Interview for A French Documentary Film

Pradip Basu

[Note: Early in January 2023, I was interviewed for a French Documentary Film on the Naxalite Movement regarding my own personal experience of the Naxalite politics. The director is Joy Banerjee. He is a Bengali-origin person, although born and brought up in France, a French citizen and a documentary filmmaker. He is assisted by ProdipChakraborty who is also a Bengali-origin person, although now a French citizen and a librarian in France for several years. Joy has directed, jointly with another filmmaker, a documentary film, ‘Bengal Shadows’, that we can find on the website of ‘Terres Du Bengale’: http://terresdubengale.com. Some other films of theirs featuring West Bengal and Bangladesh (such as ‘Rouge Bengale’ narrating the experience of 34 years of Left Front government led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) or CPI(M) in West Bengal are also available in this site. Here I have transcribed and edited the video of my interview.

I was born in 1957 in Kolkata. I was only 10 years old when the armed peasant uprising of Naxalbari took place in 1967 under the leadership of Charu Mazumder, Kanu Sanyal, Jangal Santhal, Souren Basu, et al and in the same year the United Front government came to power in West Bengal, a constituent state in the eastern region of India. The CPI(M) was a major partner to this government. A considerable number of communists all over India who supported the Naxalbari uprising were expelled from the CPI(M). Very soon, the All India Coordination Committee of Communist Revolutionaries (AICCCR) was formed by these Naxalites. But there was a lot of debate and controversy. In 1969, the followers of Charu Mazumder founded the new Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) or the CPI (M-L), headed by him. After his death in police custody in 1972, the Naxalite movement suffered a serious setback and substantially subsided. Gradually, it was splintered into several groups, yet they were slowly trying to regain strength through rectifying their blunders [1].

In 1974, as a student of 17 years, I joined a Naxalite organization, named the Central Committee (CC), CPI(M-L), led by Satya Narayan Singh (SNS). In 1975, the central Congress government declared Internal Emergency, which was lifted in 1977 when the Janata government was installed in power at the centre. In the meantime, several Naxalite organizations and Naxalite prisoners who had just been released from jail joined together to form a larger Naxalite organization called the Provincial Central Committee (PCC), CPI (M-L), led by SNS, Chandra Pulla Reddy, Santosh Rana, Vaskar Nandy, Dhruv Choudhuri, and others. But then again, this large organization also witnessed sharp debates within and subsequently, several splits. In 1981, out of my disappointment, I totally disengaged myself from all active party politics and began to think seriously about pursuing an academic profession–Pradip Basu]

Interviewer: Dr. Basu, you have written and edited a good number of books on the Naxalite Movement. These books are widely appreciated by the specialists as well as by the lay readers. What, according to you, gave the real momentum to the movement, pushing it in front of all other issues of that period? What was the context that favoured the birth of this movement?

Basu: In fact, in India, the communist movement had a long history. Many glorious people’s struggles of the workers and peasants were conducted and guided by the Communist Party. But unfortunately, the Communist Party leadership was confined to parliamentary elections. They were using the mass movements, mass organisations, and mass agitations, all, only for the sole goal of capturing governmental power, without disturbing the bourgeois capitalist and semi-feudal framework of economy, politics and culture. So, very briefly speaking, the cadres, a large section of the sympathisers, and supporters of the communist movement were unhappy. There was discontent in their minds. As a result, a group of radical cadres began to criticise the Communist Party leadership. Their parliament-centric, election-centric, vote-centric, governmental power-centric activities and thoughts were criticised by these cadres. It must be noted here that in the long history of the communist movement in India, two things could be identified:

(1) The radical cadres, on the one hand, thought that this parliament-centric politics was revisionist, it should be rectified, and a revolutionary Marxism should be incorporated. So, the present leadership should be replaced.
(2) On the other hand, many of these radical cadres thought that India’s revolution would take the path of the Chinese revolution. Indian situation was largely similar to the Chinese situation before the revolution. And so, even in 1948, in ‘Andhra Thesis’, the Andhra state committee of the then undivided Communist Party of India adopted a document. When I started my PhD research, I had to go through this long document. The title was, ‘China’s Road is Our Road’. So, even in 1948, even when the Chinese revolution had not yet fully attained its success and victory, many Indian communist cadres were thinking in terms of the Chinese road.

