Author	Suba Chandran and Mallika Joseph
Publication	Searching for Peace in Central and South Asia
Year	2002

Summary

In India, the term 'Naxalite' refers to a variety of revolutionary rural struggles. The Naxalite movement shuns participation in electoral politics and attacks the landed classes directly in a bid to liberate entire territories from feudal and capitalist exploitation. Although it has an ideological following all over the country, it is mainly restricted to three states: Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand, and Bihar. The Naxalite movement, which started in the late 1960s, has undergone numerous splits due to ideological and personal reasons. The efforts taken by the various state governments have contained the movement but 'liberated zones' continue to exist. The Naxalites operate in areas that on one hand have very low levels of income and very low human development indicators, and on the other hand suffer from extreme forms of economic and social polarization. The state governments, rather than addressing the security needs of the landless laborers most affected by the violence or providing protection to villagers at risk, have approached it as a law-and-order problem. Civil-society sympathy for the Naxalites' cause and concern about the repression by police and the private armies of landlords (the so-called senas) is mixed, with misgivings about the more extremist tendencies within the Naxalite movement.

India has a long history of peasant uprisings. From the 1930s onwards, communist-inspired organizations and movements have been in the forefront of the struggle for land and tenancy reform. The agitation was especially powerful during the last years of colonial rule and during the first years of independence when the government of India dragged its feet on land reform and compromised with the feudal landlords. In 1946, Bengal witnessed a large-scale tebhaga ("three shares") movement among sharecroppers, which demanded the reduction of the landlords' share in the crop from a half to one-third. Landlords had been using force to take at least half the harvest. The peasants, guided by the kisan sabhas (peasant unions), forcibly seized two-thirds of the harvest, leading to violent clashes. The landlords fled and the kisan sabhas temporarily established control in many rural areas.
In subsequent decades, the popularity of the communist peasant leaders declined in some areas, such as Punjab and Andhra Pradesh, but the movement has endured in Tripura, Kerala, and West Bengal, three states where communist parties have repeatedly headed popularly elected governments. When this happened for the first time in 1967 in West Bengal, a populous state plagued by feudal forms of exploitation and suppression in agriculture, a section of the leftist communist party, the Communist Party of India–Marxist (CPI–M), broke ranks and opted for a radical alternative. They rejected participation in multiparty governments, and electoral politics in general, and opted for a nonconciliatory attack on the landed classes.
While a left-dominated front was forming the government in Calcutta (in 1967), three sharecroppers with the help of 150 members of the breakaway wing of the CPI–M, armed with sticks, bows, and arrows, removed the entire stock of grain from a landlord's granary. This happened in the village of Naxalbari in the narrow corridor between Nepal and what is now Bangladesh that connects mainland India with the northeastern states. Peasants and tribals have continued to be oppressed by unscrupulous landlords and moneylenders, and the local leaders in Naxalbari considered government intervention too slow, too legalistic, and too moderate. Their revolt signaled the birth of a new armed struggle.
The struggle, inspired by the Chinese Communist Party, was initially led by the Communist Party of India–Marxist-Leninist (CPI–ML) under the chairmanship of Charu Mazumdar. Very soon, dissent erupted and gradually the party disintegrated into numerous breakaway factions, all claiming to be less revisionist in ideology and more revolutionary in practice than the others. Since then, all forms of armed struggle by such groups that have taken up the cause of socioeconomic development of the downtrodden rural masses have come to be termed "Naxalite."
In West Bengal itself, where the government has been quite successful in implementing land reforms, the movement did not endure beyond the late 1970s. In many other areas in eastern India, semifeudal conditions have remained. The semifeudal conditions have been exacerbated by the failing government machinery and by the formation of senas (armed squads) by the upper castes and classes to safeguard their socioeconomic and political interests.
Today, a dozen Naxalite groups operate primarily in the states of Bihar, Jharkhand, and Andhra Pradesh (AP), and in pockets in the neighboring states of Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Chattisgarh, and Orissa, although other states may also be incidentally affected. Most groups are disorganized, lack popular support, and continuously face splits, but the People's War Group (PWG) in AP and the Maoist Communist Centre (MCC) in Bihar and Jharkhand are the two best-organized, and most ruthless, Naxalite groups in India.

