India's Experiment with Revolution

Abstract

Revolutionary marxist politics which from its appearance in the political rhetoric of the Naxalite movement in the 1960s has had a rollercoaster ride. Traveling from the south to the east, returning to the south and then gradually spreading to raise the specter of a north-south red corridor, it has created an apparition of revolution from time to time without being able to realise the dream so far. However, paradoxically Maoism has not only emerged and spread across the country – at present in sixteen states and 194 of the 610 districts – despite socialistic claims of the Indian state and competitive open and transparent election process in the polity in four distinct phases, it has elicited a dominantly security-centric response from the Indian state. The current phase of liberalisation and globalization of the Indian economy has created new contexts for its spread and consolidation. This paper puts this phenomenon and the questions it raises in historical, social, political and economic contexts.