Wednesday, May 31, 2017
Monday, March 2, 2015
DABHOLKAR TO PANSARE: Journey of Rabid Communal Terrorism
Ashok Dhawale
The dastardly assassination of Comrade Govind Pansare, the veteran 81-year old former CPI state secretary, national council member, trade union leader, eminent lawyer and prominent Marxist intellectual and writer – exactly a year and a half after the similar assassination of renowned rationalist and socialist Dr Narendra Dabholkar - has been another black mark in the recent history of Maharashtra. It may be recalled that Dabholkar was martyred in Pune on August 20, 2013; Pansare and his wife Uma were shot in Kolhapur on February 16, 2015 and he was martyred on February 20.
The fact that the assassins of Dabholkar and their political paymasters remain untraced even after a year and a half – and also the fact that the modus operandi of the killing of Pansare was eerily similar to the killing of Dabholkar – two men on a motor-cycle shooting their targets when they were on their morning walk - these have put the state government and the law and order machinery of the state to eternal shame. Not surprisingly, there is no clue yet about the assassins of Pansare and their political paymasters either.
Thousands of people led by the Left, democratic and secular political parties and mass organisations of all hues – Marxists, Gandhiites and Ambedkarites - immediately came out on the streets from February 16 onwards to denounce the cowardly attack on the Pansares and Comrade Pansare’s death four days later. Along with the CPI, the CPI(M) was in the forefront of the protest actions in all districts and most tehsils throughout the state. Both the print and electronic media gave prominent coverage to this tragic and shocking event.
The massive funeral procession of Comrade Govind Pansare took place in Kolhapur on February 21 and it was attended by thousands of people from all walks of life. The CPI state conference was due to open in Kolhapur on February 21 with a mass rally. Hence all the state delegates had gathered there. The sad and bitter irony was that instead of the mass rally, they had to march in the funeral procession of their tallest leader in the state.
CPI general secretary Sudhakar Reddy, CPI state secretary and national council member Dr Bhalchandra Kango, CPI(M) state secretary and central committee member Dr Ashok Dhawale, central committee member Narsayya Adam, state secretariat members Udayan Sharma and Ajit Abhyankar, state committee members Dr Subhash Jadhav, Chandrakant Yadav, M H Shaikh, Sidhappa Kalshetty and Umesh Deshmukh, Kolhapur district secretary Dr Uday Narkar, Satara district secretary Manik Avghade and all CPI(M) leaders from Kolhapur district marched in the funeral procession.
Among the other leaders who paid homage to the departed leader were senior PWP leader N D Patil, PWP general secretary Jayant Patil, Milind Ranade of the Lal Nishan Party, Kishor Dhamale of the Satyashodhak Communist Party, Subhash Ware of the Aap Party, Bharat Patankar of the Shramik Mukti Dal, Arjun Dangle of the RPI, Justice B G Kolse Patil, Ulka Mahajan of NAPM and many others. Some Congress and NCP leaders also laid wreaths.
All Left, democratic and secular parties and organisations have given a call for a massive joint march in Mumbai on March 11 to denounce the assassination of Comrade Govind Pansare and to demand the immediate arrest of, and stringent punishment to the killers.
The fatal attacks on Dabholkar and Pansare were not merely attacks on some individuals; they were attacks on reason, tolerance, democracy, freedom of expression, secular values and on the very dream of equality and justice. They were attacks on the rich secular and progressive tradition of India which includes Charvaka, Buddha, Mahavir, Kabir, Tukaram, Shivaji, Phule, Gandhi, Shahu, Ambedkar, Bhagat Singh, Periyar and so many others.
Why are such attacks taking place in Maharashtra today? And which are the forces towards which the needle of suspicion turns?
Dr Narendra Dabholkar was the President of the Committee for the Eradication of Superstition (Andhashraddha Nirmulan Samiti). Till his last breath, he consistently fought for the enactment of a law against superstition. The whole array of communal and obscurantist forces were notoriously against the enactment of any such law. The BJP and the Shiv Sena had time and again opposed Dabholkar’s original draft tooth and nail both inside and outside the assembly. The so-called secular state government of the Congress and the NCP, in spite of then having a clear majority in the state legislature, still did not display the guts to enact this law during Dabholkar’s lifetime. Finally, it was only under the mass public pressure following Dabholkar’s martyrdom that the state government enacted a greatly watered-down version of the law.
As the editor of the periodical ‘Sadhana’ that was founded by the legendary socialist leader Sane Guruji, Dabholkar always strove to uphold the values of democracy, secularism and equality. The murder of Dabholkar was a violent attack on these values themselves.
Although the background of the attack on Govind Pansare was naturally different, the essence of it was the same.
Two recent programmes organised in Kolhapur with Pansare’s initiative created a stir. Readers will recall that the shocking terrorist attacks in Mumbai on November 26, 2008, killed over 160 people. The most prominent among those who were martyred was the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) chief Hemant Karkare and other top police personnel. Karkare had done sterling work in the investigation of the Malegaon bomb blasts and had uncovered the involvement of Hindutva extremist elements represented by Pragnya Singh Thakur, Colonel Prasad Purohit and others. The same trail later led to the Ajmer Sharif and Hyderabad Mecca Masjid blasts and the attack on the Samjhauta Express. A few weeks before his martyrdom, Karkare had indicated that the net of investigation was closing in on several important bigwigs of the Hindutva brigade.
After the Mumbai terror attacks, a retired Inspector General of Police S M Mushrif, after careful personal study and investigation, wrote a book titled ‘Who Killed Karkare?’ He drew the conclusion that Karkare’s killing was not the handiwork of Pakistani terrorists like Ajmal Kasab, but was a diabolical conspiracy of the Hindutva extremist forces. It is clear that these forces had the most to gain from the elimination of Karkare. The book became a hit, ran into several editions and was translated into several Indian languages.
A few weeks before Pansare’s martyrdom, a talk by S M Mushrif on the topic ‘Who Killed Karkare?’ was organised in Kolhapur. The Hindutva communal elements opposed the programme tooth and nail. But Pansare put his foot down and insisted that the programme be held. There was a record turn-out for this talk by Mushrif, where he, Pansare and other speakers alleged that the killing of Karkare and Dabholkar could very well have been the handiwork of Hindutva extremist elements. After this event Pansare received anonymous post cards with a Pune post mark, threatening to make a Dabholkar of him.
Another programme took place in the Shivaji University in Kolhapur. Pansare was invited to deliver a lecture on the relevance of the thoughts of a leading social reformer Shahu Maharaj. While concluding the talk, Pansare took stock of current events and lashed out against the Hindutva communal campaign of the denigration of Mahatma Gandhi and the glorification of his assassin Nathuram Godse. Pansare declared that Godse and his associates were members of the RSS and the Hindu Mahasabha. There was an argument where an ABVP whole-timer tried to challenge this last statement of Pansare. But Pansare stood firm and put forward the concrete evidence of Godse’s communal connections.
For the last two decades, a small booklet written by Pansare called ‘Who Was Shivaji?’ has sold over one lakh copies in Maharashtra. In this booklet, Pansare strongly countered the totally false communal distortion of the life and work of this warrior-king, who has always been one of the icons of Maharashtra. Pansare did this on the basis of concrete historical evidence and he showed Shivaji in his true secular colours as the king of all communities and castes and, as Mahatma Jotirao Phule correctly described him, as the king of the peasantry. This effective work by Pansare had always been a thorn in the flesh of the communal forces.
The clash of ideologies is at the heart of the democratic system and needs to be encouraged at all levels. But instead of that, the hallmark of fascist and authoritarian forces has always been to suppress antagonistic thoughts by simply eliminating those who express them.
