Book Review: Manoranjan Mohanty,Red and Green: Five Decades of the Indian Maoist Movement

The book under review is a cynosure on both experiencing Indian democracy and the experience about Indian democracy. The former exhibits the nature of Indian democracy and the later points out engagement with Indian democracy by a slew of constituencies. What makes this book more important and relevant to our discourse towards a democratic society is its prosaic, unambiguous statements and rigorous theoretical profundity. Manoranjan Mohanty, an outstanding political scientist who shaped the subject through his numerous contributions (particularly the ‘idea of creative society’) and a China scholar, brings two rare qualities of a social scientist in this book. His description amounts to ‘experiencing an event’ in place of a ‘mere historical event’. Second, the theoretical perspicacity in this work is striking which delineates analysis from perception. This book brings back the necessity of social science into the services of the exploited. Randhir Singh in his book Reason, Revolution and Political Theory makes this point very explicit.

The book has two parts. The first part is a reproduction of the 1977 edition of Revolutionary Violence: A study of the Maoist Movement in India. The second part deals with contemporary issues and concerns raised in the previous part. The moot question asked in this book is why revolutionary violence or a revolution cannot be a top-down-mechanical-approach. In spite of everything, revolutionary/revolution is a humane initiative because a revolutionary’s precondition is unconditional love towards oppressed. I will be looking into five aspects of the book which are crucial to comprehend its edifice.

First, vantage point of the book is a crucial component to unravel the complexity. Revolutionary violence is sans violence and encompasses ‘radiated humanism’. Mohanty insists that ‘[n]o instance of inhuman torture, such as cutting human limbs, summary trials and executions, shooting of person alleging them of being informers can pass as a permissible action under this revolutionary strategy’ (p. viii). Moreover, fetish of violence and fetish of non-violence both are problematic. In this context, Maoist movement in India faces three challenges. The first problem pertains to theoretical challenge as to how to rearticulate theory of people’s democratic revolution. Second is, how to understand democratic space being provided by parliamentary democracy. Third, Maoist movement has to prove its superiority over social movements which have a direct bearing on consciousness of people. The challenge before the Indian state is to overcome its non-addressal of structural questions.

In addition to it, there is a discursive violence which closes the possibility of alternative explanations. Meaning is fixated. ‘There is a growing phenomenon of discursive violence that has shifted attention from government and politics to governance, from relations to empowerment, from equality to inclusiveness, to give a few indicators’ (p. xiv). The purposive task of the book is to combine two desired realms. These realms are red and green. Red represents justice and equality whereas green denotes ‘sustainability’. In other words, justice and equality are inseparable from sustainability.

Second, movement occupies herein an uncontested space in terms of origin, expansion and decline. Naxalite movement (eventually Maoist movement) needs to be judged on four important criterions: strategy, environment, ideology and organisation. It is important to demonstrate that environment constraints interaction between ideology and strategy, and that ideology constrains the interaction between environment and strategy. Here organisation plays an important role to balance acts. In other words, there has to be interaction amongst all. Ideology needs to understand environment and strategy must be based on environment. In case of Indian Maoist, Indian environment was understood by way of applying Maoist ideological tools. This application, however, remained mechanical due to non-exploration of Indian realities. It gave pre-organisational activities without organisation for revolutionary activities and invention of ‘small squad actions’. This strategy was not based on dialectical synthesis of ideology and environment. ‘There is sufficient indication that the Maoists presumed that the environment in India was essentially similar to the environment in pre-liberation China’ (p. 108).