Conflict Dynamics

In Andhra Pradesh, the revolutionary peasant movement was of great significance at the time of independence. An armed struggle emerged as early as 1946 in the princely state of Hyderabad. The movement, first against the Nizam and then against the government of India, is known as the Telengana Armed Struggle. It started as a revolt against the continuation of feudal land ownership and the oppression of the poor peasantry and tribals by landlords. The communist-led movement "liberated" more than three thousand villages, but, ultimately, after more than four thousand revolutionaries lost their lives, was suppressed by the Indian army. Again in 1961, a violent movement under the banner of Srikakulam Armed Struggle sought to liberate the deprived hill people from the clutches of the plainsmen who had alienated them from their land and oppressed them economically. Coordinated police action resulted in the collapse of this movement.
Extremist activities in AP began once again with the formation of the People's War Group in 1980. Presently, fifteen of the twenty-three districts in AP are affected. The two parties to the conflict are the government, represented by the police, and approximately nineteen Naxalite groups. The PWG is predominant among them in terms of party organization, network, manpower, and striking capabilities: it has about one thousand full-time underground cadres, three thousand overground militants who are organized into four military platoons and further into dalams (forest squads).
In the last couple of years, activities have intensified after a decline in the mid-1990s. In October 2001, the Coca-Cola plant was attacked. The attack, in response to the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan, caused substantial damage without affecting the production process. One month earlier, in a single action, the PWG killed nine policemen in Guntur district.
The aim of the PWG is to capture power through the strategy of protracted armed struggle and an areawide seizure of power by initially building bases in rural and remote areas. These bases would eventually be transformed into guerrilla zones and later into liberated areas that would ultimately encircle the urban centers of power.
The security forces as well as police and government offices have been the main targets of the PWG, but most victims have been civilians. Of the nearly three thousand casualties since extremism started, less than five hundred are policemen, the rest being civilians. Analysis of the casualty list shows that only a quarter of the civil victims belonged to the high castes. The others belonged to the lower classes, "scheduled castes," and "scheduled tribes," the very sections whose cause the Naxalites are supposedly championing. Naxalite activities thus also appear to be associated with the struggle to eliminate the political influence of other organizations such as the parliamentary communist parties, among others.
In Bihar, similar conditions exist as in the most backward areas of AP. The feudal nexus of big landowner, rack-renting, and market control has left millions of poor peasants, sharecroppers, and agricultural laborers in abject poverty and oppression. Communist parties had been reasonably strong in some pockets of the state and mass movements were active, but revolutionary violence erupted only after the developments in Naxalbari. From West Bengal, revolutionaries went over into Bihar and assisted locally in the organization of revolutionary cells. The CPI–ML was formed at Musahari in 1967 under the leadership of S. N. Singh. After Singh left the organization in 1971, as in the neighboring West Bengal, the movement very soon underwent various splits. In the early 1980s there were at least three major Naxalite parties: the CPI–ML (Liberation), MCC, and CPI–ML (Party Unity).
CPI–ML (Liberation) is said to be active in thirty-six districts and to have five thousand full-timers and a membership of more than two hundred thousand. It runs five organizations: the All-India Students Association, Bihar Pradesh Kisan Sabha, All-India Coordination Committee of Trade Unions, All-India Progressive Women's Association, and Jan Sanskriti Manch. Dipankar Bhattacharya is the Liberation's national general secretary. In 1977, the organization, then under the leadership of the influential Vinod Mishra, decided on a "rectification" program.
This program resulted in the creation of the Indian People's Front (IPF) and the decision to participate in elections. The first initiative (the IPF, meant to unite all anti-feudal and anti-imperialist forces) failed to attract other groups and the IPF was discontinued in 1994. The second initiative was reasonably successful. Particularly in Bihar, some of its candidates were elected to parliament. The other two major segments of the Naxalite movement (Party Unity and the MCC) have not "rectified" their political line and have continued to operate as underground movements.
The rectification by CPI–ML Liberation resulted in the MCC emerging as the most radical and militant of the Naxalite groups in Bihar. The Maoist Coordination Committee was originally established as the Bengal–Bihar Special Area Committee in the early 1970s, but was renamed the MCC in 1975. It became very powerful during the second half of the 1980s. The first major massacre in which the MCC was involved took place in 1987 when it brutally killed forty-two persons belonging to upper-caste Rajput families in the Aurangabad district of Bihar. The MCC has been fighting the upper-caste/class landlords in Bihar and their private armies (senas) ever since. It is said to be active in thirty districts, and to have three hundred professional revolutionaries, sixty armed squads, and thirty thousand members. Like the CPI–ML Liberation, it has various front organizations such as the Krantikari Chhatra League (students), Communist Yuva League (youth), Naari Mukti Sangh (women), and Mazdoor Mukti Sangh (workers). The organization has been banned since 1987.