The assassination of Mahatma Gandhi within six months of gaining independence, by Nathuram Godse and his RSS-Hindu Mahasabha accomplices who also included V D Savarkar (who had submitted an abject apology to the British rulers while he was in the Andaman Cellular Jail), was the classic instance of such fascist authoritarianism. The glorification of such condemnable elements today gives an accurate indication of the climate of our times.
Two such instances took place in Maharashtra in the early 1970s. One was the assassination of CPI MLA Krishna Desai, and the other was the slaying of Dalit Panther activist Bhagwat Jadhav. Both these heinous acts took place in Mumbai, and they were the handiwork of Shiv Sena hoodlums. The first murder was aimed at breaking the Communist hold over the working class movement of Mumbai; the second was aimed at cutting down the influence of the militant Dalit movement that was then taking shape. It is an open secret that the Shiv Sena at that time had the full backing of Big Business and the Congress state government.
In its first stint in power in the late 1990s, the Shiv Sena-BJP state government hatched a diabolical conspiracy that was aimed at rooting out the strong CPI(M) influence in the tribal areas of Thane district. On the evening of Republic Day, January 26, 1997, under instructions from the state home ministry that was then in the hands of the BJP, the police without any provocation fired on a peaceful gathering of tribals in the Kavada village of Talasari tehsil. Two young CPI(M) activists – Lakshya Beej and Babu Kharpade – were martyred on the spot.
The police then slapped false cases on over 100 top CPI(M) leaders in Thane district, arrested them and put them behind bars. Tremendous repression was let loose in the Talasari and Dahanu tehsils by special camps of the State Reserve Police (SRP). All this was meant to dislodge the CPI(M) from its tribal strongholds in the Zilla Parishad and Panchayat Samiti elections that were due on March 3, 1997. Many of the CPI(M) candidates for this election had to fill their nomination forms from jail.
But the Party fought back this repression with great grit and determination and, in fact, won more seats in Thane district in these ZP/PS elections than ever before, with a record number of votes. In Talasari tehsil, both the BJP and the Congress lost their deposits in all the seats that they contested. The anti-communist game plan of the BJP was blown to smithereens.
After the 2012 ZP/PS polls, which also the CPI(M) won, BJP hoodlums attacked a dedicated CPI(M) tribal woman activist called Mathi Ozare and smashed her head with stones at night when she was going home. She died on the spot. During the election campaign, these BJP hoodlums had threatened to kill her if she continued to work for the CPI(M). Undeterred by such threats, Mathi Ozare continued to work sincerely and the Party won that seat. That is why she was killed. She became the first woman martyr of the CPI(M) among the 60 martyrs in Thane district who have laid down their lives since the famous Adivasi Revolt in 1945.
Five months ago, Hindutva hoodlums attacked the CPI(M) office in Pune in broad daylight, and no action was taken by the police. Just after the Modi regime came to power, the same brand of hoodlums killed a young techie called Mohsin Shaikh, again in Pune. Communal incidents and tension has perceptibly grown during the last few months in the state, as also all over the country with the advent of the BJP regime at the centre and in some states.
As a reaction to this, Islamist fundamentalist forces like the MIM are spreading their influence in Maharashtra among the minority community. Inflammatory speeches are being made by MIM leaders like Owaissi, and it could win two seats in the state assembly for the first time in the elections held last October. It stood second in half a dozen more seats.
The ideological roots of the RSS can be easily traced to the fascist regimes of Germany and Italy in the 1930s. RSS chief M S Golwalkar in his book We or Our Nationhood Defined had openly glorified the German Nazis under Hitler; and another RSS founder B S Munje had gone to Italy, met Mussolini and had similarly praised the Italian fascists under him.
In India, it is the Muslims and Christians who take the place of the Jews in Germany. The attacks against Communists, Socialists and all democrats are a common feature of both. The assassinations of Dr Narendra Dabholkar and Comrade Govind Pansare are clear indicators.
All Left, democratic and secular forces in Maharashtra have come together against this onslaught and have decided to organise a massive march to Mantralaya in Mumbai on March 11, 2015, to denounce the assassination of Comrade Govind Pansare and to demand that the assassins of both Dabholkar and Pansare, along with their patrons, are immediately identified and arrested and the strongest possible action is taken against them.
The dastardly assassination of Comrade Govind Pansare, the veteran 81-year old former CPI state secretary, national council member, trade union leader, eminent lawyer and prominent Marxist intellectual and writer – exactly a year and a half after the similar assassination of renowned rationalist and socialist Dr Narendra Dabholkar - has been another black mark in the recent history of Maharashtra. It may be recalled that Dabholkar was martyred in Pune on August 20, 2013; Pansare and his wife Uma were shot in Kolhapur on February 16, 2015 and he was martyred on February 20.
The fact that the assassins of Dabholkar and their political paymasters remain untraced even after a year and a half – and also the fact that the modus operandi of the killing of Pansare was eerily similar to the killing of Dabholkar – two men on a motor-cycle shooting their targets when they were on their morning walk - these have put the state government and the law and order machinery of the state to eternal shame. Not surprisingly, there is no clue yet about the assassins of Pansare and their political paymasters either.
Thousands of people led by the Left, democratic and secular political parties and mass organisations of all hues – Marxists, Gandhiites and Ambedkarites - immediately came out on the streets from February 16 onwards to denounce the cowardly attack on the Pansares and Comrade Pansare’s death four days later. Along with the CPI, the CPI(M) was in the forefront of the protest actions in all districts and most tehsils throughout the state. Both the print and electronic media gave prominent coverage to this tragic and shocking event.
The massive funeral procession of Comrade Govind Pansare took place in Kolhapur on February 21 and it was attended by thousands of people from all walks of life. The CPI state conference was due to open in Kolhapur on February 21 with a mass rally. Hence all the state delegates had gathered there. The sad and bitter irony was that instead of the mass rally, they had to march in the funeral procession of their tallest leader in the state.
CPI general secretary Sudhakar Reddy, CPI state secretary and national council member Dr Bhalchandra Kango, CPI(M) state secretary and central committee member Dr Ashok Dhawale, central committee member Narsayya Adam, state secretariat members Udayan Sharma and Ajit Abhyankar, state committee members Dr Subhash Jadhav, Chandrakant Yadav, M H Shaikh, Sidhappa Kalshetty and Umesh Deshmukh, Kolhapur district secretary Dr Uday Narkar, Satara district secretary Manik Avghade and all CPI(M) leaders from Kolhapur district marched in the funeral procession.
Among the other leaders who paid homage to the departed leader were senior PWP leader N D Patil, PWP general secretary Jayant Patil, Milind Ranade of the Lal Nishan Party, Kishor Dhamale of the Satyashodhak Communist Party, Subhash Ware of the Aap Party, Bharat Patankar of the Shramik Mukti Dal, Arjun Dangle of the RPI, Justice B G Kolse Patil, Ulka Mahajan of NAPM and many others. Some Congress and NCP leaders also laid wreaths.
All Left, democratic and secular parties and organisations have given a call for a massive joint march in Mumbai on March 11 to denounce the assassination of Comrade Govind Pansare and to demand the immediate arrest of, and stringent punishment to the killers.
The fatal attacks on Dabholkar and Pansare were not merely attacks on some individuals; they were attacks on reason, tolerance, democracy, freedom of expression, secular values and on the very dream of equality and justice. They were attacks on the rich secular and progressive tradition of India which includes Charvaka, Buddha, Mahavir, Kabir, Tukaram, Shivaji, Phule, Gandhi, Shahu, Ambedkar, Bhagat Singh, Periyar and so many others.