Along with it, Lin Pio’s 1965 essay on People’s War about annihilation of class enemy had enormous impact. Eventually, three criticism (particularly of Charu Mazumdar) on mass movement (abandoning mass struggle in urban areas), squad actions (narrowing class struggle to guerrilla warfare and further reduction to squad actions; utter subjectivism) and united front (not broad united front) were raised within Maoist discourse. Furthermore, Independence of Bangladesh confounded Maoists more due to initial (and crucial) Chinese’ policy. Mazumdar supported Bangladesh liberation which was against Chinese policy. China so far had supported Maoist Movement openly through press, most importantly ‘Spring Thunder over India’ editorial. China’s reaction to Bangladesh liberation was based on the assumption that it had the backing of USSR (Maoist perceived USSR as social imperialist/or USSR represented social imperialism). Mazumdar took Chinese line on every other issues; his stand on Bangladesh was the only crucial aberration vis-à-vis China’s policy. This gave opportunity to anti-Mazumdar group who were disagreeing with him on the idea of mass organisations, activities in urban areas and line of class annihilation to oust him. Mohanty makes succinct remarks in this case. He suggests that ideology or outlook can be borrowed from outside but not strategy. Maoist did this fundamental mistake.

Mohanty suggests that revolutionary movement in 1960s had brought two contradictions—‘contradiction between popular goals and the constitutional system’ and ‘contradiction between parliamentary struggle within the India Maoist movement’ (p. 275); two short-term impacts—necessity of land reform and radicalisation of politics (p. 276), and two consequences—‘violent means as a “legitimate” mode of social change in the eyes of many people’ and mass activism in politics (p. 277). Of late, as Mohanty suggests, Maoists have organised big mass movements and developed organisation. Human rights must be given priority while understanding state–Maoist relationship.

Third, political history comes in form of narratives. It discovers and analyses Maoist Movements in states like West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha and Kerala. It is a history of communist movements and their differences. It is a history of China and India of their formative stage and different political system. Political history of India is necessary to unravel communist movements in India.

Fourth, political theory is writ large in the book on two accounts. First, political theory of violence suggests that absence of violence or not to be violent is not revolutionary rather it is the eradication of violence which is revolutionary. This applies to both source of violence and counter of violence. In this regard, the chapter on ‘The Ghinua Santhal Thesis on Violence’ becomes extremely important (pp. 391–395). This thesis, in place of violence in people’s movements, does put violence as a part of the broader political movement against structure of oppression, but this is a last resort. Such violence does not target ordinary people. It is resorted to by people like Ghinua, who loved humanity and was a close friend of nature (p. 394). Second, political theory of communism is vividly available. Mohanty did not use the term ‘Maoism’ but Maoist Outlook which comes closer to Mao’s ideology. By not evoking the term Maoism, he denies its independent existence while clubbing it with ‘Marxism-Leninism Mao tse Tung Thought’. In other words, capitalism, organisation and indigenous experiments are important. Put differently, outlook is extremely important along with empirical reality. Empirical reality cannot be borrowed.

Fifth, adivasis face serious dispossession and deforestation in the context of primitive accumulation of capital. Constant attack on adivasis also paved the way for assertion of livelihood, dignity and selfhood. There are three components to comprehend perspectival take concerning advisais, namely, state, civil society and academia. State has not kept its promises to fulfil the aspiration of tribals. Civil society under brahmanical influence treated adivasis from civilising mission standpoint. While academia has taken serious note of various practices of adivasis, it has not changed the reality much. Mohanty suggests that

The State, civil society and academia can find liberative possibilities if they recognise the full magnitude of the evolving process of adivasis awakening which is much more than merely a violent challenge to authority. (p. 303)

This book is highly valuable and recommended for suggesting that democracy will triumph if inequality and injustice are abandoned; violence will triumph if equality and justice is abandoned. Thus, the conclusion is—save democracy through promotion of equality and justice. Democracy (supported by equality and justice) and violence are inversely related. In a conflict between democracy and violence, democracy takes priority and in absence of democracy, the latter becomes an option. The book not only engages and convinces the reader on the arrival of democratic society/creative society but also provokes to disagree on violence. This provocation further forces us for following summation that democracy precedes violence, not otherwise. This is the sui generis aspect of the book.