These two were equated–that parliamentary politics should be rejected, should be discarded, and revolutionary politics should be accepted, and equidistance of CPI(M) party from Moscow and Peking (now Beijing) should be rejected as a line of opportunism. Instead, pro-China line advocating the road of Chinese revolution and Mao Zedong’s thoughts should be accepted. So, revolutionary Marxism was equated to Mao Zedong’s thought and the Chinese road [2].That must be noted.

In 1955, in Naxalbari area, in Darjeeling district, there was a big movement of the tea plantation workers and the peasants. In 1959, there was a firing, killing around 80 peasants by the West Bengal Congress government with Bidhan Chandra Roy at the helm. In 1965-1966, throughout West Bengal, there were a series of food movements, along with many other movements. And ultimately, from 1966, there were militant peasant movements taking place in Darjeeling district. And what happened? In 1967, on 2nd March, so far I remember, the United Front government came to power in West Bengal. The CPI(M) was a major partner to this government. And, you know, the CPI(M) was already formed in 1964 after the split from the CPI. The CPI(M) leadership gave tall promises of revolutionary politics. Many cadres were much influenced by it. But during 1967, the militant cadres were shocked to see that the CPI(M) leadership again practised the line of the sole objective of parliamentary politics. Just like the CPI. So, the promises of revolution were belied. And for the second time, the militant cadres were disillusioned. And right at this moment, the Darjeeling district committee of the CPI(M) in North Bengal was guiding a militant peasant struggle. The CPI(M) leadership, before coming to power, promised to help and accelerate this peasant movement. But after they were installed in power, they were in a dilemma.

The CPI(M) leadership was under pressure from the central government as well as beneficiaries of the capitalist and semi-feudal economic system. So they were in a dilemma whether to support the Naxalbari peasant uprising, which was an armed uprising, or to suppress it by force, by military, by armed force of the Indian state and remain in power. In the dilemma, they took the decision in favour of remaining in governmental power. Actually, during this time, in March, April, and May of 1967, two poles for the first time in Indian communist history–two poles–two opposite poles–came very close to each other and stood side by side. First pole was the revolutionary upsurge of Naxalbari peasants and the second pole was the parliamentary politics culminating in the governmental politics of the CPI(M) leadership. So, one was revolutionary politics, other was parliamentary politics. These two poles came close and the division was very clear before the militant cadres. And hence 1967 made a clear distinction between the two politics. About these two poles, I wrote a book in Bangla (I am saying Bangla, and not Bengali, which was a British distortion. I am deliberately trying to unlearn the British distortion of our language). In this Bangla book, I have done a painstaking research to show these two poles [3].

And a large section of the Darjeeling district committee of the CPI(M), including Charu Mazumder, Kanu Sanyal, Jangal Santal, Souren Basu, Khokon Mazumder, and under their leadership, a large section of the communist cadres and secondary leadership, revolted against the CPI(M) leadership. The AICCCR provided a new platform for the radical communists who believed in revolutionary politics, armed peasant struggle and the Chinese road. Sushital Ray Choudhury, a state committee member of the CPI (M), joined it. Saroj Dutta, a noted leftist intellectual, joined it. I am talking about West Bengal because I don’t know much in detail about the other states of India. But in Andhra Pradesh, I remember, in the course of the movement, Tarimella Nagi Reddy, D. V. Rao, Chandra Pulla Reddy, and many of the important communist leaders of the CPI (M), joined. Ram PiaraSaraf from Jammu and Kashmir and Satya Narayan Singh from Bihar, so many people joined. The AICCCR became a platform for debate and for coordinating similar militant movements taking place in different parts of India. On 22nd April, 1969, a new party was formed under the leadership of Charu Mazumder, which was called the CPI(M-L).

While I criticize Charu Mazumder on many grounds, at the same time, I must appreciate that he built up this glorious struggle of the peasants and made efforts for a long time. He did not appear abruptly. There is a long history of his association with the peasant movement since his age of 16-17 years. He was a veteran communist leader and he created a sense of rejection for the parliamentary politics, opportunist politics, and politics hankering after power, corruption, and greed. He created a kind of idealism, revolutionary idealism of sacrifice. He taught to respect the peasants. That is very significant. The peasants are those whom we educated middle-class people, just humiliate every moment. Charu Mazumder asked to go to the peasants, respect them, and learn from their daily experiences. He advised not to go to teach them, but to go to learn from them, learn from their life, and learn from their culture, their values, their lifestyle, their revolutionary spirit, their suffering; to respect the peasants. For these few aspects like this, for this, I have great respect for him. And certainly there were many mistakes made by him and the Naxalites.