Why are such attacks taking place in Maharashtra today? And which are the forces towards which the needle of suspicion turns?
Dr Narendra Dabholkar was the President of the Committee for the Eradication of Superstition (Andhashraddha Nirmulan Samiti). Till his last breath, he consistently fought for the enactment of a law against superstition. The whole array of communal and obscurantist forces were notoriously against the enactment of any such law. The BJP and the Shiv Sena had time and again opposed Dabholkar’s original draft tooth and nail both inside and outside the assembly. The so-called secular state government of the Congress and the NCP, in spite of then having a clear majority in the state legislature, still did not display the guts to enact this law during Dabholkar’s lifetime. Finally, it was only under the mass public pressure following Dabholkar’s martyrdom that the state government enacted a greatly watered-down version of the law.
As the editor of the periodical ‘Sadhana’ that was founded by the legendary socialist leader Sane Guruji, Dabholkar always strove to uphold the values of democracy, secularism and equality. The murder of Dabholkar was a violent attack on these values themselves.
Although the background of the attack on Govind Pansare was naturally different, the essence of it was the same.
Two recent programmes organised in Kolhapur with Pansare’s initiative created a stir. Readers will recall that the shocking terrorist attacks in Mumbai on November 26, 2008, killed over 160 people. The most prominent among those who were martyred was the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) chief Hemant Karkare and other top police personnel. Karkare had done sterling work in the investigation of the Malegaon bomb blasts and had uncovered the involvement of Hindutva extremist elements represented by Pragnya Singh Thakur, Colonel Prasad Purohit and others. The same trail later led to the Ajmer Sharif and Hyderabad Mecca Masjid blasts and the attack on the Samjhauta Express. A few weeks before his martyrdom, Karkare had indicated that the net of investigation was closing in on several important bigwigs of the Hindutva brigade.
After the Mumbai terror attacks, a retired Inspector General of Police S M Mushrif, after careful personal study and investigation, wrote a book titled ‘Who Killed Karkare?’ He drew the conclusion that Karkare’s killing was not the handiwork of Pakistani terrorists like Ajmal Kasab, but was a diabolical conspiracy of the Hindutva extremist forces. It is clear that these forces had the most to gain from the elimination of Karkare. The book became a hit, ran into several editions and was translated into several Indian languages.
A few weeks before Pansare’s martyrdom, a talk by S M Mushrif on the topic ‘Who Killed Karkare?’ was organised in Kolhapur. The Hindutva communal elements opposed the programme tooth and nail. But Pansare put his foot down and insisted that the programme be held. There was a record turn-out for this talk by Mushrif, where he, Pansare and other speakers alleged that the killing of Karkare and Dabholkar could very well have been the handiwork of Hindutva extremist elements. After this event Pansare received anonymous post cards with a Pune post mark, threatening to make a Dabholkar of him.
Another programme took place in the Shivaji University in Kolhapur. Pansare was invited to deliver a lecture on the relevance of the thoughts of a leading social reformer Shahu Maharaj. While concluding the talk, Pansare took stock of current events and lashed out against the Hindutva communal campaign of the denigration of Mahatma Gandhi and the glorification of his assassin Nathuram Godse. Pansare declared that Godse and his associates were members of the RSS and the Hindu Mahasabha. There was an argument where an ABVP whole-timer tried to challenge this last statement of Pansare. But Pansare stood firm and put forward the concrete evidence of Godse’s communal connections.
For the last two decades, a small booklet written by Pansare called ‘Who Was Shivaji?’ has sold over one lakh copies in Maharashtra. In this booklet, Pansare strongly countered the totally false communal distortion of the life and work of this warrior-king, who has always been one of the icons of Maharashtra. Pansare did this on the basis of concrete historical evidence and he showed Shivaji in his true secular colours as the king of all communities and castes and, as Mahatma Jotirao Phule correctly described him, as the king of the peasantry. This effective work by Pansare had always been a thorn in the flesh of the communal forces.
The clash of ideologies is at the heart of the democratic system and needs to be encouraged at all levels. But instead of that, the hallmark of fascist and authoritarian forces has always been to suppress antagonistic thoughts by simply eliminating those who express them.
The assassination of Mahatma Gandhi within six months of gaining independence, by Nathuram Godse and his RSS-Hindu Mahasabha accomplices who also included V D Savarkar (who had submitted an abject apology to the British rulers while he was in the Andaman Cellular Jail), was the classic instance of such fascist authoritarianism. The glorification of such condemnable elements today gives an accurate indication of the climate of our times.
Two such instances took place in Maharashtra in the early 1970s. One was the assassination of CPI MLA Krishna Desai, and the other was the slaying of Dalit Panther activist Bhagwat Jadhav. Both these heinous acts took place in Mumbai, and they were the handiwork of Shiv Sena hoodlums. The first murder was aimed at breaking the Communist hold over the working class movement of Mumbai; the second was aimed at cutting down the influence of the militant Dalit movement that was then taking shape. It is an open secret that the Shiv Sena at that time had the full backing of Big Business and the Congress state government.
In its first stint in power in the late 1990s, the Shiv Sena-BJP state government hatched a diabolical conspiracy that was aimed at rooting out the strong CPI(M) influence in the tribal areas of Thane district. On the evening of Republic Day, January 26, 1997, under instructions from the state home ministry that was then in the hands of the BJP, the police without any provocation fired on a peaceful gathering of tribals in the Kavada village of Talasari tehsil. Two young CPI(M) activists – Lakshya Beej and Babu Kharpade – were martyred on the spot.
The police then slapped false cases on over 100 top CPI(M) leaders in Thane district, arrested them and put them behind bars. Tremendous repression was let loose in the Talasari and Dahanu tehsils by special camps of the State Reserve Police (SRP). All this was meant to dislodge the CPI(M) from its tribal strongholds in the Zilla Parishad and Panchayat Samiti elections that were due on March 3, 1997. Many of the CPI(M) candidates for this election had to fill their nomination forms from jail.
But the Party fought back this repression with great grit and determination and, in fact, won more seats in Thane district in these ZP/PS elections than ever before, with a record number of votes. In Talasari tehsil, both the BJP and the Congress lost their deposits in all the seats that they contested. The anti-communist game plan of the BJP was blown to smithereens.
After the 2012 ZP/PS polls, which also the CPI(M) won, BJP hoodlums attacked a dedicated CPI(M) tribal woman activist called Mathi Ozare and smashed her head with stones at night when she was going home. She died on the spot. During the election campaign, these BJP hoodlums had threatened to kill her if she continued to work for the CPI(M). Undeterred by such threats, Mathi Ozare continued to work sincerely and the Party won that seat. That is why she was killed. She became the first woman martyr of the CPI(M) among the 60 martyrs in Thane district who have laid down their lives since the famous Adivasi Revolt in 1945.
Five months ago, Hindutva hoodlums attacked the CPI(M) office in Pune in broad daylight, and no action was taken by the police. Just after the Modi regime came to power, the same brand of hoodlums killed a young techie called Mohsin Shaikh, again in Pune. Communal incidents and tension has perceptibly grown during the last few months in the state, as also all over the country with the advent of the BJP regime at the centre and in some states.
As a reaction to this, Islamist fundamentalist forces like the MIM are spreading their influence in Maharashtra among the minority community. Inflammatory speeches are being made by MIM leaders like Owaissi, and it could win two seats in the state assembly for the first time in the elections held last October. It stood second in half a dozen more seats.
