K Balagopal Naxalite Terrorism: Social and Legal Issues by K Aravinda Rao, East and West Books, Chennai, 1996. THE naxalite movement in Andhra Pradesh phenomenon. No intellectual working in any deployed to apprehend and kill naxalites, is now nearly three decades old. It has many of the universities of AP including those their sympathisers, and whoever else is victories and much unanswered criticism to inspired by the naxalite movement, has taken perceived as obstructing the anti-naxalite its discredit, It has shaped thousands of the trouble of making a serious study of the operations of the police. This SIB includes activists and inspired people a hundred times naxalite phenomenon. The dilemma of the the armed hatchetmen called 'greyhounds', more in number. It therefore claims that it inspired ones is understandable, for they a specially trained and equipped anti-guerrilla is the realisation of 'the people's' subjectivity, have learnt from the communist revolutionary police force. That the first analytical study notwithstanding the qualms of sceptics who movement a theory of society and social of the naxalites of AP should come from the can see no way that the people can impose change but are yet to craft for themselves head of these human hounds is a testimony their will on it. Its cadre have died and killed the equipment necessary to apply it creatively to the sad state of affairs prevalent in the in numbers of the same order, if not in to complex contemporary events. Moreover, slate. The social system which the communist precisely equal number, and whether they they have not yet learnt to face the subject- revolutionaries are out to overthrow has have died or killed it has been an equally object - or commitment-objectivity - allotted the entire task of meeting the merciless death. The terror it inspires is no dilemma that is characteristic of philosophies challenge to the police: not only the challenge less than that of the police, though unlike such as Marxism for which the analysis is to society's orderly l i f e , which is the police it also inspires a lot of affection. part of the act and every act is an analysis. understandable, but the challenge to its Outside the tribal areas it has not really They have learnt that it is not enough to write politics, its ethics and its philosophy as well. succeeded in realising its principal slogan history but one must be part of the making Policemen are by training and orientation i l l - of 'land to the tiller' (which in practice of history; that to be part of it is to be partisan equipped to undertake this task, but the police usually means land to the landless, a with the revolution that is making it, and in of Andhra Pradesh are quite merrily engaging difference that is neither understood nor particular with the vanguard of the revolution; themselves in it, much to the discomfiture theorised), but it has succeeded in turning and that the true partisan is the true scientist of even moderately sensitive souls. A the power relations of rural Telengana society and the true scientist is the true partisan. This viewpoint that begins with order as the central upside down. It has produced innumerable view docs not altogether rule out the good and searches in all unconventional poets and singers from the t o i l i n g possibility of criticism, but where the act and behaviour - individual or group - for its communities, given briefs and a purpose to the reflection arc in truth aspects of one and potential for disorder, hidden or explicit, is many young lawyers, and inspired the ideas the same, criticism can only be self-criticism. singularly ill-suited for understanding social of teacher-intellectuals in p r o v i n c i a l To realise and remedy the inadequacy of this or political rebellions, or even the sociology universities, colleges and schools as well as in full requires a multilinear, humanist (and of crime, for that matter. But it has been the other white-collar sections of society in the perhaps also contingent) revision of Marxism. fate of Andhra Pradesh that the voice of the small towns. This intellectual outcrop has But even without that, Marxist intellectuals police is the loudest and most confident in perhaps distinguished itself more in elsewhere have led themselves through the analysing and explaining the naxalites and passionate commitment than in intellect, but philosophical churning that makes possible their struggles. The day-to-day expressions its very existence is an achievement of sorts liberation from political tutelage while of police pedantry are usually very embarras- and a bulwark against the kind of reaction keeping one within history. Such a churning sing. This book is not quite as crude, but is which newly educated sections are else where is yet to take place among the ranks of nevertheless unmistakably khak hi in its tenor. co-opted or themselves prone to. It has put revolutionary partisans in Andhra Pradesh. That the politicians who lack the slightest power in the hands of raw youth of But if the partisans arc not writing history vestige of moral authority to face the naxalites traditionally powerless communities, given because of their own dilemmas, neither have or any other principled political dissenters, them bombs and guns and a world-view to the intellectual opponents and critics of the have given up the task of meeting the naxalite guide their use, but left hanging in the air communist revolutionaries produced any challenge p o l i t i c a l l y is perfectly the uncomfortable questions stemming from work of substance criticising it. What exist understandable, though not excusable, for the often arbitrary and always ruthless way are the documents and understandably one- whatever their degeneration they happen to that power is being exercised. More vitally, sided reports produced by the revolutionaries represent the legitimate face of society's perhaps, it has no real answer to the question themselves, the equally one-sided and abusive politics. But what is difficult to comprehend how the revolution it plans to bring about leaflets produced by other political parties is the abdication of all responsibility by is going to differ in its shape and its fate from (including one naxalite group about another) society as a whole to engage the naxalite all the communist revolutions that have been and the 'benami' publications of the police movement in a rational debate about its and gone in this century, except to reiterate who have a penchant for producing (very methods and its means, its theory and its to its own evident satisfaction that 'the people' abusive) pamphlets in the name of 'the practice, its analysis of society's problems will solve all problems, which anyway appear people', 'the people's voice', etc. and its idea of their resolution. Society as insuperable only to intellectuals, or But one book has now come into existence. a whole (its official face) and all parts of it (alternately) that some difficulties do not It is by a policeman, and not an ordinary one minus the police have withdrawn into total exist and the residue will be taken care of at that. Aravinda Rao is inspector general silence and let the men in uniform conduct by the 'cultural revolution'. of police, presently head of the Special the debate at the crude level which alone is Quite surprisingly, there is no study worth Intelligence Bureau (SIB) of the AP Police, possible for them. One cannot blame the mentioning about this very remarkable the plainclothes sleuths and murderers police for filling this vacuum, for once their
