar.blogspot.in

Bitterness. When I started receiving calls that Alex Paul Menon, the collector of Sukma, had been kidnapped, that was my over-riding feeling. Bitterness and a cold anger. Menon is one of the best collectors I have met, and doing what he could to make life better for the people of his district, even in the face of an overall counter-insurgency policy designed for the opposite. Though kidnapped by the Maoists, Menon joins the ranks of several other hostages who have paid the price for their efforts to bring about peace. Take for instance, my co-petitioner in the Supreme Court in the Salwa Judum matter, Kartam Joga, an elected representative who believes in democratic means. He has been held hostage by the Chhattisgarh government since August 2010, in jail on a variety of trumped up charges.

Podiyam Panda, the former sarpanch of Chintagufa, who was singlehandedly responsible for getting seven Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) men released in an earlier hostage crisis, and who ensured that through the worst times the school in his village was not blasted and continued to function, is now accused of over a dozen heinous crimes. It is men like Menon, Joga and Panda, who can broker peace at an everyday level, and yet these are precisely the men who are being turned into hostages by ruthless revolutionaries and an equally ruthless security establishment, both of whom see nothing beyond the use of military force.

Maj Gen (retd) GD Bakshi's plea in the Supreme Court that prisoners should not be released in a hostage crisis because the security forces risked their lives to arrest Maoists is, at best, a very partial truth. In truth, the vast majority of people in the jails of central India arrested as "Maoists" are ordinary adivasis, who have been incarcerated on flimsy grounds and whose families cannot muster the amounts needed to pay lawyers or file for bail. The government and judiciary should take urgent steps to release them, not because of the Maoists, but because it is what the Constitution demands. The Chasi Mulia Adivasi Sangh, now synonymous with a Maoist front, started off as a legitimate movement for adivasi land rights. Yet, the State's preferred response was to side with the oppressors and file cases against its leaders.

Manish Kunjam, CPI leader in Sukma and I met Menon in his office in January. I had just come back from Tadmetla, where the CBI was investigating attacks on villages by Special Police Officers (SPOs) in March 2011. While the villagers were incredibly brave in testifying, despite the intimidating presence of security forces, frustration is inevitably building up. People have no hope of legal redress because the State refuses — despite many directions from the Supreme Court — to recognise the crimes that were committed by the security forces and their proxies. Far from disbanding the SPOs after the Supreme Court declared their use unconstitutional in 2011, the Chhattisgarh government has renamed them an "armed auxiliary force', and given them better guns and more money. Emboldened by this, in February, the SPOs even attacked the CBI team. The superintendent of police who tried to stop them was physically manhandled by his own SPOs.

Manish and I said how, in this kind of context, "development" through the "integrated action plan" (IAP) was beside the point. Moreover, it was doomed to fail in the interior villages, because none of the sarpanches lived in the villages, and the money was being spent on paper.  Menon said he was interested in some basic changes — especially agricultural improvement — not because it would win hearts and minds, but simply because it was the right thing to do, and his duty as a collector. He described how, in his first posting in Bijapur, he had slipped away and attended a Maoist meeting incognito, but could no longer do so,  because after Vineel Krishna had been kidnapped, the government had issued instructions to all its officers not to travel alone. We agreed that by kidnapping officials, the Maoists are doing the villagers no favour, because there is no one to monitor whether schools are being restored in the villages or anganwadis are functioning, even if the teachers agree to go.

However, it is not as if the top security establishment is keen to restore normalcy — they have been resisting peace talks by killing off Maoist leaders, and for two years, stalling any discussion of a rehabilitation plan for Dantewada in the Supreme Court. The IAP then becomes not only irrelevant, but also appears a form of low intensity counterinsurgency. This, in turn, has hardened the Maoist attitude towards what villagers are allowed to access from government. While schools, handpumps, anganwadis and PDS are allowed, the Maoists do not want the villagers to accept any other funds from government, including compensation, unless it comes with criminal prosecution of Salwa Judum leaders. They argue that this would be tantamount to accepting blood money. The villagers themselves want both the state and the Maoists, since they bring benefits of different kinds: they want National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) but not the police and forest guards.

Where does that leave people like us, who are struggling for justice under the Constitution? The Centre's first statement is not encouraging, with its offer to send more troops. They can send all the paramilitary forces they want, to die as cannon fodder.  There are also plenty of half-starved adivasis waiting to be killed. Perhaps some mediators will come forward, but at best, this will be piecemeal. Rather, since the CRPF claims that the kidnappings are an indication of their success in putting the Maoists on the back foot, such incidents are bound to increase. As against the government's two pronged strategy of security and development, therefore, I would suggest a three pronged strategy — peace talks, reparations and genuine devolution of control over resources. Only then will our collective bitterness begin to thaw.  Under the ice, there is always clear water.

Source :

http://www.hindustantimes.com/editorial-views-on/Edits/Take-a-different-route/Article1-845110.aspx

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Posted By Abhay to Naxalite Maoist India at 4/25/2012 01:55:00 PM