The ideological roots of the RSS can be easily traced to the fascist regimes of Germany and Italy in the 1930s. RSS chief M S Golwalkar in his book We or Our Nationhood Defined had openly glorified the German Nazis under Hitler; and another RSS founder B S Munje had gone to Italy, met Mussolini and had similarly praised the Italian fascists under him.
In India, it is the Muslims and Christians who take the place of the Jews in Germany. The attacks against Communists, Socialists and all democrats are a common feature of both. The assassinations of Dr Narendra Dabholkar and Comrade Govind Pansare are clear indicators.
All Left, democratic and secular forces in Maharashtra have come together against this onslaught and have decided to organise a massive march to Mantralaya in Mumbai on March 11, 2015, to denounce the assassination of Comrade Govind Pansare and to demand that the assassins of both Dabholkar and Pansare, along with their patrons, are immediately identified and arrested and the strongest possible action is taken against them.
Thursday, May 8, 2014
Dastardly honour killing in Kharda, Maharashtra: CPI (M) delegation calls for State-wide protests
Ajit Nawale
On April 28, 2014 there occurred a dastardly act of honour killing of a 17 year old Dalit youth called Nitin Aage in Kharda village of Ahmednagar district, bordering the Marathwada region. The sheer cruelty with which the act was perpetrated shocked Maharashtra and rekindled the tragic memories of the Khairlanji and Sonai Dalit massacres a few years ago.
The news was flashed in the media on May 1, which is both the International May Day of the working class and also Maharashtra Day – the day on which the state was formed in 1960. On the same day, the CPI(M) Maharashtra state committee and Ahmednagar district committee issued a joint press release condemning this honour killing and calling for statewide protest demonstrations demanding the immediate arrest of, and stringent action against all the upper caste perpetrators of this heinous crime and steps for the protection and rehabilitation of the poor Aage family.
On May 4, a CPI(M) state delegation led by state secretary and central committee member Dr Ashok Dhawale and comprising state committee members Shailendra Kamble, Prakash Choudhari and Dr Ajit Nawale, district committee members Dr Mahebub Sayyad, Kiran Moghe and Subhash Thorat, and Party activists Dr Sanjay Dabhade and Suresh Bhor visited Kharda village to console the Aage family and to bring pressure on the authorities to ensure that justice was done. They were accompanied by activists of democratic organisations.
HEART-RENDING EVENTS
Kharda is a village with a total population of around 15,000. There are around 250 Dalit families, which means a population of around 1,000. The village and the entire surrounding area has dryland agriculture and is chronically drought-prone.
The Aage family originally hails from a small village in the Patoda tehsil of Beed district of Marathwada, but it migrated to Kharda in search of work about a decade ago. The slain boy Nitin’s father Raju Aage is a manual labourer who does the hard work of breaking stones in a quarry. Nitin’s mother Rekha is a casual labourer who does whatever work she gets. Since they are migrants they do not live along with the Dalit community in the village, but have an isolated small hut on the outskirts. Apart from Nitin who was their only son, they have three daughters, two of whom are married, and the youngest is in the eighth standard.
According to the narrative told to us by Raju Aage, on the fateful morning of April 28 Nitin went to his school which is just opposite his house for extra coaching classes for the twelfth standard. It appears that he was friendly with a girl from a so-called higher caste. She was one year his junior in school. On that day he was seen talking to that girl behind the school building by her brother Sachin Golekar. Sachin and his friends confronted Nitin and started badly beating him up in the school premises itself.
Seeing this, the headmaster and some teachers, instead of stopping the beating and warning Sachin, apparently told them that “there should be no fights in the school premises, and that they should go out of the school compound and do what they want.” Raju Aage was very bitter about the role of the school teachers. He said that had they stopped the fight and sternly reprimanded the goons, his son might still have been alive today.
As it happened, Sachin and his friends dragged Nitin to a nearby brick-kiln owned by his maternal uncle Sheshrao Yevale. Here he was beaten up mercilessly by a hammer, he was burnt by iron rods and finally he was strangulated to death. The perpetrators of this crime were around a dozen upper caste people, most of whom were relatives of Golekar and Yevale. The inhuman torture of Nitin continued for over four hours. Then they took the body and hung it from a nearby tree in order to make it appear like a suicide by hanging.
Nitin’s parents got word that he had been severely beaten up. They frantically searched for him all over the village. Nitin’s mother went to the above brick-kiln where she was told by Sheshrao Yevale himself that they had beaten up Nitin and that he would return home in the evening. Finally, after a prolonged search they were stunned to find his body hanging from the tree. The post-mortem report showed that Nitin was assaulted and strangulated.
CLASS AND POLITICAL ANGLE
We went to the school and spoke to the headmaster who was not only evasive in replying to our questions, but also resorted to the ploy of attacking the character of the slain Nitin. We met the Investigating Officer in the case – Deputy Superintendent of Police Dheeraj Patil. He told us that a total of 13 people had been arrested. They had been charged with murder and the SC/ST Atrocity Act had also been applied. He said that no stone would remain unturned to secure their conviction and investigations were on towards that end. When asked about the girl, he said that she was safe and secure. As a result of the statewide uproar, the state home minister announced that the case would be conducted in a special fast track court.
The Golekar and Yevale families were among the dominant economic and social strata in the village. Apart from having a reasonable amount of land they also owned several shops, a brick kiln and other paraphernalia. One member of the Golekar family was the deputy sarpanch of the village (the sarpanch post was reserved for the Scheduled Castes). Another family member was on the school board and another controlled the local co-operative. We were told that they owed political allegiance to the NCP for the last several years.
That perhaps explains why the guardian minister of Ahmednagar district, Madhukar Pichad of the NCP (who is himself an Adivasi) nevertheless took over five days to visit the village of the caste atrocity. He made the ridiculous excuse that the election Code of Conduct came in the way of his visiting the village earlier.
The need of the hour now is to build a strong unity of all sections of the working people, not only to condemn such caste atrocities and also atrocities on women that are on the rise in Maharashtra as also elsewhere in the country, but also to ensure that such ghastly incidents are prevented from occurring in the future.
Towards this end, immediate protest demonstrations were jointly organised by the CPI(M), the Jaati Anta Sangharsh Samiti (Struggle Committee for the Annihilation of Caste) and by various mass fronts in Mumbai, Pune and other places. Memoranda to the district collectors were submitted in some other districts.
Maharashtra has a glorious tradition of the social reform movement that was spearheaded by Mahatma Jotirao Phule, Rajarshi Shahu Maharaj and Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, among others. In view of these recent serious events, it is necessary that this tradition is taken forward with even greater grit and determination by the Left in the years to come.
On April 28, 2014 there occurred a dastardly act of honour killing of a 17 year old Dalit youth called Nitin Aage in Kharda village of Ahmednagar district, bordering the Marathwada region. The sheer cruelty with which the act was perpetrated shocked Maharashtra and rekindled the tragic memories of the Khairlanji and Sonai Dalit massacres a few years ago.
The news was flashed in the media on May 1, which is both the International May Day of the working class and also Maharashtra Day – the day on which the state was formed in 1960. On the same day, the CPI(M) Maharashtra state committee and Ahmednagar district committee issued a joint press release condemning this honour killing and calling for statewide protest demonstrations demanding the immediate arrest of, and stringent action against all the upper caste perpetrators of this heinous crime and steps for the protection and rehabilitation of the poor Aage family.
On May 4, a CPI(M) state delegation led by state secretary and central committee member Dr Ashok Dhawale and comprising state committee members Shailendra Kamble, Prakash Choudhari and Dr Ajit Nawale, district committee members Dr Mahebub Sayyad, Kiran Moghe and Subhash Thorat, and Party activists Dr Sanjay Dabhade and Suresh Bhor visited Kharda village to console the Aage family and to bring pressure on the authorities to ensure that justice was done. They were accompanied by activists of democratic organisations.
