A Brief Overview of Naxalism and its Causes

Naxalite is a generalised term representing the Maoists and militant groups operating in a few areas of India since the mid-1960s. The word Naxalite has been derived from Naxalbari, a small town in North Bengal that falls in Northeastern India. This area saw major revolts of tribal people against the local landlords. The revolt cooled down for a certain period. After that, however, this became the focus of communist-led movements against the government. The Naxalites led these movements. 

Naxalism

In India, the Naxal movement has been the most rebellious act, which has been long ongoing since 1967. It all started when a group of tribes, labourers, and peasants held a rebellious movement and raided a landlord’s granaries in a North Bengal village called Naxalbari. Although this rebellion was suppressed by the police temporarily, the Naxalites kept their movement alive under the leadership of Charu Majumdar, working with Jangal Santhal and Kanu Sanyal. As a result, the people of nearby villages supported this movement, and even the Chinese started to support the movement. 

It was named the “Spring Thunder” by the Chinese media. The Naxalite movement was vast and started spreading out to other parts of India, including the North East and Jammu and Kashmir. With time, the rebels have enhanced themselves with modern weapons, firepower, and, most importantly, support from a certain group of India. In time, they also became capable of building high-end bombs. They also started weapon manufacturing and production camps in leaps and bounds. The most recent attack by these groups was the attack on the Indian security forces on the 3rd of April, 2021, which took place on the Sukma-Bijapur border.

Factors responsible for the cause of Naxalism

Naxalism was not just a movement that sparked in one day. Behind this movement, many factors were responsible, some of which have been the problems for India which were overlooked then. Let us look at some of these factors below:

Mismanagement of Forests:

Mismanagement of forests has been an issue that came into play since the British ruled India. The British government introduced laws to monopolise forest resources, which came into play for this. The situation worsened post-1990 when the Indian government started the natural resources of the forests. This led to a spark that formed fire in the hearts of the people living in the forests to contribute to the movement against the Indian government.

Disorganised Tribal policies: 

The detachment of the local tribes of the forests from the government was expected to be resolved and eradicated post-independence from British rule. However, this was not the case. The government failed to implement proper tribal policies. Instead, it concentrated on projects which led to forests being burned or cut down hence abandoning the tribes from their homes and making them resourceless. This led them to join the Naxalites movement from even other states of India.

Intraregional and Interregional discrepancies: 

The poor in India have always been the less privileged. In previous years the government did not make any schemes or policies for the poor. So Naxalites became the voice of the poor, and the people from the lower economic class thought the Naxalites would solve their problems. Hence they started joining the Naxalism movement.

Absence of Land reforms and industrialisation:

At that time, there was a tremendous impact on the backward society people when they saw half-hearted attempts by the government to bring in land reforms and policies. The government had failed to set up agriculture organised in rural India. This led to a poor economy in the rural parts of India. As a result, the employment rate for these people almost neared zero at that time. People, as a result, formed a protest and joined the Naxal movement to raise their voices against the government.

Forest cover in India: 

Most parts of rural India are covered by forests, giving the Naxalites considerable advantage to continue their movement. They form groups and make camps in the forests, making them less vulnerable to the police and the government.

Indian Youth:

Failing to generate sufficient jobs for Indian youth just graduating from colleges and universities has been one of the major causes of the rise in Naxalism. The idealism for the Naxal movement has been inflicted on the youth who are fresh graduates. Hence the increase in such numbers has been in leaps and bounds in the past few years.

Conclusion

Although the Naxalism movement has risen throughout the years and has turned the lives of thousands of youth having a tremendous potential upside down, the Government of India is still trying to mend terms with this militant group by introducing reforms, and new agricultural policies, generating jobs for the youth, etc. In addition, development activities are carried out by the government for the poor in these affected areas to halt this movement.