In this Issue
People’s Interests are the only Interests of the Party
(In Lieu of Editorial) - CHARU MAJUMDAR
We republish here an abridged version of the last article of the founder General Secretary of CPI(ML) to pay tribute to him on 28 July, his martyrdom day. Obviously the article was written in a very different historical situation. Still, with the UPA government in its second avatar mounting a major assault on democracy and people’s livelihood, the call to “carry forward the work of building the Party among the basic masses and develop a common front with the broadest sections of the people”—the left ranks in particular – “on the basis of struggle… against [an increasingly oppressive] Congress rule” assumes a new relevance today. And of course, the great revolutionary optimism based on unflinching faith on the masses and the communist spirit of treating the people’s interests alone as the party’s interests remain a hallmark of our party, and so they forever will.
“W
e have suffered a setback after the armed struggle in our country reached a certain stage. It is our task now to preserve the Party. In order to preserve it we have to build the Party among the broad masses of workers and peasants. We shall be able to get over the setback and raise the struggle to a stage higher than before, if we can build a politically united party. I hope we shall be able to do this within a short time.
“…Our India is a vast country. The people of this country are groaning under exploitation and oppression. Gradually these two camps — the exploiters and the exploited — are moving towards a confrontation. Discontent is smouldering among the exploited people. They will refuse to submit to oppression for a long time. There will be spontaneous outbursts of the people's resentment in different places. When the resentment of the people of this vast country will explode, no reactionary government will prove powerful enough to put it down. So the fall of the reactionary government is inevitable. That is why the reactionary Indira government has been trying to build up a strong Centre, for they can anticipate the future awaiting them. This vast country has many problems. Moreover, they have created another problem— ‘Bangladesh’. Tamil Nadu has already raised the demand for autonomy. The vast region between Bihar and Gujarat is inhabited by adivasis. There is no limit to the exploitation of the adivasi masses. The workers in the industrial areas of Maharashtra are victims of severe exploitation. Terrible is the exploitation of the peasantry in Mysore; the same is true of the other regions in the south. One cannot calculate and predict beforehand when the unrest among the oppressed people of our country will find its expression and in what form. …
“On the other hand, the heroic people of Vietnam have emerged as a source of courage and inspiration to the people of the entire world. They are waging a struggle that has no parallel. If Vietnam is liberated, fire will blaze up throughout South-east Asia. …
“An upsurge is coming — a country-wide upsurge. We must keep this upsurge in view. Only then shall we have confidence in ourselves. In the days before, we witnessed upsurges in one or two districts. The one that is approaching will spread over a far wider area and will attain a still higher stage than in the past. One should bear in mind that the advance of struggle is not evolutionary but revolutionary. …
“Is it possible for us to lead the coming upsurge in all places? Certainly not. The struggle in areas where it will be led by our Party's conscious leadership will set an example to the struggles in other areas where there will be no such leadership. If we can institute agrarian reforms in some areas today, these may take place spontaneously in many other areas during the revolutionary upsurge. Our conscious leadership will bring about an armed revolutionary upsurge and through this armed revolutionary upsurge our leadership will gradually be established everywhere.
“It is our duty today to carry forward the work of building the Party among the basic masses and develop a common front with the broadest sections of the people on the basis of struggle. It is possible to build the broadest united front against Congress rule. Today the “leftist” parties refuse to provide leadership to the common people in the struggle against the oppression of the Congress. The worker-peasant masses that are within the folds of those parties therefore have a lot of grievances against their leaderships. We have to carry on efforts to unite with them on the basis of united struggle. Even those who once acted as our enemies will come forward in special circumstances to unite with us. We must have the largeness of mind to unite with such forces. Largeness of mind is a quality of the Communists. Today, it is the people’s interests that demand united struggle. It is the people’s interests that are the Party’s interests.”