But anyway, I am coming back to my own experience that at the age of 17, in 1974, I read the famous Self-Critical Report (SCR)[4] of SNS. I immediately responded to it positively, favourably, and joined his organization. I joined as a whole timer. But I was staying at home, because I was instructed to stay at home. And along with others, I was given the responsibility of building up student movement in our state, because I was a student at that time. I was ready to go to any working-class front or peasant front. But the organization told me, “You do your work in West Bengal student front” [5]. And then I was organizing student movements and was holding study circles. I was not the only one. There were many others, around 25-30 young boys and girls in Calcutta, working very secretly, during the Emergency, 1975-76, the terrible–horrible rule of Mrs. Indira Gandhi. At that time, we were doing this work. We were using some camouflage. In our college, we formed a Chhatra Aikyo Committee (students’ unity committee), something like that [6]. Nobody knew that we were Naxalites. And Chhatra Parishad (the student wing of the Congress Party) at that time used to say that no Naxalite is alive there outside the jail. And we were alive, we were Naxalites, we were outside the jail, but nobody knew that. This was an Emergency. After the Emergency, in 1977, this Naxalite organization changed its line. SNS made a remarkable departure. He and many others formed the PCC, CPI(M-L). It was a big organization. Many Naxalites were freed from jail and many of them joined PCC. PCC emerged when CC, CPI(M-L) merged with Unity Committee, CPI(M-L). And I had one experience of attending a meeting of SNS and a closed-door meeting with Chandra Pulla Reddy and many others were there. At that time, the change of policy was: let us take part in the elections [7]. It was something which I greatly appreciated.

During my student days in colleges [8], I was doing very serious study of Marxism: Several works on Marx-Engels, Lenin, Stalin, as well as some works by them, Mao Zedong’s full volumes, etc. [9]. From my studies, I realized that Mao Zedong said that for revolution, communists should use every possible means: Mass organization, secret organization, armed struggle, peaceful democratic struggle, open work, secret work, elections and extra-electoral movements. And I was really surprised to see that the Naxalites, since around 1969, had boycotted mass election, mass organization, mass movement, everything. So, in matters of the tactical line, they had deviated from the teachings of Mao Zedong in the name of Mao Zedong Thought. That is important. Now, when SNS adopted the policy to participate in elections, I was happy and like me, many Naxalite people were happy. But many other Naxalite groups severely criticized SNS and PCC in that they had become another CPI(M), revisionist, neo-revisionist, that they had deviated from the path of revolution.

Q. Have you any regret of that time? You seem very strong in your opinion. Have you any regret of all the time you have spent with the Naxal movement?

A. Not at all. Just the opposite. That was the best time of my life. I was sharing so many things with my loving comrades. During the elections of Santosh Rana [10], I went to the village side in Gopiballavpur [11].  And then during the Panchayat elections, probably in 1979, I went to Bolpur, Birbhum [12]. For that short stay with the Adivasi–Santal–tribal people, poor peasants, I learnt a lot. I tried to unlearn some part of what I had learnt before. Today in postmodern, post-structuralist language we often talk about unlearning what you have already learnt. Because what you have learnt is controlled by power. Discourse and power. The invisible power, what Michel Foucault talked about? Now I realise that I unlearned to some extent the education of this system which taught me to insult the poor peasants, the black skinned Adivasi peasants, illiterate peasants. That wrong education could be unlearned. That is the major point - the teaching of the Naxalite movement. I learnt that.  Actually, I just cannot think of being repentant. I never regret.

The thing is only that when the Naxalite groups were further splintered, the PCC was splintered [13], we, many of young cadres in Kolkata, became disheartened. And after 1981, many of us gave up politics, and were dissociated from Naxalite politics. It was certainly going backward. Certainly if I had to regret at all, I must regret for that. I came back to my middle class life. My father was a doctor in an Adivasi area in today’s Jharkhand. He retired. And we had some financial problems in the family. It was all disappointment. I was failing to collect the strength, lacking in self-confidence. In the meantime, I was studying Political Science because that was the only thing which I had studied during my Naxalite period. So I took up Political Science. I already did my BA honours and now I did my MA from Calcutta University and joined the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta (CSSSC). I got a research scholarship there under Professor Partha Chatterjee. I did my PhD on Naxalite theory [14].