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gun is set up as the only answer to naxalism, something that it has. That is not an entirely describe as a mere 'pretext' for terror. Yet the gun must necessarily acquire a philosophy wrong way of seeing it, but misses out a very the decisions taken and the strategies and and a morality to match those professed by important fact, that behind the naxalite tactics adopted by the naxalites are their own the communist revolutionaries. One can of movement is a strong aspiration of the and not those of 'the people' except by virtue course rue it, for the only philosophy and oppressed for a more tolerable existence. of the grossly reductionist analysis adopted morality possible for the police is a reductio- This is the positive sense in which 'the by them in the name of Marxism-Leninism. nist exercise that brings everything down to masses' enter (he naxalite phenomenon, In devising the strategies and tactics they are order and disorder, as intellectuals who find which is not equivalent to saying that the fully conscious of the needs and hopes of themselves caught in philosophical discus- politics of the naxalites is the highest political the people, but can be dogmatically uncaring sion with policemen who have been allowed expression of popular aspirations, a claim and ruthless to the point of coming close to to become society' s total answer to all dissent that the communist revolutionaries make 'using' the people. Most of their decisions discover soon to their frustration. For to be and on which is based their appropriation are taken and implemented over the heads under constant pressure to engage in such of permanent justification for all that they of the people, but are justified in the name a dialogue can quickly deaden all that is do in the name of the 'objective' interests of the people with the theoretical argument subtle and sensitive in the human potential. of the people. A given popular aspiration can that they represent the most class conscious The blame however should be put on what have different possible political expressions, vanguard of the masses, and therefore are is usually called public opinion, which and it cannot be assumed a priori that one as a matter of theory entitled to speak on watches in silence as the battle between the of them must necessarily be 'objectively' the their behalf even if the actual masses have two guns goes on and allows the guns to highest expression, though judgment of the little say in the matter. appropriate for themselves the sole right to relative merits - on the whole or in matters The naxalites' fight against the landlords speak on behalf of society and its future. The of detail - cannot be precluded on grounds and the state is not just for the immediate vision of the communist revolutionaries, the of dogmatic relativism and epistemological direct benefit of the masses (that would be theory of human existence that supports it, nothingness, if and when it is possible. called economism) but also for the capture and the strategic means that arc supposed Thus, when we speak of naxalism we of political power, which is described as to realise it go unquestioned, and the moral speak of three elements mixed in a particular workers and peasants power and is theorised and intellectual authority of the police to way: a specific politics, a rather extensive as the scientific framework for the realisation answer this vision goes unchallenged. A social base, and ruthless terror as a means. of all egalitarian aspirations. That may be constant problem with weapons is that they The social base has two faces: on the one so and it may not be so, but whether or not dominate not merely physically but soon hand it is the support of the naxalites and the masses are greatly moved by this promise also intellectually and morally. Such is the on the other it signifies aspirations of the and this theory, they must put up with the nature of the impact of power in general on subjugated masses. In Aravinda Rao's consequences of the decisions taken and the human beings, and weapons whether intended analysis, the first of the three is totally missing. acts perpetrated in the name of their own for good or bad are a sure source of power. The third, that is terror, is dominant. The empowerment, Iike it or not. And the violence, Though, to recognise this aspect of human movement is terror and its politics is only the fear and the terror that the naxalites frailty is not to condone the cowardice that a pretence, an excuse. As for the popular employ is not aimed only at the rich and the allows, it to pass and makes no effort to base it has, yes that is acknowledged at a evil but at all those (of whichever social overcome it. The human species distinguishes couple of points, and even the economic and class) designated enemies of the movement itself as a moral creature, and it is an important social causes espoused by the naxalites are by the movement. This subjectivity in moral principle evolved in the course of listed out in detail, but the people enter the deciding who are the 'enemies of the people' civilisation that truth shall not be exclusively picture only in the form of a gullible mass allows for the degree of arbitrariness that is declared by power and authority. whose problems are 'used' by the terrorists necessary to make terror an efficacious to further their nefarious aim which is (it instalment, if one can at all accept it as a NAXALISM AND TERRORISM appeals from his account) to terrorise and legitimate instrument, for terror not The title of the book is Naxalite Terrorism, terrorise and terrorise. "Ideology is only a accompanied by some degree of arbitrariness which is itself indicative of the central theme pretext for terror". As against this, there is is no terror at all, a fact that intellectuals who of Aravinda Rao's thesis; naxalism is the attitude of the naxalites themselves: we defend terror in the name of high ideals are terorism, and that is that. That the naxalites, are