The CPI–ML Party Unity was formed in 1978; after the mid-1980s it went through a number of splits and in 1999, it merged with the People's War Group. It is active in twenty-five districts, and has various front organizations including the Majdoor Kisan Sangrami Parishad (agricultural labor), Shramik Sangharsh Manch (workers), and Bharat Naujawan Sabha (youth).
The most gruesome killings in Bihar have been related to the ongoing caste-war, in which the sena (see Chapter 7.8.7 survey on this conflict) is one of its opponents. In March 1999, thirty-five upper-caste villagers were killed in Jehanabad in retaliation for thirty-three lower-caste killings by the sena earlier in the year. Other attacks, such as the attack by the MCC in Jharkand in September 2001, killing thirteen policemen, were aimed at the security forces.
It should be emphasized that the differences between these Naxalite groups that continue along the nonparliamentarian path have to do more with personal clashes among the leadership and less with their ideology. Invariably, all the Naxalite groups work toward the same objectives, and use the same methods.
The Naxalite groups have enough weapons to operate at the local level, but they do not pose a threat at the supralocal level. Some groups in Bihar, Jharkhand, and AP are equipped with sophisticated arms including AK-56s. These weapons, however, are few: according to a news report, the MCC possesses one thousand weapons, including more than a dozen AK-47s and AK-56s. Most of the weapons have been looted from licensed holders or snatched from the police during raids on police convoys. Interestingly, there may also be a nexus between established political parties and some Naxalite groups.
It is generally known that there is a nexus between leaders of several political parties and the rebel outfits, both in Bihar and AP. In return for votes or support in general, some leaders of the Bharatya Janata Party (BJP), the main party in the government coalition in New Delhi, may have gifted AK-47 rifles and money to Naxalite outfits. On the other hand, they are also supporting the private armies of the landlords, the so-called senas. Reports from other areas in the country also suggest that this may be the case. A report tabled in the Maharashtra assembly in December 2000 established that in the Naxal-affected districts (Gondia, Chandrapur, and Gadchiroli), forest contractors and local businessmen are being forced to fund Naxalites in their area. The report also suggested that most of the businessmen actually exploit tribals and consider funding the Naxalite groups operating in the region a good investment.
The Naxalite groups exploit the vacuum in the administrative machinery to attract the masses by their campaign against various social evils such as the dowry system, exploitation of lower castes by the upper castes, theft, rape, and prostitution. The failure of the government administration and the armed power of Naxalite groups such as the MCC and the CPI–ML "People's War" in a number of areas (for example in Palamu and Daltonganj in Bihar, and in Warangal, Adilabad, and Karimnagar in AP) has created a different type of law and order.
According to Arjun Prasad Singh, joint-secretary of the All-India People's Resistance Forum, law and order in the Naxalite-infested areas is far better than in other areas. Even some landlords have started supporting the Naxalites. According to a report in The Week (20 April 2000), out of the 3,207 villages in Palamu district, Naxalites operate in 1,700. There are only three big landlords left in the district, which once had nine kings, 2,100 zamindars, and six thousand landlords. Bonded labor has been abolished and no employer dares pay less than the wages fixed by the state government. The exploitation of tribal women and collection of tolls by local goons have also stopped. But it is a fact, the local reporter adds, that the ultra outfits collect money from forest contractors, traders, and landlords in exchange for peace. The contractors are only too happy to contribute to the Naxalite coffers. A contractor was quoted as staying: "Before the Naxalites came I had to grease the palms of policemen, forest officers and local criminals. Today I have to go to only one place." Top Naxalite leaders defended this by saying they have not used the money for committing crimes but for people-oriented schemes.
The MCC and Party Unity hold jan adalats (people's courts). Jan adalats are usually held at night after a notice is issued to the villagers. These "courts" are gaining in popularity since the settlement of cases in government courts is costly and time-consuming. Moreover, the Naxalites are able to deliver on their verdicts, which the government courts often fail to do. Similarly, in the field of education, Naxalite groups in a number of areas have taken over the educational system and have made sure that it works. They are often the people's only insurance against demanding policemen, criminals, and landlords, and against upper-caste teachers who had been drawing salaries without doing any teaching.

