We witnessed yet another spectre of wasted human lives and devastation in Lower Assam - Kokrajhar, Barpeta road and Bongaingaon - on Thursday, October 30 where more than 75 people were killed. This followed blasts earlier this year in Imphal, Kanpur, Malegaon, Modasa, New Delhi, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Jaipur and in the last six years in various cities across the country. Bombs have exploded in mosques and temples, trains, market places and busy nakas, bus depots and railways stations. With each such incident, there has been loud clamour by various parties of the ruling class, to introduce fascist laws to curb democratic rights of the masses.

The official propaganda that follows every blast immediately points fingers at the numerous "terrorist outfits" that could have carried out this criminal act. Names of real or imaginery organisations are bandied about. The kind of explosives used and the vehicles used to carry the explosives - cycles, auto rickshaws or tiffin boxes - appear to provide the "clues" necessary for the investigating agencies to declare that it is one or another of these outfits or even a partnership of more than one. In the recent Assam blasts, it was first announced that "the chemical mix of bombs hints at Huji-Ulfa joining hands". Just recently, the tune has changed and a Bodo organisation is being blamed for the same. At this point, it must be noted that the ULFA has accused the Indian Army of planting the bombs.

The official propaganda is that there are disaffected people in our country who vent their frustration through terrorism, that there are antagonistic neighbouring states like Pakistan and Bangladesh that want to de-stablise Indian democracy; that they nurture, train and provide weapons to various groups that then infiltrate the borders; that some of these groups have established bases in the country, in Bangalore, Pune, Surat or Jaipur and have established links between Kerala and J&K, and Assam and Gujarat!

All this propaganda completely hides the fact that the principal source of terrorism is the Indian state. Whether it was the terrorism in Punjab in the 1980s, the terrorism in Assam and the North East over the past three decades, the destruction of Babri Masjid in the 1992 and the terrorism unleashed on the people of Mumbai and Surat, the genocide in Gujarat following the Godhra incident or the bomb blasts in the various cities across the country in the last six years, - the hand of the Indian state, its intelligence agencies and armed forces, and its main political parties needs to be exposed.

Some recent history of state terrorism in India

The 1980s was a decade when the peasantry of Punjab were taking part in massive protests against their immiseration as a result of the "Green Revolution". It is known that the Congress Party in power at center and in the state, deliberately sponsored various groups to set Sikhs and Hindus against each other. The Golden Temple was attacked by army tanks and hundreds of men, women and children were killed in the army attack. Indira Gandhi's assasination was the pretext for state organised massacre of Sikhs in 1984, with the Congress Party openly supervising the genocide.  Meanwhile, the intelligence agencies of the state set in motion various shadowy groups and organised the merciless kilings of Hindus in buses. Aftrer every such killing fingers would be pointed at some real or imaginery organisation with the name "Khalistan". Thousands of innocent Sikh youth were massacred in state terrorism unleashed in the name of fighting terrorism. Subsequent revelations from top police officials of Punjab have revealed the hand of the police in the massacre of the innocent people of Hindu faith.

State terrorism was unleashed all over the country following the destruction of Babri Masjid in December 1992. Who does not know that in Mumbai and Surat and elsewhere, organised gangs acted in full view of the police and officials and were sponsored by the major political parties? The identity of the organisers of the 2002 genocide of Muslims in Gujarat is very well known.

In the states of the North East, the Indian state developed "counter insurgency" as a tool to crush the movement of different peoples for their rights. The Indian armed forces and intelligence agencies have tried to divide the different communities and peoples, and created various real and imaginery outfits which carry out terrorist attacks as well as communal killings. The same has been carried out in Kashmir as well.

The latest revelation of the involvement of a Lt. Col of the Indian army in the Malegaon blasts is just the tip of the iceberg. He is reported to have obtained licenses, by virtue of his position, for procuring weapons handed over to the terrorist organisation which is alleged to have carried out the bombing; he is reported to have organised for their training at the Bhonsale Military School in Nashik. The government is trying to make out that this is the case of a "maverick", that the armed forces and intelligence agencies are not involved in organising terrorism.

Can such forces operate across the country without the blessings and connivance of the state security forces? In Assam, and in J&K, where there is virtual military occupation, how can the intelligence agencies and the army be unaware of "terrorist outfits"? Terrorism in India has always been state organized with the full participation of the ruling party and opposition parties, either Congress Party or BJP, or both. The attempt to blame “Hindu fundamentalists", "Islamic terrorists” and so on is to divert attention from the role of the Indian state and the main parties of the ruling class in organizing terrorist attacks. The fact that till date those who have been guilty of these crimes have not been tried and punished only reveals that the "terrorists" are different arms of the state - the intelligence agencies, police, army, political parties, etc.

What is the purpose behind state terrorism? The Indian state is an organ of the rule of the bourgeois class that imposes the agenda of a narrow stratum of society - an exploiting minority, on the entire people.  Such an anti-social agenda can only be imposed by keeping the people divided and paralysing the popular opposition to the agenda of the bourgeoisie. 

History clearly shows that state terrorism is the preferred method of rule whenever the ruling class wishes to impose a fresh set of anti popular measures and has to reckon with the rising opposition of people.

Rajiv Gandhi carried out the modernisation program in the backdrop of the genocde of Sikhs. The Narasimha Rao regime launched the first round of liberalisation and privatisation in the backdrop of the destruction of the babri Masjid. After nine more years of this reform program, genocide of Muslims was organized in Gujarat in 2002, at a time when the BJP had unveiled the so-called second generation of capitalist reforms. Six and a half years later, the Indian bourgeoisie is moving ahead with its imperialist agenda and the next set of liberalisation and privatisation measures. Organized acts of terror have been unleashed once again, in the name of ‘Islamic terrorism" and "fundamentalism".

State terrorism assists the ruling bourgeois class in justifying the imposition of fascist laws to curb the rights of people and crush any opposition to its agenda. Draconian laws such as TADA, POTA, MCOCA, AFSPA, Chhattisgarh Public Safety Act, etc. have all been justified by the state in the name of 'fighting terrorism'. However they have led to no decrease in incidents of terrorism, instead innocent people, activists of various peoples organisations fighting in defence of the rights of people have been arrested, killed and tortured. In some cases such as TADA, POTA, public outcry against the torture of innocent persons under these laws have forced the state to withdraw them.

The Indian state is the fountainhead of terrorism. Terrorist attacks on innocent people are not going to end till the rule of the bourgeoisie is replaced by the rule of the workers and peasants, which will reorganise the state power and wield it in the interests of the vast majority in society.