the people and the people are us. The too shame-faced to admit. The most visible in particular the CPI ( M L ) (People's War), reality is not located somewhere between sign of this effect is the curtain of tear that employ terror as a political instrument is a these notions, but rather it swings between soon descends over society at large, and fact, and quite often an unpleasant fact, but them. The naxalites do not just 'use' the affects even those sections of the poor who that is not to say that it is not a political people. They have genuine sympathy for are not supporters of the naxalites. movement. It is primarily and centrally a and identification with them (which does not A l l this makes for a much more complex political movement, that is a movement preclude lording it over them on occasion); picture than either the communist concerned with fighting and altering the they genuinely reflect the aspirations of the revolutionaries or the police would like to existing status of and relations between people, though as argued above there is admit. The author of what is happening in classes in society. Terror is one of the means nothing to justify the appropriation of those Telengana is neither 'the people' nor it employs. Its social base is the poor and aspirations for a permanent justification of 'terrorism' but a particular political agent the oppressed, not in the sense that all the all their politics; most of their cadre and which has a complex relation with the people poor and the oppressed are its supporters, leaders come from the very same people and their very real aspirations, and uses nor that it takes approval from those people whom they claim to speak exclusively on terror among other instruments as a means. for its strategies and decisions, but in the behalf of, though that circumstance does not Aravinda Rao has of course read enough sense that its politics is oriented in their necessarily justify the claim. The struggles of the literature on terrorism to know that favour and the considerable support it has led and waged by the naxalites, and even the kind of naming he indulges in is not is among them. But perhaps to sec the poor part of the terror employed by them, has unproblematic. He knows well the adage - as the 'base' of the naxalites is to make them benefited the poor and the oppressed usually quoted in the very first page of books an attribute of the naxalite movement: immensely, a benefit that is perverse to on terrorism - that one person's terrorist is
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another's 'mujahid' This is not an excuse a policeman to really wish to improve the but itself. Apolitical terror can only have for justifying all the terror indulged in in the democratic content of the polity to forestall terror as its goal. Political terror, on the other name of liberation in Telangana or else where. violent options, for few policemen really hand, can well have a very benign political but the recognition of a basic problem in love democracy,, though they never tire of goal, whether or not realistic, whether or not understanding and coming to terms with calling upon it to rebut the arguments of in fact realisable by means of terror. And political terror: that it is politics as much as revolutionaries. to say that human aspirations are only 'used' it is terror, and therefore has a base in genuine One can imagine an immediate response is to deny the human dimension of the politics human aspirations, represents it genuinely to this argument: that it is unrealistic to - which is itself denied anyway - and to to some extent or other, even if it is not the and of the Indian polity that it provide reduce the human beings to mere objects. sole or highest representative as it usually instant solutions to all problems and instant That the revolutionaries themselves tend to claims, for no necessarily greater reason gratification of all desires. That is of course sometimes use people, a fact only painfully than that it has more effective weapon power impossible and nobody is asking for any in evidence, cannot and should not lead to than the others. But Aravinda Rao gets around such thing. Quite balanced and responsible the denial of the actuality of the people's this difficulty by a simple means: there are critics are asking for much less, and even hopes and aspirations and the manifold ways and there may well be situations that call for that is lacking. Of course, for the masters in which they are linked to the revolutionaries revolution or violent liberation, but there is of the Indian polity, balanced and responsible and their violence, of which being 'used' is no such situtation in India. He is not just critics may be those alone who make only one dimension. saying that there is no evidence that the poor allowance for all the difficulties professed The book carries the subtitle 'Social and people of the Telangana districts are all or by the rulers. A different interpretation would Legal Issues', but the social and legal are in a majority convinced that for the betterment require a sense of balance and responsibility the two aspects its analysis singularly lacks, of their lives they should be prepared for a in the demands of sacrifice that one makes indeed, any true analysis of the naxalite violent overthrow of the present social order upon the people in the cause of progress, movement would acknowledge that its and the establishment of what the Maoists Quick solutions arc in any case difficult, and greatest achievement is not economic - that call a new democratic order. That would be any attempt to justify contemporary acts of w o u l d have probably come about even a serious criticism of the naxalites and their violence and terror by appealing to the very without the naxalites, though perhaps more claims. He is saying that there is no space human craving for a short cut to happiness slowly - but social: it has hit fatally at the at all for any violent revolution in India and is an irresponsible political attitude, though power relations of rural Telengana society there is no question of the people ever wanting one prevalent widely in radical circles. What and has endowed the poor, the dalits and the it because India is a democracy which one could on the other hand demand with tribals with a voice of their own and the responds to people's problems and l sense of responsibility towards the courage to speak out. This development has aspirations. That Indian democracy is genuine people is that the polity develop sufficiently already exhibited signs of turning into an enough to some degree will be acknowledged, genuine responsiveness to the aspirations of embarrassment for the naxalites themselves but the burden of proving that the degree life, liberty and equality before