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| CPI(M) delegation led by state secretary Dr Ashok Dhawale consoling the Aage Dalit family in Kharda. |
Kharda is a village with a total population of around 15,000. There are around 250 Dalit families, which means a population of around 1,000. The village and the entire surrounding area has dryland agriculture and is chronically drought-prone.
The Aage family originally hails from a small village in the Patoda tehsil of Beed district of Marathwada, but it migrated to Kharda in search of work about a decade ago. The slain boy Nitin’s father Raju Aage is a manual labourer who does the hard work of breaking stones in a quarry. Nitin’s mother Rekha is a casual labourer who does whatever work she gets. Since they are migrants they do not live along with the Dalit community in the village, but have an isolated small hut on the outskirts. Apart from Nitin who was their only son, they have three daughters, two of whom are married, and the youngest is in the eighth standard.
According to the narrative told to us by Raju Aage, on the fateful morning of April 28 Nitin went to his school which is just opposite his house for extra coaching classes for the twelfth standard. It appears that he was friendly with a girl from a so-called higher caste. She was one year his junior in school. On that day he was seen talking to that girl behind the school building by her brother Sachin Golekar. Sachin and his friends confronted Nitin and started badly beating him up in the school premises itself.
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| Nitin Aage's school in Kharda village. It was here that he was first brutally beaten by upper caste youth. |
As it happened, Sachin and his friends dragged Nitin to a nearby brick-kiln owned by his maternal uncle Sheshrao Yevale. Here he was beaten up mercilessly by a hammer, he was burnt by iron rods and finally he was strangulated to death. The perpetrators of this crime were around a dozen upper caste people, most of whom were relatives of Golekar and Yevale. The inhuman torture of Nitin continued for over four hours. Then they took the body and hung it from a nearby tree in order to make it appear like a suicide by hanging.
Nitin’s parents got word that he had been severely beaten up. They frantically searched for him all over the village. Nitin’s mother went to the above brick-kiln where she was told by Sheshrao Yevale himself that they had beaten up Nitin and that he would return home in the evening. Finally, after a prolonged search they were stunned to find his body hanging from the tree. The post-mortem report showed that Nitin was assaulted and strangulated.
CLASS AND POLITICAL ANGLE
We went to the school and spoke to the headmaster who was not only evasive in replying to our questions, but also resorted to the ploy of attacking the character of the slain Nitin. We met the Investigating Officer in the case – Deputy Superintendent of Police Dheeraj Patil. He told us that a total of 13 people had been arrested. They had been charged with murder and the SC/ST Atrocity Act had also been applied. He said that no stone would remain unturned to secure their conviction and investigations were on towards that end. When asked about the girl, he said that she was safe and secure. As a result of the statewide uproar, the state home minister announced that the case would be conducted in a special fast track court.
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| CPI(M) delegation meeting the Investigating Officer in the case Deputy SP Dheeraj Patil. |
That perhaps explains why the guardian minister of Ahmednagar district, Madhukar Pichad of the NCP (who is himself an Adivasi) nevertheless took over five days to visit the village of the caste atrocity. He made the ridiculous excuse that the election Code of Conduct came in the way of his visiting the village earlier.
The need of the hour now is to build a strong unity of all sections of the working people, not only to condemn such caste atrocities and also atrocities on women that are on the rise in Maharashtra as also elsewhere in the country, but also to ensure that such ghastly incidents are prevented from occurring in the future.
Towards this end, immediate protest demonstrations were jointly organised by the CPI(M), the Jaati Anta Sangharsh Samiti (Struggle Committee for the Annihilation of Caste) and by various mass fronts in Mumbai, Pune and other places. Memoranda to the district collectors were submitted in some other districts.
Maharashtra has a glorious tradition of the social reform movement that was spearheaded by Mahatma Jotirao Phule, Rajarshi Shahu Maharaj and Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, among others. In view of these recent serious events, it is necessary that this tradition is taken forward with even greater grit and determination by the Left in the years to come.
Friday, January 17, 2014
Adivasi struggles in Maharashtra and the Adivasi Adhikar Rashtriya Manch (AARM): A Note
The Adivasi population in Maharashtra as per the 2011 census is 1 crore 5 lakh. This is 9.4 per cent of the population of Maharashtra. In 2001 the proportion of the Adivasi population in the state was 8.9 per cent. Maharashtra has 10.17 per cent of the total tribal population in India. There are a total of 47 tribes and sub-tribes among the Adivasis in Maharashtra.
The Adivasi Adhikar Rashtriya Manch (AARM) was formed in Maharashtra at its first state convention held at the Comrade Godavari Shamrao Parulekar Bhavan at Talasari in Thane district on December 21-22, 2013. It was attended by 362 delegates from 15 districts, plus the Union Territory of Dadra & Nagarhaveli. There were 347 Adivasi delegates who came from 16 different tribes. The three major districts represented were the traditional bases of the Left movement in Maharashtra, viz Thane, Nashik and Nandurbar, but the significant feature was that representatives from a dozen other districts were also present.
The convention was addressed by Brinda Karat, Jitendra Choudhury and Dr Ashok Dhawale. There was a good discussion on the 18-page draft resolution placed by J P Gavit. The convention elected a 51-member state committee, which in turn elected J P Gavit (Nashik) as chairman, Barkya Mangat (Thane) as convenor and Jaising Mali (Nandurbar) as joint convenor. Veteran leaders L B Dhangar, Lahanu Kom and Kumar Shiralkar were elected as advisors. The two-day convention culminated in an impressive rally and public meeting.
Two years ago in November 2011, a preparatory state-level meeting to form the AARM was held at Belapur in New Mumbai. However, the platform and its work did not quite take off then. It has been resolved that this mistake should not repeat itself in the future.
Maharashtra has had a long and rich tradition of the Adivasi movement beginning with the historic Adivasi Revolt in Thane district from 1945-47 that was led by Comrades Shamrao and Godavari Parulekar under the red flag of the Kisan Sabha and the Communist Party. In the 1970s the movement spread to Nashik and Nandurbar districts. In the last one decade the movement among tribals has spread to newer districts like Nanded, Yavatmal, Ahmednagar, Amravati and Pune.
The traditional organisation that has been working among tribals for the last seven decades has been the AIKS. The AIKS is particularly strong in the tribal areas of Thane and Nashik districts and it also has good units in the tribal areas of Nandurbar, Nanded, Yavatmal, Ahmednagar, Amravati and Pune districts. The AIAWU has a good unit in Nandurbar district. The AIDWA and DYFI have good units in Thane district and some work in Nashik and some of the other districts above.
Hence our work report will briefly deal with the struggles led by the above mass organisations.
ON IMPLEMENTATION OF FOREST RIGHTS ACT
Two massive struggles were led by the AIKS in the last two years for the stringent implementation of the Forest Rights Act - in January-February 2011 and in April 2013. Over 50,000 tribals blocked state highways indefinitely on both occasions, forcing the state government to concede major demands. The two main issues that were raised were: mass rejection of thousands of genuine tribal claims to forest land, and granting land far less than what is actually being cultivated by tribals for long. Now a concerted follow-up is being conducted to see that the government decisions are implemented.
Another major land issue that has been taken up in Thane district is that concerning lands that are being tilled by tribals for several decades but which are still in the names of the old landlords. Now these lands are being sold to new fatcats and the tribals are being sought to be evicted. This is being opposed tooth and nail by all the mass organisations and struggles are being led on this issue.