REJECT THE FARCICAL ‘ENQUIRY’ BY THE NHRC ! STAND UP FOR TRUTH AND JUSTICE
The National Human Rights Commission’s so-called enquiry into the Batla House ‘encounter’ has pronounced the Delhi Police innocent of any foul play. Interestingly, the NHRC’s investigations into the police action on 19th September are based on evidences provided by those accused of encounter alone. The Commission’s enquiry is based on the responses of the following officers of the Delhi Police:
(1) R.P. Upadhayay, Additional Commissioner of Police, Vigilance; (2) Satish Chandra, Special Commissioner of Police (Vigilance), Delhi; (3) Neeraj Thakur, DCP (Crime & Rly.), Delhi; (4) Karnail Singh, Joint Commissioner of Police, Special Cell, Delhi.
As it appears from the Report, the Commission did not even bother to pay a visit to the Batla House locality and Flat No. 108, L-18, the site of the said encounter. There has been no attempt to collect the versions of the eyewitnesses, neighbours or relatives of those killed. The Fact-finding reports of various civil rights groups including JTSG’s (Jamia Teachers Solidarity Group) Encounter at Batla House: Unanswered Questions, a damning indictment of the police version with corroborative evidence has been given no cognizance. Applications filed by individuals from Azamgarh wishing to depose before the Commission were ignored and not even acknowledged.
The Commission also cites the post mortem reports of the deceased, which have thus far been treated as state secrets. While wounds suffered by the slain police officer has been provided with great detail such as the places in the body where bullet injuries were found, their impact, ‘entry and exit points’ etc. Even the injury suffered in the arm by injured Constable Balwant Singh carries all this information but the same treatment is curiously absent in the case of Atif and Sajid, the slain ‘terrorists’. It mentions the injuries and bullet entry wounds on Atif’s and Sajid’s bodies but refuses to consider the fact that Sajid had several bullet wounds on his forehead and head regions, which suggests that he was shot while made to crouch or squat.
Further, in both Atif and Sajid’s case, the postmorten report mentions ‘several ante-mortem injuries including firearm wounds’. This only suggests that there were at least a few ‘non-firearm wound’. In what circumstances were these caused? The enquiry team provides us with no explanation. In the absence of any description, the suspicion that they could have been tortured before being encountered gets strengthened.
In the police’s defence, it cites the serological report which says that the blood group matching that of Atif, Sajid and Balwant Singh (the police man who was injured in the 19th September operation) was found on the floor, gate, drawing room, walls, gate and furniture of the flat No. L 18. So what does this prove or disprove? Except that two people were killed and another injured. But most interestingly, it does not mention at all whether the blood matching the blood group of Inspector Sharma was found in the flat.
This is glaring as the Commission’s report in the very next few paragraphs confidently corroborates the police version that a “volley of bullets was fired on the police team as soon as it entered Flat no 108, L-18..through the side gate. …” If Balwant Singh was “also with Inspector Sharma” and sustained bullet injuries leading to the spilling of blood mentioned in the serological report, how is the serological report completely silent on the blood of Inspector Sharma?
The weapons which killed Inspector Sharma, W/2 and W/3, according to the Commission, belonged to no one in the police party, and were therefore quite obviously it concludes, the possessions of the slain youth, Atif and Sajid. The NHRC here places an implicit faith in the Delhi Police, and chooses to ignore what the civil rights activists have been saying from day one, that no panchnama or seizure list was prepared in the presence of any independent witnesses, as is procedurally required.
It also refuses to comment on questions being raised on the police claim that two alleged terrorists escaped during the operation, declaring it to be beyond the scope of its enquiry. In fact, it seems to be accepting the police version that ‘each flat has two doors and a crowd had gathered outside at the time when the exchange of fire was on’. Going by the police version the NHRC concludes, ‘in the melee it was possible for some persons to escape’. But the contradiction in the police report itself is not taken note wherein it is claimed that while Inspector Sharma led a few staff inside the building, the rest of the team members were guarding the ground floor. Now, had the NHRC team visited the site, it would have noticed that even if the flats have two gates, but the entry gate to the building is only one, on the ground floor and that was being manned by the police party. The residents of the other flats had been told to stay inside, but this again could be gathered only if the NHRC team had recorded the eyewitness accounts. How could it be possible for the two alleged ‘terrorists’ to flee?