criticising - for the social slaves they have liberated is such as is claimed by Aravinda Rao should the people for supporting or tolerating violent are not all in a mood to accept a new political in fact be upon him and people in power like options. It is a question of creating honest master, a fact that would have perhaps him, for the lack of such a degree of accounta- faith rather than creating instant paradise. It exhibited itself more visibly by now if the bility and responsiveness has been a very is not that there is a rational agent called 'the master had been less heavily armed - but basic charge of responsible critics, who have people' that weighs meticulously the probable however that may be, the achievement is identified it as one of the main causes of costs of the option of violent change against something for which the people of Telangana political militancy and terror in different the probable cost of waiting for progress, w i l l forever be grateful to the communist parts of the country. Aravinda Rao on the assuming at all that anybody knows the two revolutionaries. other hand merely declares blandly that it costs. The reasons why human beings are When the political and social dimensions is so and therefore concludes that there can be attracted to violent options are much more of terror are denied, what remains is just no reason for any violent revolution in India. complex than such a model of rational choice violence, cynical and irresponsible violence. This attitude forecloses the one genuine - or one of militant class consciousness, for Depicting political terror this way carries a question that could fruitfully occupy anyone that matter- would imply. But nevertheless, strategic advantage for the policeman's who like Aravinda Rao advocates the lack of faith in the potential for justice argument. It creates legitimate space for protection of the Indian polity against the contained in the present arrangement of things introducing police terror as an excusable or violence of the naxalites: how to make the is a very important impelling factor behind even necessary thing, whose lawlessness Indian state accountable to the people, and political violence, or at any rate it is the one would otherwise worry the kind of person to democratic principles, to the degree factor which those who are on the side of who is likely to read a book such as this. necessary to rebut the arguments of the the status quo should be prepared to account It is alright, the argument implies, to say that naxalites, that is to say how to make it for, as a matter of moral responsibility, the police should deal lawfully with the sufficiently democratic to create a popular whether or not that w i l l automatically rule violence based upon genuine social need and climate against violent options. Such an out violent options. If they have honestly political requirement, but that demand loses analysis would have been much more useful accounted for it, then they at least acquire rational and ethical force when it is applied than this polemic that presupposes a non- a moral right to ask the people to give them to illegitimate and whimsical violence. This existent answer to that dilemma and indulges a little more time. But not otherwise. is the strategic advantage that Aravinda Rao's in ridicule of the revolutionaries. It could argument gains from the depiction of This police officer, instead, denies the have aided the cause of progress by helping naxalism as violence minus political content existence of the one problem anyone - to democratise the Indian polity further, just and social raison detre. Of course, those bureaucrat or politician - in power should as the naxalites, whatever their faults, have such as human rights activists who have answer in reply to the naxalites, and thereby in their own way served the cause of progress genuine respect for rule of law would still leaves naxalism hanging in a vacuum, bereft by helping to improve the livelihood of the say that even such violence must be dealt of a rationale and hence a mere concentrate poor and instilling greater self-confidence in with only by lawful means, and the law of irresponsible terror that only 'uses' human them. But it is perhaps too much to expect should be fair and reasonable, not because aspirations to further its goal, which is nothing
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2256 Economic and Political Weekly September 6, 1997 of any fundamentalism of spirit, but because one is as ridiculous as the other. This is not the law, the report is either stored in the home otherwise the cure would be worse than the meant to show disrespect to lawful procedures ministry's archives or rejected and a fresh disease, but there axe bound to be many in restraining the police, a charge that Aravinda enquiry ordered. society who would be w i l l i n g to accept the Rao levels at civil liberties activists. What Aravinda Rao w i l l probably feel he is implied suggestion that such qualms amount the civil liberties groups would like to see being hit below the belt (for when one to irrational hypersensitivity. is real and effective restraints and not discusses a policeman's book, one is ineffective ones put on exhibition for form's supposed to refrain politely from referring POLICE LAWLESSNESS sake. What they seek is not to discredit the to what he does when he is not writing Having crafted his framework to provide institutions of law and justice to make the books) if he and his readers are reminded space for appealing to such opinion, Aravinda way clear for the revolutionaries, as Aravinda that one of the very few cases where the Rao can freely argue in favour of condoning Rao insinuates, but genuine accountability magisterial enquiry held into an 'encounter' what are usually called 'police excesses'. Of of the state machinery to the law and to the killing held it to be fake happened in Warangal course, for form's sake he denies the excesses. rights of the people. If the magisterial district at a time (in 1985) when he was He even says that the expression state terror' enquiries did in fact 'act as a check on superintendent of police of that district, and which not only the revolutionaries but also possible police excesses' (only possible, and that he successfully managed to get the report human rights activists use, is inappropriate not real), if in fact Injured persons and rejected by the government and a fresh for a democracy wedded to rule of law such independent witnesses' did appear before all enquiry ordered after the enquiring executive as India. It is valid only for totalitarian states. such enquiries to make their depositions, if magistrate, a sub-collector, was transferred It is not my case that Indian democracy and in fact there were 'several cases in which