Official Conflict Management

In general, government intervention has concentrated on military efforts to eliminate the "Naxal problem" rather than focus on the demands that the revolutionary groups have raised. Extrajudicial executions by security and police forces have been documented by international human-rights organizations and Indian civil-liberties groups. The police routinely claim that the killings occur in so-called encounters. Moreover, the Naxalite threat has been used to justify state violence against all forms of peasant resistance and against other critics of state policy. A Human Rights Watch report has stated:

Police have also repeatedly engaged in excessive use of force when dealing with Naxalites. Under the pretext of seeking out Naxalite militants police have conducted raids on Dalit villages and falsely arrested those accused of harboring Naxalites. In some cases, federal paramilitary forces have been deployed. Like the private militias, police have sexually assaulted women and attacked children who remained behind after the men fled the villages.¹

The official response to the Naxalite problem takes place at three levels, first at the state level in which the individual states deal with the problem; second at the union level, in which the union government provide funds and security forces to tackle the Naxalite groups; and third at the intrastate level, where the states cooperate with each other to deal with the situation.
The government of the state of Bihar has banned all Naxalite organizations, except for CPI–ML Liberation, and has provided financial assistance to the families of the victims. The state government launched a number of centrally assisted schemes aimed at providing better infrastructure and communication facilities, and at providing employment, but ineffective administration, corruption, and class interests made them unproductive. In December 2000, the governments of Bihar and Jharkhand mounted a coordinated offensive against the Naxalites; Bihar also put together a special task force with 150 commandos for anti-Naxalite operations and deployed them in hypersensitive areas. Additional policemen are undergoing specialized commando training. They appear, thus, to be addressing the situation more as a security problem than as a socioeconomic problem.
The government of Andhra Pradesh has adopted a multipronged approach to the Naxalite problem. Since the issue has its origins in socioeconomic underdevelopment, attempts have been made to address this by special programs for youth, the formation of cooperative societies of tribals, the improvement of primary health centers, village water-tank repairs, the provision of drinking water, roads, schools, youth clubs, etc.
The police have formed a special anti-Naxal force (the Greyhounds), which is specially trained in guerrilla warfare and equipped with sophisticated weaponry. A coordinated and consistent police action has resulted in the elimination of most of the top leadership of the movement and the year 2000 saw extremist-related killings decrease by around 20 percent. The enforcement agencies are positive that the two-decade-old problem will soon be solved.
The AP government has also tried to win back the peasantry by redistributing some of the land in the north Telengana region and has initiated programs to lure the Naxalites into surrendering by helping them to reintegrate into the mainstream society. Since 1993, when the program started, nearly four thousand Naxalites have surrendered and more than one thousand have been rehabilitated. During the last couple of years, the government has approached the left-wing extremist problem less as a police (law-and-order) problem and more as a socioeconomic issue. Those who surrender are rehabilitated. The rewards include the distribution of Jeeps, tractors, and auto rickshaws along with financial assistance to start shops. For this purpose, rehabilitation mela (fairs) are organized, attended by politicians and officials.
The Naxalites are opposed to any form of representative government under the present constitution and have issued poll boycotts. In the last ten years nearly 250 political leaders belonging to various political parties have been killed. Since other leftist parties, particularly the parliamentary parties, are catering to the same classes, it is not uncommon for leaders of these parties to be targeted.
Still, some understanding exists between the Naxalites and some political parties: it is not uncommon for right-of-center parties to seek the help of the Naxalites for getting elected in Naxal-dominated areas in return for the release of Naxalites or their sympathizers from prison and stopping police action against them. In Bihar and Jharkhand, leaders of almost every political party, including some leaders of the BJP and of the Samata Party, have been making efforts to keep the Naxalite leaders on their side. The parties do not openly condemn the Naxalites at public meetings and refer to them as misguided brethren.
The extent of support accorded to the Naxalites by the main political parties in AP remains unclear as the policy keeps fluctuating. The Congress government banned the PWG in 1992. Four years later, all curbs were lifted and the PWG was permitted to operate freely and hold meetings without any restriction, before it was banned again. N. T. Rama Rao, founder of the Telegu Desam Party, which then came to power, offered the Naxalites a "red salute" and called them "true patriots, who have been misunderstood by [the] ruling classes." The current TDP chief minister Chandrababu Naidu has expressed his willingness to hold talks with the outlawed PWG or any other Naxalite group and help them to reintegrate in society. The underground leadership of the PWG had recently said that it was ready for talks with the government. However, the PWG had laid several preconditions for the talks, including the withdrawal of the ban on the group and action against police officials involved in "fake encounters."
The role of regional and international organizations in this issue is minimal. The regional organization—South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (SAARC)—has no mandate to deal with these issues. India traditionally has been against any external involvement in its domestic issues. Besides, none of the other countries in the region or elsewhere has anything at stake in this ongoing conflict.

