Indian Air Force to be deployed ‘against naxalites’:

Heightened state terrorism

In his independence day address, Prime minister Manmohan Singh spoke of the ‘twin threats of terrorism and naxalism’ and of the need to devise ‘new methods’ to deal with them. Shortly afterwards, a leading T.V. channel reported that the Indian Air Force would be assisting the ground security forces in ‘naxalite-infested regions’. PV/MEL vigorously denounces this increased state terrorism, whose main aim is to crush the struggles of the people of these regions against their intensifying exploitation and dispossession, at the hands of the Indian and foreign monopoly capitalists.

The regions referred to, such as Jharkhand, Chhatisgarh, parts of Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and others, are extremely rich in mineral wealth, forests and other natural resources. As long as mining remained primarily the monopoly of the state sector, very little of the vast mineral wealth of these regions was actually explored and extracted. The local inhabitants, predominantly tribals, have been completely marginalized, neglected under the economy and deprived of any form of development. They have been militantly fighting back against their barbaric exploitation at the hands of the state officials and forest contractors and have often taken up arms against the state.

In recent times, these regions have been thrown open to some of the biggest global corporate giants, Indian and foreign, such as Posco, Mittal, Tata and others. There have been concerted efforts by the big monopoly capitalist corporations, both Indian and foreign, to take over huge tracts of mineral rich land in these regions to set up new plants. As a result, the original inhabitants of these mineral rich areas are threatened with large-scale displacement from their land, forests and homes, loss of their traditional means of livelihood, destruction of their natural habitat and forced to accept conditions of greater exploitation and misery. These moves have been militantly resisted by the inhabitants, as has been witnessed in Kalinga Nagar in Orissa and in other places. The Indian state has in each case come out shamelessly defending the interests of the big monopoly capitalists, violently attacking the protestors and unleashing the most brutal kind of state terror on the tribals and other inhabitants.

In his speech, the Prime Minister also shed tears about ‘those who have been left out of the benefits of the accelerated capitalist growth’. These are nothing but crocodile tears meant to try to fool the people. If our rulers were indeed so concerned about these utterly marginalized, exploited and deprived sections of the people, then surely this would warrant a reorientation of the economy to fulfill the needs of the exploited and oppressed, rather than the greed for superprofits of the big capitalist monopolies. It would certainly not warrant treatment as a ‘law and order’ problem, unleashing brutal state terror on the people resisting their exploitation and oppression, in order to defend the interests of the biggest capitalist monopolies, as our rulers are doing today and preparing to do even more forcefully in future.

The ‘new methods’ of increased state terrorism that the Prime Minister referred to, including the involvement of the Indian Air Force, are significant. They reflect the thoroughly anti national and anti people character of our rulers, who are ready to go to any extent to fulfill the rapacious claims of the big capitalist monopolies over the land, labour and rich natural resources of our people.

The massive security apparatus of the Indian state, including the armed forces, which is being further beefed up constantly, is a sign of the growing alienation of our rulers from the people over whom they rule and whom they are supposed to provide security. The daily experience of all sections of the toiling people is showing how this ever expanding security apparatus only serves the interests of the big monopoly capitalists to reap their super profits, while unleashing more and more brutal forms of state terrorism to smash the resistance and the aspirations of the toiling masses.