out of the district at his behest. rule of law are entirely fraudulent. They are the magistrates found fault with the police Let us return briefly to the National Human not, as a general proposition. But there are for excessive use of force and in those cases Rights Commission, and the respect it is many situations in which the description the police have been prosecuted' - all these accorded by the Andhra Pradesh police. The fraudulent is quite apt to describe Indian are assertions made by this senior officer of Andhra Pradesh Civil Liberties Committee democracy. The handling of armed militancy the Andhra Pradesh police - civil liberties (APCLC) sent a complaint in March 1994 - in Kashmir, Nagaland or Telengana - is organisations would be only too happy, to the NHRC about 'encounter' killings in one such situation. Aravinda Rao's statement Aravinda Rao knows perfectly well that none the state. This state has been notorious for that 'the state governments in India have not of these statements is true as far as police that particular form of extra-judicial killing created and trained any secret police apparatus excesses vis-a-vis the naxalite movement go. for nearly three decades now. But the 1990s for eliminating the terrorists except by the Even regarding police excesses in other have seen an unprecedented escalation in the process of law' is a laughable falsehood. He situations, the most one can say is that magnitude of the killings. More than 60 per himself heads a force of policemen that is magisterial enquiries to take place, victims cent of the encounter killings of the three secret for all practical purposes (for its men (if they are alive) and the more courageous decades have taken place in the last six years. move around with weapons but without among the witnesses (if any) do depose, if APCLC described and tabulated the details insignia or name plates and do not record not in all cases, then frequently enough to of this ugly phenomenon and sought from their movements in any diary open to allow policemen writing books to cite these the NHRC nothing more complicated than inspection) and has been created specifically enquiries as instances of their accountability a re- of the law: an 'encounter' is to eliminate the terrorists classified and to the law. Some report is then sent to the a self-confessed act of killing committed identified by itself, not by the process of any home ministry by the enquiring executive with the full knowledge and intention of the known law but by the lawless norms of magistrate, which rarely takes any other than policemen, and is therefore a crime of murder. arbitrary power. At another point he says purely departmental action on erring Genuine defence of the body is of course that the poor policeman who confronts the policemen, assuming that is that the report an extenuating circumstance in law. But that naxalites perpetually risks his neck at 'the has found fault with policemen, which is not is to be proved in a court. The mere statement altar of the National Human Rights common since the executive magistrates who of the killer that he has killed in self-defence Commission' .The compliment should bring do these enquiries are not judicial officers does not suffice to condone the killing. Hence a blush to the prematurely wrinkled cheeks but revenue officials whose vocation makes each case of 'encounter' must be registered of that infant institution! The sad fact is that them nearly as cynical and insensitive as the as a crime of wilful homicide, investigated the only 'altar' at which the policemen policemen whom they work cheek by j o w l by an agency independent (to the extent involved in anti-naxalite operations risk their with. Prosecutions of police officers are very possible) of the police, and tested in a court necks is the landmines of the naxalites very few, and hence punishment in of law to decide whether the plea of self- themselves. This is sad for two reasons. One, accordance with law is very very rare. In the defence is well taken. This is the plain law, that vengeful retaliation of a particularly case of police atrocities in naxalite areas, all and it requires no judicial activism to unearth brutal kind should be the only justice that one can say is that magisterial enquiries it. And yet civil liberties organisations have perceived to be available against police are ordered whenever the law requires them until recently failed consistently in their effort violence in a reasonably civilised country to be. And that is about all that happens. to cajole the courts to state this position of such as ours; and two, because the landmines Witnesses are only rarely allowed to depose. law in so many words. their victims very indiscriminately: any Policemen are known to wait at the gate of The AP High Court finally did so in 1995, policeman travelling in any jeep on any rural the enquiring magistrate's office and abduct and the NHRC in 1996 in response to track of Telengana risks his life, quite intending witnesses They are known to guard APCLC's complaint. This year, the NHRC irrespective of his own character and conduct. all the roads leaving the village which is the has directed all state governments to realise There have been instances of jeeps of forest, scene of the offence and physically stop that its direction in the APCLC complaint revenue and election officials being hit by people from going to the enquiry. There are applies to 'encounters' everywhere in the naxalite landmines due to mistaken identity. cases where the police have entered the country. But this was preceded by much Apart from the NHRC, the magisterial enquiring magistrate's chamber w i t h mayhem in Andhra Pradesh, which is enquiries held under Section 176 of Cr P C weapons in the hand and brandished them pertinent to Aravinda Rao's claim that the into police excesses are cited by this author at the deponents. If, after all this, the enquiry AP police live in perpetual fearof the NHRC. as a real restraint on police lawlessness. The does find fault with the police for violating Soon after receiving APCLC's complaint in
