But then…
So what if you are one of the top leaders of one of India’s largest underground Maoist party. You still need to get in touch with the wife. In an interview with Romita and Aveek Datta, Mint’s intrepid reporters, Communist Party of India (Maoist) politburo member Koteshwar Rao says:
My wife Maina is now at [...]
Prachanda’s actions isolate the Maoists
The question of the induction of the Maoist insurgents into the Nepalese army—a force they spent a decade fighting—has boiled over into, what else, a crisis.
Pushpa Kamal “Prachanda” Dahal, the Maoist prime minister, would like them to be absorbed immediately. Others, not least the army chief, thinks otherwise. That’s why the [...]
Nepal’s Maoists splinter along predictable lines
Over at mesocosm Aditya Adhikari has cogent analysis of the factional disputes among Nepal’s Maoists.
(Prachanda), the Maoist chairman is facing the greatest threat to his leadership at a time when his party has gained the strongest position ever. According to conventional narrative, the Prachanda faction wishes to institutionalize the federal [...]
What do you with a problem like Gyanendra?
From Nepal comes news of an royal billing dispute. After doing away with the monarchy and nationalising many of the royal assets—including the main royal palace—the government of the new republic wants King Gyanendra to cough up payment for the electricity the royal family used while he was [...]
Has anyone articulated how the citizen’s militia will be disbanded?
Prakash Singh, a distinguished police officer and a member of an expert group set up by the Planning Commission to study the Naxalite problem, dissents from the group’s conclusions and argues that the Salwa Judum was a “spontaneous movement expressing the resentment of the tribals against [...]
Nepal is Nepal, and India is, well, India
“If the Indian Maoists have something to learn from their Nepali comrades,” Siddharth Varadarajan argues, “the same is true of the Indian establishment as well. While Nepal’s erstwhile ruling parties are building peace with their Maoists, India is stuck with the disastrous Salwa Judum.”
Now the use of Salwa [...]
New dogs, old tricks
Some commentators have characterised the electoral performance of the Maoists in Nepal’s constituent assembly elections as catching India by surprise. That’s not entirely incorrect. Though polls have a tendency to get pundits wrong, election results surprised most people, including the Maoists themselves.
Does this mean India should be more worried about its [...]
The battle in the Supreme Court
The correct way to challenge dubious government policies is to take them to court. So the citizens who filed a public interest litigation (PIL) against the Chattisgarh government’s use of an armed militia to take on the Naxalites did the right thing.
The case is still in progress, but the [...]
The Hindu returns to mislead, obfuscate and yes, bat for Beijing
As expected, the The Hindu has published an entirely one-sided editorial supporting Beijing and condemning the Dalai Lama and the Tibetans. Why it took so long to come might not even be a mystery, in this age of instantaneous international communications, considering that Beijing decided [...]
Where The Acorn interprets the Mahabharata
Continuing the discussion on Naxalism, Gautam Sen points to an op-ed by Nandini Sundar, a sociologist from the Delhi School of Economics, and a member of the Independent Citizen’s Initiative (ICI) that investigated the situation in Chattisgarh in July 2006. Similar to the position the ICI takes in its report, [...]
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