The NHRC has conveniently skirted all uncomfortable questions in its urgent rush to declare the innocence of the Delhi Police. Coming as it does, in the wake of the botched up enquiry into the Shopian rape and murder case, raises serious doubts over the credibility of enquiry commissions and bodies such as the NHRC. By ignoring all contrary voices, the NHRC has proved itself to be a propaganda arm of the state, and not the independent custodian of human rights of the country’s citizens, as it was created to be.
All those interested in the pursuance of truth and justice must reject this farcical, partisan and shameful mockery of an enquiry. We reiterate our demand for an impartial judicial enquiry by a sitting judge of the Supreme Court to look into the entire issue emerging from the Batla House encounter.
NHRC’s Report Burnt right Opposite it’s Building
Several protesters belonging to the CPI(ML), AISA, JTSG, Association for the Protection of Civil Rights (APCR) and others protested this farce right outside the NHRC building on 24th July evening. A copy of the report was burnt. Com. Kavita Krishnan, CC member- CPIML, Tanweer Fazal from JTSG, Shabnam Hashmi from ANHAD, Mahtab Alam of APCR and Aslam Khan from AISA among others addressed the assembled protesters.
Initiatives against Repression in Lalgarh
On 9 July AIALA, RYA, and AIPWA organized protests in the districts of Nadia, Burdwan, North 24 PGS, Jalpaiguri, Hooghly at their respective district HQs. On 14 July AIALA and CPI(ML) jointly organized a sit-in at Midnapore city. Beside these activities Party comrades and mass organizations are also associated with Lalgarh Manch, a solidarity forum working in Kolkata in support of the ongoing movement by PSBJC. The Party supported the Bandh called by PSBJC on 8 July at Jangalmahal.
On 21 July Mamata Banerjee held a grand rally to commemorate Bengal's martyrs - claiming to pay tribute to all martyrs including those of Left-led struggles like the Tebhaga struggle. There was a glaring gap: the heroic revolutionaries and youth of the Naxalbari movement who bore the brunt of Siddhartha Sankar Ray's reign of terror cannot fit into Mamata's narrative. Exposing Mamata's politics and challenging CPI(M)'s as well as Congress' latter-day reign of terror, CPI(ML) will observe a cultural-political campaign in and around Kolkata from 20 July (martyrdom day of Prabir Datta, who was killed during Siddhartha Shankar Ray’s reign of terror) to 5 August (martyrdom day of Comrade Saroj Dutta), observing Charu Majumdar's martyrdom day on 28 July.
Massive Protest against RTE Bill in its Present Form
Organised by the All India Students’ Association (AISA), the Students and teachers from DU, JNU and Jamia Milia Islamia held a protest demonstration and burnt effigy of the UPA’s farcical Right to Education (RTE) Bill in the present form on 22nd July at Parliament Street in New Delhi.
The RTE was unanimously passed by the Rajya Sabha on July 20, and will soon be tabled in the Lok Sabha. The UPA is claiming that the RTE Bill is historic but the fact of the matter is that the RTE Bill is not designed to bring crores of poor children within the ambit of the education system. “The RTE is its present form has several fundamental, structural problems and ambiguities that shelve it of any potential to really provide universal right to education. Rather than providing free government schools for all, it proposes that 25% seats will be reserved for poor students for “free education” in private schools. The RTE claims that this quota will be filled by providing “education vouchers” to poor students. However, these vouchers will only amount to the fees that a student has to pay for admission in a government school”, said AISA’s Delhi Secretary Rajan Panday. “Do Mr. Kapil Sibal and the MHRD believe that there is ANY comparison whatsoever in the fees charged by government schools and private schools?” asked Sandeep Singh, president JNUSU. “Apart from the admission fees, how will a poor student bear the burden of “picnic fees”, “exam fees” and several other such costs that private schools regularly demand?”, he added.