ON INCLUSION OF NAMES OF RURAL POOR IN BPL LISTS
In 2012, the AIKS led another major statewide struggle for the inclusion of the rural poor in the Below Poverty Line (BPL) lists. Large demonstrations of thousands of people were held in several tehsils of Thane, Nashik, Nandurbar, Ahmednagar, Nanded, Yavatmal, Pune and many other districts. The total mobilisation in this statewide agitation was over 1,20,000, of which over 75,000 was from the tribal belt. In some districts, as a result of consistent follow-up, thousands of names of the poor were included in the BPL lists.
ON IMPLEMENTATION OF THE NREGA
In districts like Nandurbar, Ahmednagar, Thane, Yavatmal and some other districts, struggles were led by the AIAWU, AIKS, AIDWA and DYFI demanding work and proper wages under the NREGA. Many of these actions were successful and the tribals in various places received work and wages.
The DYFI in Thane district took up the issue of registration of seasonal migrant labour and the issuance of identity cards to them.
ON FOOD SECURITY AND THE PDS
The AIDWA in Thane and Nashik districts was in the forefront of struggles for food security and against corruption and mismanagement in the PDS. Thousands of quintals of rains being diverted to the black market were caught by our activists resulting in the suspension of licenses of the guilty ration shop owners. Campaigns were led for ration cards to those who did not have any.
The issue of malnutrition-related deaths of children was taken up in Thane, Nandurbar and Amravati districts by means of dharnas and demonstrations.
In Nashik district it was under our imaginative leadership that the novel Doorstep Ration Scheme was first started in the tribal areas of Surgana tehsil. This scheme is now being implemented in the state. It has served to check corruption in the PDS and to provide guaranteed grain to the poor.
ON DRINKING WATER AND IRRIGATION
The issue of drinking water and water for irrigation has been taken up in several districts, especially in the light of chronic drought conditions. Tribal districts have been wilfully neglected and water from here is often taken away to the non-tribal districts and areas.
The classic example of this is Thane district which has the largest water reservoirs in Maharashtra, but the tribal areas are bereft of even drinking water, leave alone water for irrigation. This is in spite of the fact that many of the dams built in the tribal areas are funded by the tribal sub-plan.
Now there is a new proposed river-linking scheme that aims to submerge several villages in some tribal tehsils in Nashik and Thane districts and take the water away to Gujarat and Mumbai. This is being stoutly opposed by the AIKS.
ON EDUCATION, EMPLOYMENT AND HEALTH
In several districts, local issues concerning education, employment and health have been taken up. The SFI has taken up the issues of admissions in secondary schools and colleges and of atrocities on girl students in ashram schools in Thane and Nashik districts.
In Thane, Nashik and Nandurbar districts, several schools with thousands of students are being run well by educational institutions under our leadership. One senior and junior college named after Comrade Godavari Parulekar at Talasari in Thane district is also being run with nearly 2000 students.
ON ATROCITIES AGAINST WOMEN
There have been growing incidents of attacks and sexual violence against women and girls in the tribal areas. The infiltration of consumerist culture with its commodification of women has adversely affected the security of women in tribal areas too. As is the experience elsewhere, the police administration is often hand in glove with the guilty in such cases. The AIDWA has taken up many such issues in Thane and Nashik districts, leading to the arrests of the guilty. The observance of International Womens Day on March 8 and the Savitribai Phule Birth Anniversary Day on January 3 by the AIDWA has helped to make tribal women conscious of their problems and their rights. A sustained campaign against superstitions has been carried out by the AIDWA in the tribal areas.
Saturday, December 7, 2013
Mumbai rally against superstitions and communalism
Ashok Dhawale
On December 2, 2013 an impressive rally of several thousand people marched in Mumbai around three main demands. These were: Immediate enactment of the law against black magic and superstition in the ensuing session of the state assembly at Nagpur beginning December 9; Immediate arrest of the killers of Dr Narendra Dabholkar and of the diabolical forces behind this murder; and stringent action against communal and obscurantist forces.
The rally was organised jointly by the Maharashtra Andhashraddha Nirmulan Samiti (MANS), along with other secular and progressive parties and organisations. Prominent among them was the CPI(M) which, underlining the political importance of this rally, had consciously mobilised several thousand people from Mumbai, Thane, Nashik, Raigad and Pune districts.
The presence of CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat in this rally showed the importance attached by the Party to the vital battle against superstition and communalism. 10 of the 15 state secretariat members of the Party who participated in this rally were K L Bajaj, Mahendra Singh, Rajaram Ozare MLA, J P Gavit ex-MLA, Dr D L Karad, Dr Kishore Theckedath, Ajit Abhyankar, Mariam Dhawale, Vijay Gabhane and Dr Ashok Dhawale. Almost all Party state committee members from the above five districts also participated.
December 2 marked 101 days since the murder of Dr Narendra Dabholkar on August 20. It is a shameful fact that the Congress-NCP-led state government of Maharashtra and its police department have not yet been able to even identify the culprits of this dastardly crime, leave alone nabbing them. It is even more shameful that in spite of having no clue about the culprits, the state government and its police recently submitted an affidavit in the court stating that communal forces were not behind this murder, thus giving them a clean chit!
The credibility of the Congress-NCP regime has touched rock bottom, and no one can guarantee that it will transform the ordinance against black magic and other superstitious practices that it hastily promulgated in the wake of Dabholkar’s murder into a law in the coming session of the state assembly that begins next week. As it is, this government dithered on the issue for the last 14 years, and even the ordinance that it eventually promulgated is a watered-down version of the Bill for which Dabholkar fought all his life.
The communal forces led by the RSS, VHP, BJP, Shiv Sena and other thoroughly reactionary organisations like the Sanatan Prabhat, apart from a large cluster of so-called god-men and god-women, have been running a virulent campaign of misinformation and slander against this Bill for the last two decades. Even now they have threatened to block the Bill in the coming state assembly session, falsely accusing it of being against religion. While all this is only to be expected of the communal forces, the real tragedy is that the state government which claims to be secular lacks the political will to frontally take on these forces.
The rally began from the Jijamata Udyan at Byculla and walked a 7 Km stretch to culminate in a large public meeting at the Azad Maidan. It was presided over by senior PWP leader N D Patil and was addressed by Prakash Karat, BRP leader Prakash Ambedkar, NAPM leader Medha Patkar, CPI state secretary Bhalchandra Kango, Lok Bharati leader Kapil Patil MLC, veteran social activist Prof Pushpa Bhave, one of the leaders of the Warkari Sampradaya Wable Maharaj, Congress MP Husain Dalwai and NCP MLC Vidya Chavan. The introductory speech was made by MANS working president Avinash Patil, and on behalf of the Dabholkar family Mukta Dabholkar addressed the gathering. A number of Marathi film and drama artistes had also gathered in solidarity and Sonali Kulkarni spoke on their behalf.
Prakash Karat, after releasing the annual special issue of the Andhashraddha Nirmulan Vartapatra, in his speech came down heavily on the conspiracies of the communal and obscurantist forces, on the antiques of the so-called god-men like Asaram and Ramdev, and also on the vacillating and opportunist policy of the Congress-NCP state government. He declared the full and active support of the CPI(M) to this joint struggle and said that the Party would try its best to see that an Anti-Superstition Act is enacted at the national level. He said that it was a shame that the killers of Dabholkar were not yet identified even though 100 days had passed, and suggested that if the state government and its police could not do the job, then it should be entrusted to some special central agency. He congratulated all the participants in the rally and expressed confidence that their struggle would gain success. The rally concluded with a spirited rendering of the song ‘We Shall Overcome.’