Multi Track Diplomacy

Whenever a massacre is perpetrated by the Naxalites, there is widespread condemnation of both the Naxalites and the governments for their inability to come to a negotiated solution, but on the ground improvements over the last quarter century seem to have been minimal. The media do play an important role in reporting whatever gruesome murders have taken place, but otherwise by and large are silent on the various social and economic issues underlying the conflict.
The state governments' response has varied according to the policies of political parties in power and the scale of the problem. While AP has banned the PWG, formed an exclusive counter-Naxal police force, and made it a punishable offense to provide food or shelter to the Naxalites, Madhya Pradesh is keen to negotiate with the Naxalites in order to solve the problem. A result of these disparate responses is that Naxalites committing crimes in one place flee to another where government policy is favorable to them. Following the killing of a high-profile minister from AP in March 2000, the union home affairs ministry has set up a coordination committee of the seven states most affected by leftist extremism. Their police chiefs have been meeting regularly. The central government has already granted several proposals submitted by the states for developmental activities that would help tackle Naxalism at the social and economic levels.
In some areas, the Naxalites have been able to muster public support among the downtrodden people. The polarization between the have-nots and the landed elite is sharp in areas in Bihar and Jharkhand where the Naxalites operate. The upper section of civil society, the upper classes and castes, finds the Naxalites hostile to its social and economic interests, and it has organized private militia called senas, particularly the Ranvir Sena, to safeguard their interests. As defenders of the interests of the poor villagers, Naxalites can count on a more sympathetic response from the villagers themselves. They give them shelter against the forces of law and order. NGOs such as the People's Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR) have taken sides in this caste and class conflict. In one of its reports, the PUDR considers the birth of Marxist-Leninist organizations and their growing support among the peasantry a direct outcome of the social order and the failure of the state to implement its own laws. A similar position is being taken by the People's Revolutionary Front. This ideological alignment with the Naxalite movement has somewhat diminished the neutral status of the PUDR, but it remains one of the foremost human-rights organizations in the country.
In AP, the Committee of Concerned Citizens (CCC), People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), Association for the Protection of Democratic Rights, AP Civil Liberties Committee (APCLC), and United Struggle Committee Against Fake Encounters are some of the organizations that have also raised their voices against police/government action against the Naxalites. They have frequently voiced their concern about the number of Naxalites who are killed in "encounters," labeling them "false encounters." In the wake of an "encounter" that left three central-committee members of the PWG dead in December 1999, civil-liberty activists were able to mobilize as many as forty-six different organizations and coordinate rallies protesting the police action.
The CCC and PUCL for years have been trying—unsuccessfully—to negotiate a settlement between the government and the Naxalites. However, as in Bihar, their position as a mediator is impaired by their focus on misbehavior by government staff and institutions, passing over terrorist acts by Naxalites. They have also tended to remain oblivious to the hardships caused to the people and damage to property by the Naxalites. The government therefore sees them as front organizations of the Naxalites. Consequently, their decade-long talks with the government have yielded little result. However, the reports they bring out and the press campaigns they organize are invaluable as sources that document the human-rights violations involved.
At the international level, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has been monitoring the problem for a long time and has made recommendations to the state and central governments. It has carried out a number of studies and investigations, and has approached the state government directly with a list of suggestions. These include the prosecution of senior officials found to be complicit in the attacks, the provision of full security to villagers, placing police pickets away from upper-caste areas, and creating independent commissions of investigation.