Rather than demolishing the wall of privatized, high cost schooling by bringing in government-funded quality schooling for all, it reinforces the wall. “While leaving the rampant exploitative private schooling system untouched, and refusing to provide universally available government schools free from the profit impulse, it proposes ‘Private-Public Partnerships’ through which private profiteers are allowed entry into government-run schools,” said Aslam, General Secretary AISA Jamia unit. For the more than 77% of our population which subsists on less than Rs 20 a day, this Bill is nothing other than a document of deceit and lies – ‘Right to Education’ turned upside down. Later, demonstrators burnt an effigy of the RTE Bill.
Following the demonstration, the All India Forum for Right to Education called a press conference at the Mavalankar hall cafe. Speaking at the conference, noted educationist Prof. Anil Sadgopal strongly condemned the RTE in its present form. Releasing a message of solidarity against the RTE from Prof. P.M. Bhargava, former Vice Chairmain of the Knowledge Commission and noted scientist, Prof. Sadgopal said, “There is only one answer to providing universal education — a Common Schooling System where every school [including the private schools] will be a neighbourhood school. But it is this one solution that all the torturous provisions of the bill could not come close to.”
Sibal’s Effigy Burnt in WB
On 23rd July, in protest against the tabling of the Right to Education Bill in the Rajya Sabha, AISA organized a procession in Kolkata. The procession, dotted with banners and placards covered the area around College Street and finally blocked traffic in front of Presidency College. AISA leaders called for a militant student agitation against the attempts of the UPA government to subvert the constitutionally guaranteed right to free and uniform primary and secondary education through the aforementioned bill. An effigy of the bill was then burned. On the same day, a procession was organized inside Sarat Centenarry College at Dhaniakhali in Hooghly district. An effigy of Kapil Sibal, Union HRD minister, was burnt. Com. Chandan Hansda, National Council member, AISA, addressed the gathering.
Fate of a Schoolgirl in
Nitish’s ‘Good Governance’
The rampant abduction of schoolchildren and inaction of police and administration against criminals and mafia caused a wave of popular anger against the former RJD Government. Riding that wave, Nitish Kumar came to power on a promise of “good governance” (sushasan) and stern action against crime. The shocking story of an abducted schoolgirl exposes the lie behind those promises.
15-year-old Pinki Kumari of a village adjoining Darbhanga town was abducted on 15 May 2007. The Bahadurpur thana refused to lodge an FIR. An FIR was eventually lodged on the court’s orders, following a petition by her parents. The main accused Amit Kumar is the son of Brahmanand Tiwari, who works in the Education Department and is embroiled in illegal recruitment scams. The DSP Parvez Akhtar corroborated the charges and ordered the arrest of the accused. The IG Shri Kanaujia ordered that a special campaign be undertaken to retrieve the girl, and that Pappu Mandal, also suspected of involvement, be taken into custody and questioned. On 14 February 2008, however, IG Ganesh Kumar Yadav said the case was false, and in fact ordered that the girl’s parents be prosecuted under Section 182/211 for leveling false charges. The parents were beaten up by the accused and threatened with dire consequences unless they withdrew the case. Although an FIR was lodged regarding this violence, the police took no action.
It is shocking that the girl’s parents approached the Chief Minister’s own famed ‘Janta Durbar’ (Open Court) no less than 13 times! Yet no action was taken to recover their daughter; rather they were harassed and threatened by the abductors as well as by police.
Recently, the girl was recovered by Begusarai-Khagadia police from a brothel. This happened on the basis of an appeal made by the girl’s uncle to the Women’s Commission. The girl testified in Darbhanga Court about the facts of her abduction.
On 15 July, the CPI(ML) addressed a joint press conference along with Pinki Kumari and her parents, demanding arrest and punishment for the officials who played a role in suppressing the case and protecting the accused. The party along with the girl and her family charged that the JD(U)-BJP Government were protecting the accused because the latter’s father is part of the education mafia, which has close links with the Government. Compensation was demanded for the girl and her family for the trauma and injustice they had suffered.