DISTRICT WORKSHOPS AND RALLY FOR ELECTION PREPARATIONS
On November 16-17, 2013, the CPI(M) state secretariat and state committee met to conduct the mid-term review of implementation of tasks and also to decide on other important campaigns. The meeting was attended by CPI(M) central secretariat member Nilotpal Basu.
The Party also organised DC meetings and district workshops where it is contesting priority seats for the ensuing Lok Sabha elections due in April 2014 and the Vidhan Sabha elections due in October 2014. Such programmes were held in Thane district from November 13-15, in Nashik district on November 20 and 23, and in Nanded district on November 21-22. Nearly 1000 leading Party activists attended these three district workshops.
On November 19, a 10,000-strong mass rally was organised by the CPI(M) at Akole in Ahmednagar district on the two major issues of food security and pension for the rural and urban poor. All the above programmes were attended and addressed by Nilotpal Basu, Dr Ashok Dhawale and by various state secretariat members in charge of each district. The Akole rally was also addressed by state committee member Dr Ajit Nawale and others.
In all these workshops, Nilotpal Basu placed the political understanding of the Party as regards the ensuing Lok Sabha elections and also placed the concrete organisational tasks to be taken up as part of the election preparations.
On December 2, 2013 an impressive rally of several thousand people marched in Mumbai around three main demands. These were: Immediate enactment of the law against black magic and superstition in the ensuing session of the state assembly at Nagpur beginning December 9; Immediate arrest of the killers of Dr Narendra Dabholkar and of the diabolical forces behind this murder; and stringent action against communal and obscurantist forces.
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| The Mumbai rally: A view |
The presence of CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat in this rally showed the importance attached by the Party to the vital battle against superstition and communalism. 10 of the 15 state secretariat members of the Party who participated in this rally were K L Bajaj, Mahendra Singh, Rajaram Ozare MLA, J P Gavit ex-MLA, Dr D L Karad, Dr Kishore Theckedath, Ajit Abhyankar, Mariam Dhawale, Vijay Gabhane and Dr Ashok Dhawale. Almost all Party state committee members from the above five districts also participated.
December 2 marked 101 days since the murder of Dr Narendra Dabholkar on August 20. It is a shameful fact that the Congress-NCP-led state government of Maharashtra and its police department have not yet been able to even identify the culprits of this dastardly crime, leave alone nabbing them. It is even more shameful that in spite of having no clue about the culprits, the state government and its police recently submitted an affidavit in the court stating that communal forces were not behind this murder, thus giving them a clean chit!
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| Prakash Karat, N. D. Patil and Prakash Ambedkar at the Mumbai rally |
The communal forces led by the RSS, VHP, BJP, Shiv Sena and other thoroughly reactionary organisations like the Sanatan Prabhat, apart from a large cluster of so-called god-men and god-women, have been running a virulent campaign of misinformation and slander against this Bill for the last two decades. Even now they have threatened to block the Bill in the coming state assembly session, falsely accusing it of being against religion. While all this is only to be expected of the communal forces, the real tragedy is that the state government which claims to be secular lacks the political will to frontally take on these forces.
The rally began from the Jijamata Udyan at Byculla and walked a 7 Km stretch to culminate in a large public meeting at the Azad Maidan. It was presided over by senior PWP leader N D Patil and was addressed by Prakash Karat, BRP leader Prakash Ambedkar, NAPM leader Medha Patkar, CPI state secretary Bhalchandra Kango, Lok Bharati leader Kapil Patil MLC, veteran social activist Prof Pushpa Bhave, one of the leaders of the Warkari Sampradaya Wable Maharaj, Congress MP Husain Dalwai and NCP MLC Vidya Chavan. The introductory speech was made by MANS working president Avinash Patil, and on behalf of the Dabholkar family Mukta Dabholkar addressed the gathering. A number of Marathi film and drama artistes had also gathered in solidarity and Sonali Kulkarni spoke on their behalf.
Prakash Karat, after releasing the annual special issue of the Andhashraddha Nirmulan Vartapatra, in his speech came down heavily on the conspiracies of the communal and obscurantist forces, on the antiques of the so-called god-men like Asaram and Ramdev, and also on the vacillating and opportunist policy of the Congress-NCP state government. He declared the full and active support of the CPI(M) to this joint struggle and said that the Party would try its best to see that an Anti-Superstition Act is enacted at the national level. He said that it was a shame that the killers of Dabholkar were not yet identified even though 100 days had passed, and suggested that if the state government and its police could not do the job, then it should be entrusted to some special central agency. He congratulated all the participants in the rally and expressed confidence that their struggle would gain success. The rally concluded with a spirited rendering of the song ‘We Shall Overcome.’
DISTRICT WORKSHOPS AND RALLY FOR ELECTION PREPARATIONS
On November 16-17, 2013, the CPI(M) state secretariat and state committee met to conduct the mid-term review of implementation of tasks and also to decide on other important campaigns. The meeting was attended by CPI(M) central secretariat member Nilotpal Basu.
The Party also organised DC meetings and district workshops where it is contesting priority seats for the ensuing Lok Sabha elections due in April 2014 and the Vidhan Sabha elections due in October 2014. Such programmes were held in Thane district from November 13-15, in Nashik district on November 20 and 23, and in Nanded district on November 21-22. Nearly 1000 leading Party activists attended these three district workshops.
On November 19, a 10,000-strong mass rally was organised by the CPI(M) at Akole in Ahmednagar district on the two major issues of food security and pension for the rural and urban poor. All the above programmes were attended and addressed by Nilotpal Basu, Dr Ashok Dhawale and by various state secretariat members in charge of each district. The Akole rally was also addressed by state committee member Dr Ajit Nawale and others.
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| The Akole rally begins |
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| Comrade Nilotpal Basu speaking at the Akole rally |
Saturday, August 24, 2013
Maharashtra denounces murder of Narendra Dabholkar
Ashok Dhawale
On Sunday, September 1, a large state-level
condolence meeting to pay homage to Dr Narendra Dabholkar and to take a pledge
to fight the communal and obscurantist forces, is being held in Mumbai on
behalf of the Left and secular parties and organisations in Maharashtra, and
Sitaram Yechury will be the chief guest at this meeting.
Maharashtra reacted with shock, indignation and outrage at the dastardly
assassination of Dr Narendra Dabholkar in Pune in the early morning of August
20. He was gunned down by two young armed men when he was on his morning walk.
Top police sources said that it was a meticulously planned and premeditated
murder. The needle of suspicion for this cowardly act pointed to the
right-wing, obscurantist and intolerant Hindutva forces. It is now five days
after this heinous murder; and yet no arrests have been made.
All over the state for the next three days, thousands of people rallied
in almost every town and city to denounce this diabolical act. Left, democratic
and secular political parties and organizations took the lead in this campaign.
Within an hour of the news of the murder, the CPI(M) state centre issued
directives to all its units to mobilize like-minded forces throughout the state
to organize immediate protest demonstrations.
In cities like Mumbai, Pune, Satara, Nashik, Solapur, Kolhapur, Aurangabad,
Jalna, Latur, Nanded, Parbhani, Nagpur, Amravati and several other places,
large joint protests were held. Several leading Party comrades were among those
who paid homage to the remains of Dabholkar in Pune and attended the funeral in
his home town of Satara. Most sections of the print and electronic media
covered this shocking occurrence in depth.
The murder of Narendra Dabholkar recalled memories of the gruesome
murder of Communist MLA Krishna Desai by Shiv Sena hoodlums in 1970, and of the
heinous assassination of Mahatma Gandhi by Nathuram Godse and his Hindutva
cohorts in 1948.