Prospects

The extremist communist movement is often analyzed as a highly fragmented and splintered movement without a proper road map, intent only on violence and destruction. Yet, in a number of districts, it has survived for many decades. The reasons for its endurance are related to a number of factors. First, land reforms have not been properly carried out and landlords have been left in effective control of land, credit, and labor markets. The major Naxalite outfits thrive on the issue of land redistribution and proper wages and labor treatment. Second, the governments, which are often controlled by the urban upper-class elites and the rural landlord class, have not extended infrastructural facilities to the remote and backward areas. Many villages in Jharkhand and Bihar are without even basic necessities such as schools, health centers, roads, electricity, and water. The government's failure has resulted in the growth of the Naxalite movement with its parallel governments there. In North Telengana, conditions are somewhat better, and the issue is more a law-and-order than a socioeconomic problem. The extremist groups operating there have become more interested in extortion than in the socioeconomic improvement of poor tribals and peasants. Finally, the collusion between vested political interests and extremist politics may be an added reason.
Some progress has been made. In West Bengal, the cradle of the Naxalite movement, extremist tendencies have been brought under control through an effective socioeconomic program, including land reforms, and an effective (police) administration. The success achieved by counter-Naxalite operations in AP registering an 18 percent decline in the year 2000 is a pointer to the general optimism that the movement can be brought under control.
Leftist extremism in the 1960s could be tackled more effectively due to a strong centralized authority and because basically the same party (the Congress Party) was in power at the center and in the states. With political fragmentation and with decentralization, law and order being a state subject, the effective response to the problem has been lacking. The states with a Naxalite problem have woken up to the need for concerted action and have had a series of interstate meetings beginning in December 1999. With the states' responses getting more organized than in the past two decades, the extremist movement will face greater challenges.

Recommendations

An effective response to Naxalism would have to include strategies at three levels. The Naxalite movement can thrive in an environment where economic development is lagging, where the old exploitative classes (feudal lords, contractors, and traders) have not been dislodged by modernization and development, and where the government machinery has not been made transparent by the pressure of a functioning democracy.
At the first level, the lack of socioeconomic development provides a breeding ground for discontent and extremist solutions. The implementation of tenancy reforms, protecting the rights of sharecroppers, and the payment of minimum wages require urgent attention. In some of the areas, land redistribution should help to create sustenance for landless labor families and curtail the power of landlords. Governments must ensure that existing facilities are properly utilized: schools, primary health centers, and government extension facilities should be run in such a way that the most downtrodden people have unhindered access. A basic-needs strategy, including a network of roads that makes the areas more accessible, will help to open the remote and backward areas to the outside world. If these conditions are fulfilled, the breeding ground for violent resistance will be reduced.
Second, law and order being a state responsibility, efforts at countering the Naxalite problem have until recently been undertaken only at the state level. There is a need for coordinated and uniform policies and for coordinated police action, including resource and intelligence sharing across the states, to tackle the problem from a law-and-order angle. There is also a need for evenhandedness by the police and administration, who tend to come down heavily on Naxalites yet remain inactive when private armies of landlords (senas) resort to violence.
A case could be made for the modernization of the police force in order to increase their effectiveness and morale. The problem, however, is to distinguish between terrorist activities and poor-people's movements, and it is imperative for the police to be evenhanded. All too often repressive behavior by the elite has not been curtailed or punished, and this permissiveness had been a breeding ground for terrorist reactions. Citizens' vigilance committees should be given an official status so that they can help in separating legitimate action against terrorist and criminal outfits and human-rights abuse in actions against rightful political activities.
The often repressive onslaught, of which genuine Naxalite organizations have been the target, often in fake encounters, should be considered as a human-rights abuse, and should be allowed to be investigated as such. On the other hand, the various Naxalite outfits should also allow civil-society organizations, other than the human-rights groups associated with them, to investigate cases of manslaughter and large-scale killings. Their extremist political stand continues to prevent a united front of all organizations and political parties fighting for the poor and thus in fact sustains the very power of exploitative classes and castes.
Social and economic rehabilitation programs to bring the discontented Naxalites into the mainstream would be helpful. Currently, only AP has a comprehensive package for rehabilitating surrendered Naxalites. The problem with such programs is that it may reward those who have held villages at ransom, and who continue to do so in alignment with mainstream political leaders. The programs have also been utilized by mainstream politicians in a secret understanding with Naxalite leaders. Development finances meant for the general good of the poor people in the affected areas should not take second position to the individual buying out of Naxalites willing to surrender.

