‘Violence led to the fall of Maoism’

The man well past 70 years of age, dressed in simple shirt and trousers, wearing a faint yellow scarf around his neck, with a broad grin on his face and briskness in his walk, was a part of the powerful Central Committee of the proscribed organisation Communist Party of India (Maoist) … till he surrendered last year before Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis at Gadchiroli. His surrender made national and international news, because he was treated as the ‘brain’ or ‘ideological teacher’ of the Maoists in India. And, rightly so, his surrender marked the beginning of the end of Naxalism or Maoism in India. Because, soon after, several top Maoists either surrendered or got killed in encounters across India. On Monday, Union Home Minister Amit Shah declared India free of Naxalism.

“Emphasis on violence or military action, and failure to correctly assess the changing scenario led to the fall of Maoism in India,” Bhupathi tells ‘NewsBharati’ in an exclusive interview.

“Ideology must develop and evolve with changing social realities. If it does not adapt to change, it loses relevance. In the 1990s came liberalisation policy, followed by its progression and impact on society. We failed in bringing about change in accordance with this, and could not change the ideology to give ‘appropriate direction’ to the ‘struggling masses’. I debated on various ideological points, pitched for change, analysed the impact of various laws including the Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas (PESA) Act and Forest Rights Act and tried to convince Maoist ranks and file to work for implementation of these laws so that it could benefit the people and thus increase mass base of the Maoists. “However, CPI-Maoist leadership focussed mostly on military tactics and did not adapt to changing scenarios,” he elaborated.

Did ideological rift continue through the history of Naxalism to the present-day Maoists? Bhupathi responds with a serious tone. “In 1975, we prepared a Self-Critical Report to analyse Charu Mazumdar, who had said that ‘China’s Chairman is Our Chairman’. During that period, several statues of reformers were demolished in West Bengal. Our party identified the problems, and reached out to people post-Emergency. This had its impact and Naxalites expanded to more than 150 districts in 16 States. But, when PLGA was formed after the emergence of CPI-Maoist through the merger of Maoist Communist Centre of India active in the north and People’s War active in Maharashtra and the south, focus again shifted to militarisation. And, this proved to be a detriment.”

Lawful Means

“We will continue working for people, in accordance with the Constitution. We will take up issues of people and try to resolve those through lawful means. We will work on the Forest Rights Act, PESA Act, education rights, fundamental rights etc. We will work in whatever the capacity the Constitution permits. We may even contest elections, and participate in making laws. We wish to lead people towards an exploitation-free society, that is without discrimination on gender and such issues,” says Bhupathi. To many, this sounds as if the surrendered Naxalites/Maoists have not left their ideology but are hinting at adoption of Constitutional methods. But, he does not give any direct answer to questions in this regard.

Among the actions taken by the government that hit the Maoists hard was demonetisation. Some of the surrendered Maoists have stated that demonetisation actually hit their funding very hard. Bhupathi, however, tries to downplay the impact and says, “People fund the Maoists. Demonetisation did have an impact on funding. But, despite the demonetisation in 2016, I survived, and surrendered only nine years later in 2025. We survived despite demonetisation as funds are available. The only thing is that people moved away from armed methods and we pursued another direction. This created a gap between us and the people.”

Modi Impact

Did people move away from the Maoists because of developmental push by the Modi Government? Bhupathi nods in admission but fails to get rid of ideological bias that gets reflected in his reply, “We need to take people towards better development. World Bank, IMF reports show that income inequalities are increasing even as the country is witnessing fast pace of development.”

Urban Naxals

The Maoists’ documents categorise the ruling party as ‘primary enemy’ and the opposition as ‘secondary enemy’. Another factor that prompts this question is the allegations that there were ‘Urban Naxals’ in Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’. He laughs, trying to dismiss the question, and says, “Only Rahul Gandhi will know that. I was in the jungle not aware of these things.” Later, Bhupathi adds, “We treat every political party as the ruling class. What is the difference between the policies of Congress and BJP? One party moves slowly, and another takes a faster route to development. All are implementing the economic liberalisation policies.”

People’s Agitations

Popularly known as ‘Sonu Dada’ among the Maoist cadres in the Dandakaranya belt, Bhupathi observes that the Maoists failed to ‘utilise’ the people’s agitations. He elaborates that popular agitations reflect the sentiment of the society and offer the best opportunity to reach out to them and influence them. Citing some examples, he said that Maoists failed to make use of veteran social worker Anna Hazare’s agitation against corruption when it had become a national talking point. “Since 1975, people have participated in or supported various agitations ranging from railway workers’ agitation led by George Fernandes, Sampoorna Kranti agitation led by J P Narayan, farmers’ agitations etc. We failed to utilise these agitations to rally people,” he added.

But, Maoists had expelled their cadre named Darshan Pal from Punjab because he had participated in the farmers’ agitation of 2020-2021. Doesn’t this prove that Maoists did participate in farmers’ agitation?

PESA Act

Irrespective of skepticism, Bhupathi continues that when he tried to convince the Central Committee of CPI-Maoist to support implementation of PESA Act and rules regarding allotting land titles to tribals etc, he was branded as a ‘reformist’. In Gadchiroli, which was under the command of Bhupathi in a banned Maoist organisation, the PESA Act was implemented and it yielded good results, he says. But, due to opposition of the Maoists, it did not get implemented in Bastar in the adjoining state of Chhattisgarh. “Except in Gadchiroli, our party opposed its implementation elsewhere. But only Maoists are not responsible for non-implementation of the PESA Act. The government did not implement the laws sincerely, and the blame was pinned on Naxalites. Why was the law not implemented in Nandurbar, Bhandara, Gondia etc not affected by Naxalites?” he asks.

One Maoism

Confronted about the urban spread of Naxalites/Maoists, Sonu Dada said, “What is jungle Maoism, urban Maoism, and such shades? There is only one Maoism. as only one Mao existed. There cannot be different shades of Gandhian Socialism, Gandhian Marxism etc… only Gandhian thought. Similarly, there can’t be Urban Maoism, Jungle Maoism, Rural Maoism etc… there is only one Maoism.”

When the Maoist document ‘Urban Perspective: Our Work in Urban Areas’ focusses specifically on urban work, how can one deny the existence of ‘Urban Naxalism’ or Urban Maoism’?

Bhupathi admitted that Maoists do have the ‘Urban Perspective’ document. But, he adds, “After our Unity Congress in 2007, our Urban In-charge Cherukuri Rajkumar alias Azad was killed in an encounter. Others also got killed gradually. This affected implementation of whatever has been said in our documents. We have lots of documents ranging from ‘Urban Perspective’, ‘Financial Policy’, ‘Woman Perspective’… but we could not implement those.”

(The interview first appeared on the website of NewsBharati www.newsbharati.com)