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March 1994, the NHRC decided to first of language that an 'encounter' is an act of cul- democratic it may claim to be. But since all get a feel of the 'naxalite problem' in AP. pable homicide which must be registered as human beings will always require some And so it paid a visit to the state in August a crime, investigated by an agency as indepen- policing - the state is never going to wither 1994 to gather public opinion in the affected dent as possible of the local police force, the away - it remains a problem of civilisation areas, about the naxalite movement and the report of which is to be placed before a court to make its police swallow the idea that they government's response to it. They thought that is to judge whether the killing in fact ply their nasty role within the strict limits - and one cannot complain, for that is what took place in self-defence. This was, as said of the norms set by society. The most common sense as well as the judicial instinct above, in November 1996. As this review important norm, of course, is that the role would recommend - that the best way to is written, about 70 persons have been killed of the police in society w i l l be severely, gather public opinion visit the affected in encounters by the Andhra Pradesh police limited and circumscribed within the districts and hold open enquiries to which since the publication of the NHRC's report narrowest l i m i t s necessary. Today, people would be invited to come and express but in not a single case have the police unfortunately, it is expanding to fill the their views and grievances. The government superiors - and that includes the author of vacuum left by decaying political institutions was expected to encourage the people to this book - of Andhra Pradesh directed their and diminishing social responsibility. What attend the sessions and express their views. subordinates to act in accordance with the is happening in Telengana is only an instance It in fact did no such thing. It did not even directions of the NHRC, and they evidently of this general disease. give a press release informing the people of have no qualms about not doing so. C I V I L LIBERTIES MOVEMENT the NHRC' s visit. Instead, the police That, once again, is how much the Andhra machinery was geared to exert itself utmost Pradesh police respect the NHRC, and how Finally, a word or two about Aravinda ' to hijack the sittings. This they did with the much in awe they stand of its powers. Rao's treatment of the c i v i l liberties ease born of their contempt for anything But one need not belabour the point too movement, in particular his bete noir, the judicial. They mobilised large numbers of much. Nowhere in the world do policemen Andhra Pradesh Civil Liberties Committee. victims of naxalite violence (including not like the idea that they too are accountable A writer who wishes to be taken seriously only men of the exploiting classes or others to the law. That, they believe, is like telling must beware of bad blood, for it makes for who may be reasonably described as enemies god that he loo is bound by the Holy Book a poor critique. Aravinda Rao's account of of the poor, but also victims of arbitrary and that he has pronounced to keep mortals in APCLC is an example. He is willing to unreasonable acts of violence by the naxalites) check. It would not have mattered what concede some virtues, however reluctantly, plus paid informers of the police, kith and individual policemen - or an entire police to the naxalite movement, but to the civil kin of policemen slain by the naxalites, force, for that matter - thought, but for the liberties movement, none. He docs not professional criminals who live at the behest fact that this attitude is a sanctioned part of concede even the minimal virtues of reason of the police and plainclothes policemen the notion of sovereignty of the state. The and common sense. It is of course true that themselves. This crowd thronged the place rhetoric of democracy says that the people the civil liberties movement was initially a of the sittings and created with their shouting are the true Sovereigns, but while in creature of the CPI(ML). Whether or not the and shoving such an atmosphere of terror democracies the people do have some degree first generation office-bearers were actually that anyone not friendly with the police felt of control over the political masters, the state members of the CPI(ML), they were very deterred from going there. The only exception as a whole is as yet very reluctant, and more much part of its ethos and political discipline. was the handful of civil liberties activists so in third world countries, to allow itself It is also true that the various CPI(ML) from the complainant organisation and the to be held accountable to the people, or even groups in Andhra Pradesh would still like few victims of police violence that they had to the law, which is a partial mode of it to be that way, and therefore motivate their brought with them. They found themselves accountability to the people. sympathisers, and intellectuals amenable to surrounded by a hostile crowd which booed Aravinda Rao points to the enquiries held their way of thinking and their discipline, them with offensive slogans and manhandled by the executive magistrates and the to join the APCLC, so that the organisation them right in the presence of the dignitaries directions and recommendations of the may better serve their needs. What Aravinda of the NHRC, as the entire lot of superior NHRC as the two checks upon police Rao knows but does not wish to acknowledge police officers of the district looked on in misbehaviour provided by the system (the is that right in the midst of this pressure - ill-disguised glee. This happened on successive implication being that there is no need to and of course the very brutal pressure excited days at Karimnagar Warangal and Nalgonda. make any further noise about police, by the police, of which Aravinda Rao knows That is how much respect the Andhra atrocities), but apart from the contempt with quite well, for he was the superintendent of Pradesh police have for the NHRC. which the police habitually treat these police of Warangal district when the first Later the NHRC came back to Andhra institutions and their proceedings, it must be killing by the police of an APCLC activist, Pradesh to pursue the matter. This time it recognised that neither of them has the power the elderly pediatrician A Ramanadham, took came, not to gather public opinion but to to pronounce judicially on anybody's guilt place in that town - APCLC has carved for record evidence concerning six selected cases and award mandatory punishment. As a police itself a unique identity and a wide-ranging of 'encounters' from out of the list submitted officer, Aravinda Rao would certainly not agenda. It is not a question of moderates vs by APCLC. The police once again did their countenance the suggestion that all criminals extremists vis-a-vis naxalite violence, as he best to threaten, cajole or buy off witnesses. should have this facility of being held says at one point. That makes it seem as if They succeeded fully in one case and partialIy accountable to the law only through the the worry is only about the quantum of in another. In the remaining cases, the kith mechanism of an executive magistrate's violence the civil liberties movement may and kin of the dead men and other witnesses enquiry which ends in nothing more harmful uncritically countenance on the part of rebel did appear before the NHRC. braving con- than a report that is never acted upon, and movements. It is rather whether movements siderable police pressure. After hearing the a direction by the NHRC which amounts to which arise from the injustices of society and evidence and the arguments concerning the nothing more serious than an admonition. speak and act in the name of justice shall question whether the law allows impunity Policemen, of course, will not find this themselves be allowed to behave unjustly to the police to torture and k i l l , the NHRC comparison amusing. Not just policemen, and get away without any censure from the gave its report in November 1996 telling the the sovereign as such does not like to be human rights movement. But more than this, government of Andhra Pradesh in quite plain equated with common mortals, however, the debate and the differences within the