Miscellaneous

1. Human Rights Watch report: http://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/india/India994-06.htm.

Service Information

REPORTS:	Human Rights Watch, Broken People: Caste Violence Against India's Untouchables, 1999: http://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/india/
OTHER PUBLICATIONS:	Imperialism and Revolution in South Asia, edited by Kathleen Gough and Hari P. Sharma. New York/London, Monthly Review Press, 1973. India's Freedom Struggle Betrayed, by Suniti Kumar Ghosh. Calcutta, Rupe, 1998. Inside India Today, by Dilip Hiro. London, Routledge, 1976. 'Love for the Outlaws', by Kanhaiah Bhelari. The Week, 30 April 2000: www.the-week.com/20apr30/events6.htm. Maoism in India, by Mohan Ram. Delhi, Vikas Publications, 1971. The Naxalites and Their Ideology, by Rabindra Ray. Delhi, Oxford University Press, 1988. The Naxalite Movement, by Biplab Dasgupta. Bombay, Allied Publishers, 1974. '30 Years of Naxalbari: An Epic of Heroic Struggle and Sacrifice': www.maoism.org/misc/india/cpiml/cpiml-pw/30years/30_Years.htm.
SELECTED INTERNET SITES:	www.aiprf.purespace.de/ (Web site of the All-India People's Resistance Forum, claiming to provide research documents, mainly on the People's War); www.cpim.org/ (The largest communist party, not involved in, but often victim of, Naxalite activities; good web site with linkages and regular updates); www.cpiml.org/ (A good source of CPI-ML documents, including Liberation, the monthly magazine of the organization); www.fas.org/irp/world/india/threat/naxalite.htm (Federation of American Scientists, Intelligence Resource Program; also info on MCC and PWG); www.ipcs.org/nmt/nax-index.html (An excellent source providing comprehensive coverage of newspaper reports on Naxalites); www.maoism.org/misc/india/india.htm (A couple of documents, mostly dated, of the CPI-ML People's War)
RESOURCE CONTACTS:	K. K. Mitra, IPS (Retd), tel: +91-11- 5616714; Ambrose Pinto, Indian Social Institute, e-mail: ambrose@unv.ernet.in; Ashwini K. Ray, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi 110067, India; Shankar Sen, IPS (Retd), Institute of Social Sciences, e-mail: sankar@ndf.vsnl.net.in; Yogendra Singh, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi 110067, India;
ORGANIZATION:	Center for the Study of Developing Societies, 29, Rajpur Road, Delhi, India 110054, Tel: +91-11-3951190 Fax: +91-11-2943450 E-mail: csds@del2.vsnl.net.in DATA ON THE FOLLOWING ORGANIZATIONS CAN BE FOUND IN THE DIRECTORY SECTION: Center for Policy Research; Institute for Conflict Management; Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies; People's Union for Civil Liberties.

About the author

Suba Chandran is a research officer at the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi. His areas of expertise include Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kashmir, religious fundamentalism, and terrorism. He has contributed to publications on these issues and to the Landmine Monitor 2000 and 2001. Mallika Joseph is a research officer at the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi. She has worked extensively on the issues of landmines and improvised explosive devices, particularly their use by nonstate actors including Naxalites. She has contributed to several publications and to the Landmine Monitor 1999, 2000, and 2001 as the researcher for South Asia.