Q. You yourself didn’t take any ‘action’ or didn’t join any squad?

A. No. I was never a member of any armed squad. In the villages, when I went there, the jotedars [15], their armed people, were moving here and there and we Naxalites were living mostly in the tribal villages. Some of our friends also carried weapons so as to protect themselves. But I never attacked any person. I myself was attacked by Congress student wing in college. I was severely beaten up during the Emergency and after. Maybe, 3-4 times. Once or twice, I was admitted in the Calcutta Medical College & Hospital. I was treated there for 3-4 days. These things happened [16]. One of my comrades was arrested at that time and I took shelter in an unknown place. I also didn’t know who these people were. Some people took me there and I spent nights there. So, I was never arrested.

Q. Your present position?

Basu: Finally, where have I come now and how? That is a very crucial point for me. It was written in my Presidency University website. After being dissociated from the Naxalite movement in 1981, which means at the age of 24, I gradually became interested in Antonio Gramsci and Louis Althusser. Althusser, I did not understand much. Gramsci was easier. And if you are interested in Gramsci, Michel Foucault would not be far away. (From 1991), My interest was gradually shifted to Foucault, post-structuralism and a little bit of Jacques Derrida. And then I became interested in Foucault’s concept of power. Later, I read I studied seriously the postcolonial theory of Edward Said and Homi Bhabha. I became interested in feminism and then, in Ambedkarite theory of caste annihilation. So at this moment, if I look back, I can see that the Naxalites were honest and persistent agents of fundamental social transformation in India. But their theory lacked gender sensibilities, caste sensibilities, the Adivasi question, the Foucauldian power perspective, Althusser’s concept of ideology, and Gramsci’s concept of hegemony–Ideological hegemony. These things should be incorporated into Naxalite theory to enrich the movement. Many sensibilities were absent in their ideology, although they were honest, dedicated and persistent agents of social transformation.

And that is why in my life, present life, I have taken up this job. I took up the work to edit a book on this dialogue between the gender question and the Naxalite movement. Another edited book I will publish soon on the caste question and the Naxalite movement. In one edited volume, there are different discourses on Naxalite movement. And in another edited book, there is the Naxalite politics in post-structuralist, postcolonial and subaltern perspectives [17]. I am editing these books, requesting other people to do research and write. I myself also write. That is my present position that there should be a meaningful dialogue between revolutionary Marxism on the one hand and post-structuralism, postcolonialism, feminism, Ambedkarism, Adivasi theory and anti-racism. Indeed, the concern of LGBTQIA+ also should be addressed. That means, in other words, my position is that class struggle cannot be the only focus of the movement. Because it is not the only form of oppression. So class struggle should be combined with anti-caste, anti-environmental pollution, anti-gender oppression, and anti-Adivasi oppression movements. All these forms of oppression are there and they should be blended with class struggle. Only then a new revolutionary movement can be built up.

I believe that the Naxalite movement was an honest revolutionary movement. The Naxalites were persistent agents of social transformation. But there were many drawbacks. I have already mentioned to you about boycott of the election, the boycott of mass organizations, boycott of open forms of struggle. So many things. But Mao Zedong himself said that we cannot miss any form of struggle. Revolution is a very difficult task. And if you want to go for a successful revolution, you should leave no stone unturned. (I would say to the Naxalites) You beheaded the statue of Rammohan Roy [18]. But why? You must explain to the people what the faults of Rammohan Roy were. How was he associated with the British colonial rule? Or, can we have a dialectical evaluation, assessment? Rammohan Roy, on the one hand, was fighting for the feminist cause, gender equality. He was fighting for secular liberalism. On the other hand, he believed that the British rule was a divine providence for India, a blessing for India. All these should be dialectically and critically evaluated. You cannot reject Vidyasagar. It’s true that Vidyasagar gave shelter to the British army during the Revolt of 1857. But, you have to understand the situation and what Vidyasagar did for women’s emancipation, for the struggle against the superstitions of Hindu society, its prejudices. His glorious role must be appreciated. For Rabindranath, Mahatma Gandhi, for everyone, a Marxist should put the person in the historically specific context. And in that context, the plus and minus points should be assessed. Only thus, the evaluation could be done as was pointed out by Lenin and Mao Zedong. But here, if you behead Vidyasagar's statue unjustifiably, you are creating a lot of adverse criticism among the people. First you go to tell the people that this education teaches you to hate your own country people. It teaches you to hate manual labour. It teaches you to glorify intellectual labour. All these bourgeois values, feudal values, should have been discarded first through adequate ideological work. But you took a shortcut. You didn’t take up this laborious work. You didn’t do this historical study, research. You never did this. You just beheaded the statues. You destroyed the laboratories and the schools and the libraries. But you must explain this to the people: What is the meaning of this feudal education, colonial education?