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human rights movement perta to to recognis- regard the civilisational restraints on policing risk or harm to those classes. Firstly, as a ing - or denying - a specific role for the with contempt and enjoy the power that parallel adjudicatory and executive movement within each sphere of social flows from their regular violation. mechanism, the revolutionaries adjudicate iniquity, struggle and transformation, a role Aravinda Rao was, at the juncture of the matters not only between the oppressed and that is not merely supportive of "people's incident, the SP of Cuddapah district of the the oppressors but also between different struggles' but has an agenda of its own, an Rayalaseema region. He took personal sections of the oppressed or the middle agenda of furtherance of democratic norms initiative in apprehending and interrogating classes. And their procedures and their norms and values in social relations and institutions, a professional housebreaker by name being determined by whatever political To make the civil liberties movement look Venkateshwarlu of Badvel. The man was consciousness the local activists possess plus ridiculous he says that mere arrest and detained for more than 50 days in a series raw weapon power, their administratis of interrogation of a naxalite is denounced state of police stations on either side of the justice and their executive directives are terror by the civil liberties movement. That Cuddapah and Prakasam districts and tortured sometimes more harsh and brutal than those is not true, and he knows it to be not true. to confess to a number of robberies and of bourgeois law, apart from being amenable N o t w i t h s t a n d i n g pressure from the thefts, and to reveal the names of the persons or liable to the common ills of power, any revolutionaries and their ideologues that the the stolen goods were sold to. A l l the while power. Secondly, it is a notorious truth about crimes of violence committed by them arc the wife and infant daughter of the man were armed political militancy that it is perpetually not crimes but acts of liberation, the civil also - totally without the sanction of law - involved in the brutal act of weeding out liberties movement has taken the stand that detained in the various police stations. The agents of its enemy within its social base, it will not oppose the law taking its course child contracted infection in course of this to such an extent that it soon is found killing in the matter of revolutionary violence, for ill-treatment and died of diarrhoea almost at more of its own people than the enemy. that is part of the rule of law. What we have the time the police succeeded in 'cracking' Kashmiri militants have killed more Kashmiri opposed is extra-legal suppression of the the series of thefts and robberies the child's Muslims than either Hindus or the officers naxalites or anybody for that matter; the father had committed. Both the success of of the union of India; the same is true of enactment of statutes such as T A D A which the investigation (publicised by the SP) and Khalistani militants who have killed more cannot be called law at all it that expression the death of the child (publicised by APCLC) of the Sikh 'agents' or 'informers' of the includes respect for natural justice and civic received prominent attention from the press. union of India than their systemic enemies. freedoms; and the refusal to recognise that Aravinda Rao's furious reaction (as stated The naxalitcs, similarly, have killed more of behind the violence is a politics with its to press reporters) was to call civil liberties the poor and the rural middle classes than specific social base and raison d'etre. activists 'birds of prey that are perpetually the landlords, the other exploiters or the Aravinda Rao knowingly makes the false in search of corpses'. Today he says they police. This is a very unpleasant fact about allegation that torture of ordinary criminal are interested only in the corpses of naxalitcs political terror which its practitioners and suspects does not evoke the kind of response What, in the end, is this policeman's sympathisers are hard put to defend, except that torture of the radical activist does. On prescription tor curing what he regards as to point - for the benefit of whoever is the contrary, it is the civil liberties movement the naxalite disease? Since he believes that willing to find that a satisfactory reply - to that first drew the attention of social concern there is no real reason for its existence he the promise of what the people w i l l attain to custodial deaths in which it is mostly non- probably expects that it will eventually fade after liberation. political crime suspects that die. If today in out. There is no evil in hoping so. But in But notwithstanding all this, the naxalitcs Andhra Pradesh and some other states even actual practice, the state is not waiting for do fill the space that really exists in Indian otherwise insensitive political parties have the alleged irrelevance of naxalism to drive society and democracy for a popular and learnt to react to custodial deaths, and if the it out. The stale and its police are committing effective counter-weight to the force of the courts and NHRC are responding positively more and more gruesome acts to eliminate slate's bureaucracy and the police, and the to complaints of custodial torture and killing, the naxalitcs and are doing so as a matter social power of the dominant classes. No the credit goes to the civil liberties movement, of deliberate political policy. The quantum amount of curses delivered by Aravinda Rao I may recall an incident of nearly a decade of injury they are causing in the process to is going to drive out this gap and the force ago that is likely to again embarrass Aravinda