www.time4education.comTriumphant Institute of

Management Education P Ltd

NaxalismThe single

biggest threat facing India?

Naxalite Violence Continues Unabated…• Prime Minister’s Rural Development Fello

ws Scheme – ET 05 April – 156 Fellows will spend next 2 years assisting district collectors in 78 worst affected Maoists districts

• Federal Hero Bows to Maoists – TOI 05 April Odisha Govt. / Naveen Patnaik agrees to release 27 persons secure release of hostages - BJD legislator Jhina Hikaka & Paulo Bosusco.

• Maoists, J-K, NE continue to be top three areas of concern ET 05 Apr.

… Maoists violence had claimed 3,240 lives between 2008 - 2011 in nine Naxal hit states -- Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal....NE + J&K Casualities– 1034 / 496.

• Hostage crisis: Centre backs Orissa govt TOI 01 Apr 12

...a Puri-based tour operator was abducted along with 61-year-old Italian tourist Claudio Colangelo Subsequently Colangelo was released but BJD legislator Jhina Hikaka was taken by the Naxals....

Human cost…• 12 CRPF personnel killed in naxal attack

ET 28 Mar 2012, 03:34...attacks is nothing new in GADCHIROLI....be

the sole district in Maharashtra affected by Left-wing extremism, but it accounted for 109 of the 1,755 incidents of Naxal violence across the country and 54 of the 606 Maoists' killings.

• Manipur's People's Liberation Army providing training to Naxal groups in Jharkhand TOI 18 Mar 2012, 12:16 IST

• ...evidence of groups from northeast aligning with banned Naxal groups, the CRPF official claims.

• Poverty, lack of development lead to Naxalism: P Chidamabaram ET 14 Mar 2012, 14:26 IST

• ...form of democracy. He said the government was ready to talk to CPI(Maoist) or Left-Wing Extremists who are ready to shun violence…

Origins• Throughout the fifties, the Terai

region of West Bengal, saw discontent brewing in its tea gardens.

• In 1964, when the CPI split and the CPI(M) was formed, Charu Mazumdar showed his undisguised inclination to the Maoist line.

• Naxalbari: The peasant agitation. – In May 1967, the first police bullet was

fired, triggering a violent phase in the movement.

– May 25: The police fired at the demonstrators, killing nine women and two children.

– It was after this incident that the movement lost its agrarian character and became a militant movement.

The Spread of the Movement

• Calcutta • Andhra Pradesh• Bihar & Jharkhand• Chhattisgarh

Class Enemies• Naxal activists defined “class

enemies” rather broadly. Government employees, judges and a vice-chancellor were among those killed in Kolkata in “class action”.

• At the height of the movement, traffic policemen were stabbed on the streets of Kolkata.

Sangam & DalamThe Red Corridor including NepalFlowing Water Theory – Rural v/s

Urban

Naxalism

Impact• Social divisions• Economic and business related –

POSCO• Security related.

Steps that can be taken

• Development– Jobs– Infrastructure development

• Bridging the divide – Between the Haves and the Have nots.– Government and people.

• Use of security forces

Sun TzuNow an army may be likened to water, for just as flowing water avoids the heights and hastens to the lowlands, so an army avoids strengths and strikes weakness. And as water shapes its flow in accordance with the ground, so an army manages its victory in accordance with the situation of the enemy. And as water has no constant form, there are in war no constant conditions.

Inspiration - Mao• “When the enemy advances,

withdraw; when he stops, harass; when he tires, strike; when he retreats, pursue.” Mao Tse Tung

Mao’s Strategy• Mao employed four elements of

national power in his theory of guerrilla warfare.

• The general populace (peasant populationof the rural areas) was the center of gravity in his theory of guerrilla warfare.

• A symbiotic relationship between revolutionary soldiers and the citizenry.

• "The (people) may be likened to water and the (guerrillas) to the fish who inhabit it. How may it be said that these two cannot exist together?".

Mao’s Strategy…• The guerrillas not only operated

among the people, they were dependent on them for logistic and informational support.

• It was absolutely key to have the people in allegiance with the political aims of the guerrilla forces and understand how it concerned him .

• This education process was to be multifaceted and well developed, "by word of mouth, by leaflets and bulletins, by newspapers, books and pamphlets, through plays and films, through schools, through the mass organizations end through our cadres.'

Three Stage Process• At the strategic level, Mao managed

"victory in accordance with the situation of the enemy" through a three-stage process: – Strategic defensive– Strategic stalemate– Strategic offensive

Strategic defensive• The forces are on the strategic

defensive, focused primarily on mobile, irregular warfare to erode the strength of the enemy and build one's own strength, both militarily and politically.

Strategic stalemate• The enemy has ceased his offensive

while friendly forces have control of certain base areas and continue to employ guerrilla tactics as well as some conventional operations when and where appropriate.

Strategic offensive• Friendly forces assume the strategic

offensive with the primary emphasis on conventionalwarfare to thoroughly defeat the conventional forces of the enemy.

DAU TRANH - Struggle

• The Vietnamese adopted Mao's three stage strategy a means of throwing off French colonialism.

• The authors of Dau Tranh – Vo Nguyen Giap, Ho Chi Minh, and other members of the Politburo in Hanoi viewed the military element of their theory, in Maoist terms, with both guerrilla and conventional elements.

• They incorporated political, military, informational, and economic considerations.

Dau Tranh• Giap had highly trained commandos

infiltrate into the south to conduct a wide variety of limited operations.

• This strategy allowed Giap to conserve his fighting power while wearing down that of the enemy.

• Giap planned two-year campaign in January 1975, but he was successful in just four months with the total collapse of South Vietnam

Three Action Programmes

• Action among the enemy: – aimed at both the South Vietnamese

and American peoples. – Among the southerners, a wide variety

of media was used: meetings, leaflets, lectures, rumor campaigns, rallies, protests, stage dramas, etc.

– All were directed at enhancing the legitimacy of the government in the north.

Three Action Programmes

• Action among the military:– Aimed at persuading South Vietnamese

civil servants and military personnel to defect or desert.

– Promised rewards, undercover agents to spread dissension, intimidation, influence through friends and family, etc. are typical of the tactics used within this program.

Three Action Programmes

• Action among the people:– This was within communist controlled

areas and primarily involved administrative measures (recruitment, tax collection, organization).

– This action provided safe base areas for the Vietcong forces, raised revenues, and portrayed the image of societal stability under communist rule.

Che Guevara & Regis Debray

• If a guerrilla operation is not in direct contact with a socially favourable situation, if the really powerful social charge that is ready to explode is somewhere else …. then clearly there must be a definite link there, between the two, the detonator and the explosive, the vanguard and the moving forces of the revolution.

Che Guevara & Regis Debray

• That link is a system of communication and supplies - men, information, orders, arms and ammunition, food - operating in both directions between the guerrillas and the town centres.

• Such a system is both technical and political since the technical operation - with contacts, couriers, reinforcements - is inseparable from its political content, and the importance it is given in the guerrillas' general scheme of things.