So far as I have studied Mao Zedong, I have seen that Mao believed that there should be a people’s court in the village. Thousands of peasants should have gathered. Then the proceedings would be conducted. And the accused jotedar or police officer would be prosecuted. And if his crimes were proved, only then the people’s court can give a verdict to punish that person. But what the Naxalites did here: an armed squad of the party took the decision, armed squad of five people took the decision that this police officer or this armed jotedar was doing wrong things to the people. It is true that wrong things were done by some notorious landlords and police officers. They were responsible for killing, rape, torture, encounter of thousands. Many dead bodies were seen floating in the Ganges (river Ganga). In Kashipur, Baranagore, Barasat etc. genocide took place. Areas were surrounded by hooligans and the young people were butchered. True, but the secret armed squad cannot take the decision for the whole people. That is anti-democracy. So, a revolutionary Marxism must respect democracy. Must respect the principle of Mao Zedong: ‘Learn from the masses. Go to the masses. And Charu Mazumder also, in the last stage said the same thing in spite of all his mistakes.

References :
1     For details of the Naxalite movement, see Banerjee, Sumanta.2009. In the Wake of Naxalbari. Kolkata: SahityaSamsad; Ghosh Suniti Kumar. 2009. Naxalbari: Before and After: Reminiscences and Appraisal. New Delhi: New Age Publishers.
2    BasuPradip. 2012. [2000]. Towards Naxalbari (1953-1967): An Account of Inner-Party Ideological Struggle. Kolkata: Progressive Publishers.
3    BasuPradip. 2012. [1998]. Naxalbari-r Purbakshan: Kichhu Postmodern Bhabna. Kolkata: Progressive Publishers.
4    It was written in 1971. Various aspects of CharuMazumder’s tactical line, particularly that espousing ‘Khatam’ or annihilation of individual class enemies, were severely criticised here.
5    Later on, I was made the Convenor of the Calcutta Student Fraction and a member of the All India Student Fraction of the PCC, CPI(M-L).
6    Gradually, afterwards, in many colleges, Students’ Association (SA), Democratic Students’ Association (DSA), All Bengal Students’ Association (ABSA), Democratic Students’ Coordination Committee (DSCC), Indian Students’ Association (ISA), All India Students’ Association (AISA) etc were formed.
7    and some open and legal work as well.
8    From my school days, I was a science student.
9    Also, I read several books written in Bangla by Suprakash Ray on Indian peasant uprisings, Naxalite literature, novels and short stories on the lives of the toiling people, workers and peasants, written in Bangla by ManikBandyopadhyay, TarasankarBandyopadhyay, Ashapurna Devi, Mahasweta Devi, Narayan Gangopadhyay, BibhutiBhushanBandyopadhyay, SaratchandraChattopadhyay; Bangla translations of the novels and stories on the lives of the toiling people written by Leo Tolstoy, Maxim Gorky, Lu Tsun, Prem Chand, Mulk Raj Anand, etc; also, works of Vidyasagar, BankimchandraChattopadhyay, KaziNazrul Islam, Swami Vivekananda, Subhaschandra Bose, etc.
10  It was the West Bengal State Assembly election of 1977. Santosh Rana was still a prisoner in Medinipur jail.
11   It was in Medinipur district. Also, I stayed at Jhargram in Medinipur district.
12 I also stayed at Tantipara, Bakreshwar in Birbhum district.
13  In early 1980s.
14  I was a Ph.D. Research Scholar at the CSSSC (1984-1985). Then, I joined the Scottish Church College (1985-2012). I was a Doctoral Teacher Fellow of the Indian Council for Social Science Research (ICSSR) (1988-1991). My Ph.D. thesis was on the inner-party ideological struggle in the communist parties of India which finally led to the Naxalite movement.
15  The local landlords.
16  One of my comrades was brutally thrashed. Another was severely beaten up with bricks.
17   I have already started to do research for authoring a book myself on the Naxalite approaches to the caste question with reference to the views of T. N. Reddy, D. V. Rao, Vinod Mishra, VaskarNandy and Santosh Rana.
18  Naxalite poet, writer, intellectual and a martyr Saroj Dutta repeatedly justified this iconoclasm.

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Vol 58, No. 3, Jul 13 - 19, 2025