Dr Narendra Dabholkar, a medical doctor by training, was the Founder
President of the Maharashtra Andhashraddha Nirmoolan Samiti (MANS); the
foremost champion of the Anti-Superstition Bill which the Congress-NCP state
government left hanging for the last 14 years; the Editor of the popular
socialist weekly ‘Sadhana’ that was founded 65 years ago by the legendary Sane
Guruji; a strong proponent of rationalism and the scientific temper; one of the
early activists of the ‘Ek Gaon Ek Panavtha’ (One Village, One Source of Water)
campaign against the caste discrimination of Dalits that was begun in the 1970s
by Dr Baba Adhav; and one of the prominent leaders of the socialist stream in
the state.
Even earlier, there had been several attacks by vested interests and
obscurantist forces on programmes organized by the MANS in Maharashtra under
Dabholkar’s leadership. The organization challenged the rapidly proliferating
religious godmen who claimed to perform miracles, to give a demonstration of
these ‘miracles’ in the presence of MANS activists. None dared to take up the
challenge. The same was the case with astrologers.
Dabholkar fought against a number of superstitions – like human
sacrifice, black magic, witchcraft, ghosts, reincarnation and all kinds of
obscurantist rituals. Recently he began a campaign against the so-called Jaat
(Caste) Panchayats, which prohibited marriages outside their caste and meted
out dire consequences to those who disobeyed. He was about to begin a campaign
against the increasingly lucrative trade in ‘Astro Gems’. All these activities
could never be to the liking of communal and obscurantist forces.
This assassination has also exposed the thoroughly opportunist and
weak-kneed character of the Congress-NCP regime in the state. For the last 14
years since its advent to power in Maharashtra in 1999, it did not display the
courage to enact the Anti-Superstition Act for which Dabholkar consistently fought
in his last years. It actually diluted the original Bill that had been drafted
with the help of Dabholkar and others. What it did not do for the last 14
years, it finally promised to do within a few hours of Dabholkar’s murder, in
the form of an ordinance. What happens finally still remains to be seen. But
whereas the original Bill prescribed stern punishment for 27 types of acts of
superstition, the new measure has reportedly whittled them down to just 11.
This dilly-dallying on such an important issue was due to two main
reasons. One was, of course, the soft Hindutva approach that has been a
characteristic of the Congress in recent decades. It was afraid of the backlash
that such a measure might lead to. The second reason is that many leading lights
of the Congress- NCP, and naturally of the Sena-BJP as well, are ‘devout
disciples’ of many of these religious godmen, and are connected with the vested
interests that they represent. Hence, not enacting the Anti-Superstition Act
was actually a result of the match-fixing between the ruling and main
opposition combines.
Nor did the Congress-NCP regime take stern action against the forces
that attacked or threatened the anti-superstition programmes held under
Dabholkar’s leadership. The same has generally been its response so far as
Hindutva terrorism is concerned. A few years ago, RSS-VHP-Bajrang Dal elements
were caught red-handed in the bomb blasts in Nanded, Parbhani, Jalna and other
places. Had thorough investigation been conducted and strict action been taken
then by the Congress-NCP regime, the Malegaon and other bomb blasts could have
been avoided. It was only due to the single-minded determination of martyred
Anti-Terrorist Squad chief Hemant Karkare that the Hindutva connection behind
the Malegaon blasts was exposed. But after his death, that trail has gone cold.
The state government remains unconcerned. The murder of Narendra Dabholkar is
the result.
The CPI(M) Polit Bureau and the CPI(M) Maharashtra state committee
issued strong statements condemning the dastardly murder. CPI(M) Polit Bureau
member Sitaram Yechury raised the issue of Dabholkar’s murder in the Rajya
Sabha, and he was supported by many other MPs. As a result, the Rajya Sabha
adopted a condolence resolution mourning the death of Narendra Dabholkar –
quite an extraordinary ocurrence.
Thursday, May 30, 2013
DYFI 4th All India Women's Convention held in Mumbai
The Democratic Youth Federation of India held its 4th All India Young Women’s Convention in Mumbai on 25th and 26th of May. Apart from Central Executive Committee members of the organisation, 94 delegates from various states assembled for the convention at Lakshmi Sehgal Nagar (Aarsh Vidyalaya Campus, Chembur).
The convention began with DYFI national president M B Rajesh hoisting the flag at the convention venue on 25th morning. Renowed economist Prof. Utsa Patnaik inaugurated the convention. In her inaugural address Prof.Utsa reminded the youth movement that a comprehensive fight against atrocities on women inseparable from the fight against neo-liberal economic regime which is causing immense distress and gunger in our country. The advent of neo-liberal economic policies has pulled back hunger and malnutrition levels to those of colonial times. Women are the worst sufferes of this. Instead of reversing the policies which are causing misery to the people, the ruling establishment is displaying pathetic intellctual dishonesty in claiming that hunger and poverty levels are coming down. She explained the ridiculous nature of poverty line announced by officialdom. Acute poverty is compounded by rising unemployment of which women are the worst affected. Employment opportunities for women are becoming nearly absent in rural India. She drew attention to the structural changes taking place in the workforce of the nation as a result of neo-liberal economics. Decline of organised labour has meant weakening of the social agency that stood for an alternate ‘moral universe’ opposed to capitalism’s culture of objectifying women. This along with ‘lumpenisation’ not only of sections of working class but also of fractions of bourgeosie haver connection to the growing level of atrocities against women.
Eminent social activist Teest Setalvad also spoke at the seeion which was chaired by MB Rajesh. CITU leader K L Bajaj and CPI(M) state secretary Ashok Dhawale were also present.
Several eminent women activists, writers and TU leaders like Teesta Setalwad, Sandhya Nare Pawar, Tapati Mukhopadhyaya, Madhu Paranjape, Armaity Irani, Shubha Shamim, Sonya Gill and Mariam Dhawale were felicitated at the inaugural session.
The convention began with DYFI national president M B Rajesh hoisting the flag at the convention venue on 25th morning. Renowed economist Prof. Utsa Patnaik inaugurated the convention. In her inaugural address Prof.Utsa reminded the youth movement that a comprehensive fight against atrocities on women inseparable from the fight against neo-liberal economic regime which is causing immense distress and gunger in our country. The advent of neo-liberal economic policies has pulled back hunger and malnutrition levels to those of colonial times. Women are the worst sufferes of this. Instead of reversing the policies which are causing misery to the people, the ruling establishment is displaying pathetic intellctual dishonesty in claiming that hunger and poverty levels are coming down. She explained the ridiculous nature of poverty line announced by officialdom. Acute poverty is compounded by rising unemployment of which women are the worst affected. Employment opportunities for women are becoming nearly absent in rural India. She drew attention to the structural changes taking place in the workforce of the nation as a result of neo-liberal economics. Decline of organised labour has meant weakening of the social agency that stood for an alternate ‘moral universe’ opposed to capitalism’s culture of objectifying women. This along with ‘lumpenisation’ not only of sections of working class but also of fractions of bourgeosie haver connection to the growing level of atrocities against women.
Eminent social activist Teest Setalvad also spoke at the seeion which was chaired by MB Rajesh. CITU leader K L Bajaj and CPI(M) state secretary Ashok Dhawale were also present.
Several eminent women activists, writers and TU leaders like Teesta Setalwad, Sandhya Nare Pawar, Tapati Mukhopadhyaya, Madhu Paranjape, Armaity Irani, Shubha Shamim, Sonya Gill and Mariam Dhawale were felicitated at the inaugural session.
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