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India behind the Games

Philip Ferguson The Spark November 2010

In the lead-up to the Commonwealth Games the media was full of criticisms of India.  All these, however, revolved around whether the Games’ facilities would be finished and good enough, what the quality of the athletes’ village was and whether athletes would be safe from the supposed dangers represented by Islamic fundamentalists.
What was never touched upon in any serious way was the position of the mass of Indians themselves.  Indeed, the media continues to promote the number one global myth about India: that it’s the world’s biggest democracy.  In point of fact, India is a country marked by lack of democracy, by vicious state repression and huge inequalities of wealth and power. Continue reading “India behind the Games”

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"Free, free Kobad Ghandy"

Demonstration outside Indian embassy WellingtonFree Kobad demo WellingtonDemonstrators gathered at the Indian High Commission in Wellington to protest against Operation Green Hunt and the detention of Kobad Ghandy.
Kobad is a Maoist political leader, imprisoned since October 2009. His arrest is part of the Indian state’s attempt to crush all opposition.
Operation Green Hunt is a counter-insurgency strategy where tens of thousands of armed forces are trying to wipe out the Maoist movement that has support though a third of India. Read more here.
The protesters rallied outside the Indian embassy then marched to parliament. Chanting “free, free Kobad Ghandy”, and “stop the war on the poor” they handed out leaflets to the public and marched on into the city centre speaking about the lack of genuine democracy in India and the growing state repression.

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India – Stop Operation Green Hunt

PROTEST 12 midday Thursday 29 April

High Commission of India, 180 Molesworth Street, Wellington
India is at war. The government calls it ‘Operation Green Hunt’, and has sent tens of thousands of armed police and paramilitary troops to the vast forest region of Dandakaranya.

Arundhati Roy speaking with Maoists

There are two Indias – one is the new high tech economy; the other is the 800 million people who still live in poverty. The poorest of the poor are tribal people in the forests. Over the last thirty years they have joined India’s revolutionary Maoists and set up democratic organisations and a People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army (PLGA). The territory they are active in has been dubbed ‘the Red Corridor’. Continue reading “India – Stop Operation Green Hunt”

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India's Maoist spokesman interviewed in The Hindu

The Communist Party of India (Maoist) is a banned revolutionary party leading a revolutionary movement which has  support in more than a third of the country.
The party’s spokesman, Azad,  has been interviewed by The Hindu, a widely read publication. In this interview Azad talks in detail about the armed struggle,  how and why it developed.
You can download the interview  here: Azad’s Interview with The Hindu
or read it on line here:
http://beta.thehindu.com/news/resources/article396694.ece

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Protest against India's state terror

One of India’s leading Maoists Kobad Ghandy is facing charges under India’s repressive laws which have been denounced by human rights activists.

Kobad is a campaigner for liberation against Indian state terror.

Join the demo to free Kobad Ghandy and protest against Operation Green Hunt, India’s war on the poor.

12 midday Thursday 29 April
High Commission of India, 180 Molesworth Street, Wellington

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Arundhati Roy on India's revolutionaries

In February 2010, unannounced, Arundhati Roy decided to visit the forbidding and forbidden precincts of Central India’s Dandakaranya Forests, home to a melange of tribespeople many of whom have taken up arms to protect their people against state-backed marauders and exploiters. She recorded in considerable detail the first face-to-face journalistic “encounter” with armed guerrillas, their families and comrades, for which she combed the forests for weeks at personal risk.

 http://kasamaproject.org/

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Indian government starting 5-year military offensive against revolutionary forces

The Spark November 2009
Jared Phillips

 The revolutionary movement in India, under the leadership of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), has expanded its base over the last three to four years through regroupment of the movement and also through consolidation of its support in urban centers. Consequently, the Indian state has extended its ban on the party. Previously the political ban was imposed on the party in several states mainly in the east of the country. Now there is an ‘all-India’ ban on the CPI(M). The party has established peoples’ committees in three states, and has done so in-part in other states. Continue reading “Indian government starting 5-year military offensive against revolutionary forces”