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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | 'We want a dialogue between Naxalites and the government' by Jyoti Punwani

'We want a dialogue between Naxalites and the government' by Jyoti Punwani

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published Published on Dec 17, 2010   modified Modified on Dec 17, 2010

Manish Kunjam , a former MLA and president of All India Adivasi Mahasabha, the tribal front of the CPI, is the only politician in Bastar who continues to organise Adivasis peacefully for their constitutional rights. Jyoti Punwani spoke to Kunjam about doing politics while facing police repression and Naxal violence:

After a long gap, Chhattisgarh recently witnessed two massiveAdivasirallies.What were your demands?

The Chhattisgarh government is running under the writ of corporates. From Bastar to Sarguja, MoUs cover almost the entire region. This is Adivasi land and their livelihood is threatened. So the main demand of the December 8 rally, under the banner of the Chhattisgarh Bachao Andolan , was to implement the laws relating to scheduled areas, which empower gram sabhas. These laws are not being implemented because doing so would hurt the profits of the corporates.

The November 25 rally was to protest against the arrest of our comrades under false cases, and demand the removal of Dantewada SSP Kalluri. Instead of arresting Naxalites for their crimes, police are arresting activists of CPI and other mass organisations . Ten of our leading activists are in jail with five to seven cases of murder against them. The Naxalites attacked Congress leader Avdesh Gautam, but our activists were arrested, including Sukul Prasad Nag, a 65-year-old popular leader who was hounded out of his village by Naxalites in 1994. The police beat up our activists even before they could reach Dantewada for the rally. Two hundred were injured, including women; many ran away, but we could get 25 of them to hospital, some with broken limbs. When we protested to the collector, he said he would pay for the treatment of those admitted to hospital.

Will such repression force your cadre into inaction?

If that happens, democratic ways of protest will come to an end. Then only two forces will remain: the police and the Naxalites . The latter don't believe in the Constitution; the former are supposed to follow it, but don't . If on both sides you have inhuman tactics, the use of guns and bombs, you can imagine what will happen to the society affected by them. The country's intellectuals should think about this.

Has the Supreme Court's intervention made any difference ?

There has to be some monitoring of the court's orders. If the other pillars of democracy, like the press, don't function either because they've been suppressed or managed, then who will monitor ? The country's laws simply don't apply to some areas of Chhattisgarh. When the government itself doesn't respect the law, how can Naxalites be asked to do so? People with national standing, those who care about the Constitution, must come here and study the situation, not NGOs or PUCL. There has been such propaganda against them, even in the press, of being Naxalite sympathisers , that their coming here only aggravates the situation.

Sometime back there was talk of dialogue between the Centre and the Naxalites, but that has died down.

We want a dialogue. If violence is used as the only solution by both sides, then a large section of the Adivasi population will be finished. The responsibility for initiating a dialogue lies with both sides. The Naxalites' position at this moment is so strong among the Adivasis that they can, through dialogue, bargain with the government for many strong measures that would protect Adivasis, their culture, and their natural right over their lands and forests. If they don't do this, it would be a mistake, because they may not remain in such a position five years hence.

The Times of India, 17 December, 2010, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/We-want-a-dialogue-between-Naxalites-and-the-government/articleshow/7115316.cms


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