the people as well as to democratic civitiation that fills it. Genuine democratisation and Rao. One can of course comprehend the is incalculable. But they will not succeed - reform may do it, but nobody is thinking of embarrassment, unless one is of the Utopian at least not easily. It does not matter whether it, and instead our rulers arc opting for the persuasion that policing as such (and not the the new democratic revolution of the naxalites dictates of international capital which only degree and kind of policing) is an artificial is relevant or irrelevant as a prescription for make things much worse. Let us remind our- creature of human pre-history, which is bound our ills. Notwithstanding that, there is space selves that the might of the police forces of to vanish once the epoch of true human in our polity for an effective popular counter- Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and the central para- history begins. Policemen habitually weight to the unresponsive and unheeding military are finding it impossible to apprehend complain that society leaves them the most executive and the very inadequate the single brigand called Veerappan who nasty job of dealing with explicit expressions mechanisms of adjudication, that respond if seems to have created some kind of a popular of the evil in the human potential, and repays at all on the side of the rich and the powerful base for himself by appealing to ties of com- by preaching morality at them for their alleged and against the poor. That is the main role munity and providing some employment insensitivity in doing the job that the rest the naxalites are playing today, and though and income to forest dwellers around. The of society is not prepared to do. One can it has nothing much to do with their theory reason is not that our police are all that ineffi- sympathise with this complaint, but only of agrarian struggle as the axis of the --ent, nor only that whether it is Veerappan when it comes from policemen who restrain revolution, it can well sustain itself, even it or naxalites their terror is no mean thing for themselves to act within the norms set by it w i l l probably find it difficult to move out the people in whose midst they live, a factor civilisation for handling human evil by means of the undeveloped areas of the stale. Of which the state makes much of. of force rather than persuasion, and tell society course, the fact that the naxalite counter- More than all these factors is the simple honestly that this is all the police can do, weight functions on behalf of the poor and truth that very few people in this country and the rest is society's civilisational burden. the oppressed as against the rich and the have much love and affection for the 'sarkar', But not when it comes from those who powerful does not mean that it is without at any rate not enough to help it to apprehend
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any and all challengers of its monopoly of says, go beyond the law to advance the law question whether such powers should be law and force, especially if the challenger, and that is allowed and respected by society allowed, anywhere and at any time, it must out of cleverness (as in the case of Veerappan) in the name of judicial activism. Vigilantism, be remarked that the police force in those or political principle and social sympathy (as then, is the act of police going beyond the countries is more amenable to self-disciplinc in the case of naxalites), keeps his force on law to enforce the law, and why does not and discipline of the law than is ours by any the right side of the masses. society respect it? I do not know whether stretch of imagination. The common The conclusion a reasonable person would this Andhra police officer is the originator rhetorical comparison of the Indian police draw from this is that what we have here of this novelty or it has its origin in the with a licensed gang of ruffians may not is a situation that the police and the armed intellectual output of the international reflect the whole truth, for policemen perform forces cannot handle. That it can, if at all, fraternity of policemen. The trick lies in quite a few difficult and necessary duties, be handled only politically, or even better, saying only that both judges and policemen but in matters of amenability to lawful control by reasoned societal interaction with the go 'beyond the law' without adding that the and discipline the comparison is very apt. parallel sovereign and its aspiration to replace one expands rights when it does so (though They are as unruly as a gang of ruffians, with the actual sovereign. The role of the police we seem to be in for some reverse judicial the added disadvantage of being consecrated should be strictly confined to the control activism in the coming days) and the other by the law to discipline others. To trust such and investigation of crimes. Those who arc violates rights in doing so. a force with more powers than at present, political sympathisers of the naxalites need Apart from this, the only other legal issue' in the name of what is given in Britain or not put themselves outside this process raised by this author is the lamented demise Sweden would be suicidal for India, of interaction, for they too presumably of T A D A . He wants it back with the same irrespective of whether it is right in those realise that social transformation is not powers and less ambiguity in its definitions. countries. If Aravinda Rao knows nothing unproblematic and needs a helping hand He will probably have his wish once the else, he should know at least one thing, that from all concerned to keep it on the proper political instability at Delhi goes. There is whether it is in Telengana or Punjab or. track. no need now to go into the reasons for Kashmir, not everybody may love the But instead, Aravinda Rao and his ilk ask opposing that non-existent statute, and militants, but everybody without exception for more powers to the police. He makes at whether they are all born of ignorance as hates the police and the armed forces. Such one point a very curious argument for condon- Aravinda Rao seems to think, but it is is the character of policing in India, and ing police lawlessness, or vigilantism as he necessary to answer the comparison he draws nobody other than a policeman would argue calls it. The word vigilantism has shades of with western democracies and the greater that the Indian police deserve more powers, meaning, both positive and negative, but this powers they allow the police in general, or or that such a conferment of additional powers author uses it in a positive sense. Judges, he in dealing with terrorism. Apart from the would solve any problem whatsoever.
2260 Economic and Political Weekly September 6, 1997