The martyrs’
meetings, which have been going on as a campaign since December ’99, will
culminate in the week July 28-August 3, with the construction of stupams
(columns) in memory of these beloved martyrs. These comrades have already become
folk legends in the course of the massive propaganda campaign during the past
seven months. Folk songs euloging these leaders are now on the lips of the party
workers, sympathisers and the revolutionary masses.
In the ongoing
People’s War in India thousands of comrades have sacrificed their precious lives
in order to overthrow feudalism, imperialism and comprador bureaucrat capitalism
and to build a new democratic society with the ultimate aim of establishing
communism. Every year, revolutionaries all over India observe July 28 — the day
of the martyrdom of Comrade Charu Mazumdar, the founder-leader of the CPI (ML) —
as Martyrs’ Day and CPI (ML)[PW] has been observing July 28 — August 3 as
Martyrs’ Week since 1989. Memorial meetings are held in thousands of villages
all over Andhra Pradesh, North Telangana, Dandakaranya, Bihar and other parts of
the country. Martyrs’ columns are constructed with bricks, wood, stone and
whatever improvised material available locally. An extensive campaign is taken
up among the masses to spread the message of revolution for which the martyrs
had laid down their lives. The masses are involved in thousands, in public
meetings and in the construction of martyrs’ columns.
The week-long
campaign poses a direct challenge to the ruling classes whose desperate hopes of
extinguishing the fire of revolution by eliminating the revolutionary leaders
and cadres are dashed to the ground as martyrs continue to live in the hearts
and hearths of the oppressed people all over the areas of class struggle driving
them to the cause of revolution with even greater zeal and determination.
The extensive combing
operations of the repressive armed forces during the week, to foil the campaign
by the People’s War fails to dampen the spirit of the masses. The guerillas,
playing hide and seek with the state’s armed forces, find novel methods of
conducting the campaign even in villages where police camps exist.
Besides the four
comrades martyred in the so-called Koyyuru encounter, over 300 revolutionaries
belonging to various Marxist-Leninists parties became martyrs in the ongoing
people’s war in the country, in the past one-year, since July 28 last. Of these,
over 250 belong to the CPI (ML)[PW] while the rest belong to the MCC and various
Marxist-Leninist parties. The fake encounters, which were hitherto confined to
the PW for over a decade and a half, have now extended to engulf other parties
too.
The Indian state has
no other alternative before it but to eliminate all those forces which are
bitterly opposing the policies of globalisation, liberalisation and
privatisation and other anti-people activities pursued by the Indian ruling
classes. Nationality movements are sought to be suppressed by unleashing the
worst blood baths, killing thousands of activists and leaders in Kashmir, Assam
and other parts of the North-East. Even leaders of the Dalit Bahujan Party, like
Veeranna, are murdered in cold blood. Cultural activists like, Belli Lalitha,
who had been arousing the masses for a separate democratic Telangana, are being
brutally eliminated. Muslim youth are shot dead in the name of curbing ISI
activities. Cadres and leaders of parties like the CPI (ML) Janasakthi, CPI (ML)(COC),
CPI (ML) (Pratighatana), CPI (ML) (Praja Pratighatana), CPI (ML) (New
Democracy), etc., are being eliminated in fake encounters. It is high time that
all these forces that bear the brunt of state repression join hands to fight the
common enemy. Revolutionaries must, on the occasion of this Martyrs’ Week, not
only rededicate themselves to the New Democratic Revolution and the cause of
Communism with a firm resolve to renew their pledge to avenge the death of the
martyrs. They must also join forces with other democratic forces that are waging
struggles against the unjust, authoritarian regime, thereby facilitating the
intensification and further spreading of the flames of people’s war throughout
the country.
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