Following widespread press coverage, the matter was raised in the Assembly. Its back to the wall, the Government has said it will ensure that all accused including the woman who runs the brothel will be arrested and their premises searched; cancellation of bail of the main accused; and a fresh enquiry into the whole matter headed by the ADGP.
AICCTU’s Demonstration at Guwahati
A massive demonstration of AICCTU was held at Guwahati in Assam on 21st July on the burning issues of the tea workers and unorganized workers of Assam. A militant protest procession started from Guwahati Railway Station that ended
at Deputy Commissioner’s office, Kamrup, Guwahati, and handed over a memorandum to the Chief Minister of Assam. It demanded to raise daily wage of tea workers to Rs. 200/-, monthly fixation of electricity charge for every tea workers family at Rs. 40/-, setting up of construction workers’ welfare board, separate legislature for women domestic worker association, to raise wage of construction workers to Rs. 300/-, check price rise, to fill up back log in different industries and govt. deptts., budgetary allocation of money for sick and closed industries, modernization of Assam State Fertilizer and Chemicals Ltd, make permanent the contractual and casual workers, ensure job cards to all and 100 days works etc. The demonstrators handed over another memorandum to the Chief Minister from the Asom Samgrami Chah Sramik Santha.
Rural Workers’ Massive Demonstration Demanding Special Assembly Session
At Guwahati on 7th July near about two thousand agrarian workers raised their strong voice of protest against Tarun Gogoi Government’s rampant corruption in different rural schemes including implementation of NREGA. This state-level protest demonstration was called by Sadou Asom Gramin Sramik Santha (SAGSS) and participated by the rural workers of Nagaon, Jorhat, Tinsukia, Dibrugarh and Kamrup districts. The protest procession marched from Guwahati Railway Station to the Deputy Commissioner’s office and handed the DC a memorandum addressed to the Chief Minister of Assam.
The 7-point memorandum includes the demand of a special session of Assam Assembly to discuss rampant corruptions at Panchayat level including implementation of NREGA. The memorandum demanded high level enquiry and a white paper on corruption of civil supplies, check prices, withdraw price hike of petroleum goods, issue BPL cards to all rural poor, ensure 50 Kg. food grains and 5 liters Kerosene at the price of Rs.2 through PDS and supply 25 of items as essential goods under essential commodity act. The memorandum demanded job card and job to all card holders and otherwise to pay unemployment allowance to them. It demanded to increase daily minimum wage to Rs. 100/- and payment must be done within 15 days and otherwise to pay wage with compensation under the provisions of Wage Act 1936. Moreover it demanded house to the homeless under IAY. Patta of the land, land to the forest dwellers under forest right act, 2005 are another demands of the memorandum. A brief meeting was also held at the dharna place, where Com. Rubul Sarma, CPI(ML) State Secy, Com. Arup Mahanta, Gen. Secy. SAGSS and Biren Kalita, President AICCTU Assam, addressed the people.
Punjab Struggle Update
The agricultural labourers of Punjab’s Malwa region continue their struggle against the severe repression unleashed on their movement for homestead land. As we go to press, 10 CPI(ML) activists still remain in jail, though the State Secretary Rajvinder Singh Rana and some other leaders eventually have been released.
A petition has been filed in the HC demanding compensation of Rs. 10,000 per head, to be paid from the pockets of the police officials responsible for the illegal arrests of the over 1300 agricultural workers.
On 19 July a Mansa-level Cadre Convention was held which was addressed by AICCTU general Secretary and Punjab Party in-charge Comrade Swapan Mukherjee, youth leader Kanwaljeet Singh who had just been released from jail and other comrades. State-wide conventions have been held at 50 places all over Punjab at block, and tehsil level, jointly addressed by leaders of CPI(ML) Liberation, CPI(ML) ND, and MCPI.
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