Volume 3, No. 11, November 2002

Amid sweltering heat and enemy’s repression the first ever all India cultural workshop of the CPI (ML) (People’s War) was successfully held in one of the guerilla zones between 18th April and 20th May. The lush green forest with lofty mountainous ranges gave shelter to the guerillas from the scorching heat some time temperatures reaching to 490c. Springs provided water and quenched the thirst of the inmates of the camp. The people of the surrounding villages stood like a fortress of steel between the guerilla camp and the enemy. This was the camp where "a congregation of the guerilla cultural fighters who carry gun and the pen and daphli, tied "gajjelu (Payal)" to their feet to bring song and dance together with the bullet to fight the enemy.

The spring thunder of Naxalbari inspired hundreds of writers, artists and intellectuals who dedicated their writings, voices, artistic creations and even their lives for the masses and revolution. With their sacrifices they gave birth to the revolutionary cultural movement and new democratic culture. The revolutionary cultural movement is surging ahead as the continuation of their ideals and sacrifices. This tradition of sacrifices is continuing from Com. Saroj Dutt to Com. Bhaskar who recently lost his life in a boat tragedy in river Krishna. The revolutionary movement is supplying oxygen to the revolutionary cultural movement, which is flowing like a small stream. This all India workshop is part of the efforts to transform this small stream into a wide river, to transform the revolutionary cultural movement into a hurricane, which can wipe out feudal and imperialist cultures.

The onslaught of the imperialist and their comprador Indian ruling classes is growing in all the walks of life. To justify and strengthen this onslaught, these oppressors are intensifying their grip on the ideological sphere. The growth of imperialist, feudal, reactionary and Hindu communal culture is a result of this. In these times there is an urgent need to develop a strong revolutionary cultural movement throughout the country to fight back this cultural onslaught. This also enables to propagate democratic values and revolutionary ideas so as to make the Indian people join the ongoing revolutionary struggles.

Keeping this in view the 9th Congress of CPI (ML)(PW) which was held in March 2001 decided to draft an all India perspective paper on culture. In this process, an All India Cultural Workshop was held during 18th April 2002 and 20th May 2002. This workshop was named as Com. Saroj Dutt – Com. Subba Rao Panigrahi All India Cultural Workshop. The commune was named after Com. I.V. Sambasiva Rao – Com. KVR.

This workshop had three objectives: to prepare the all India perspective on culture; to exchange experiences and ideas among the cultural squads of various states; to give a basic training to the cultural squads. The armed cultural squads of Jana Natya Mandali (JNM) from North Telangana Special Zonal Committee area and Andhra-Orissa Border special Zonal Committee area, Chetana Natya Manch (CNM) from Danda-karanya and a few other delegates from some other states were the participants in this workshop.

The workshop began on 18th April 2002 with the delegates entering the commune in a procession from Paul Robson ground through the gates erected in the memory of martyrs, reaching Com. Bhaskar stage where the inaugural meeting was held. The CNM squad of North Bastar, in green dress, the other CNM squads from Dandakaranya and JNM squads in white dhotis, white sarees with red borders, gajjelu tied to the feet, daphli in hand and weapon on the shoulder, guerilla comrades in olive green faitigue – this was the scene in the ground. Like nature, the ground was also full of colours. With the cautions "Saavadhan !" (Attention), the sounds of "gajje" gave fusion of the army and cultural-army mixture of thud and jingle. When the red flag was unfurled by Com. Tubri from AOB Jana Natya Mandali, the flag song "the red flag with hammer and sickle" reverberated in the valley in Telugu, Hindi and Gondi languages. Com. Vidya from North Telangana JNM inaugurated the martyrs column followed by two minute silence in memory of the martyrs. This inaugural session was presided by Com. Kiran from AOB. Com. Tubri in her brief speech recounted the contributions of martyr comrades Diwakar and Bhaskar who should have been part of this workshop. Com. Vidya paid tributes to all the martyrs.

Com. Ashok, State committee member of North Telangana Special Zonal committee recounted the experiences of people’s cultural artists, which contributed to the spread of revolutionary message. He explained how the cultural artists are being forced to take up arms so as to counter state repression and work amongst the masses. Com. Ashok also said that to reach all the corners of this vast country our cultural front has to organizationally get strengthened throughout the country.

Com. Bhaskar, who represented the Bihar Cultural front, said that to defeat the enemy we need a cultural army too. It is a good thing that even though it is late that we are formulating a perspective on the cultural front.

Then Com. Sonu, Central Committee Member of the CPI (ML) (PW) spoke in Gondi. He said "to complete the new democratic revolution apart from the armed struggle we have to fight on many fronts and the cultural front is important among them. The Cultural front is not mere song and dance. Though in our experience song played a major role, in reality the cultural front has a wider meaning. Writers, singers, performing artists, dramatists, painters, journalists all are cultural activists. By coordinating all these forms we have to develop the cultural front. We have to fully utilize the cultural front to fight back the economic policies of imperialist globalization and Hindu fascism."

Com. Sonu also said, "since the enemy is attacking the people ideologically also apart from the physical suppression through the gun, our cultural activists should get fully prepared to counter this onslaught. Culture develops according to the mode of production of that particular society. Likewise people’s consciousness varies form region to region. In the guerilla zones, people’s political consciousness will be much higher than in the other regions where the class struggle is yet to develop. Keeping in mind all these specificities, our cultural activists should work. They have to make efforts to raise the cultural consciousness in the guerilla squads also, since these fighters come from different backgrounds". He finally urged the cultural activists to develop the cultural organization into a real mass organization and a specialized wing to complete the tasks given by the central committee.

In between speeches, songs in Gondi, Telugu and Chattisgarhi were song. With this the inaugural session came to an end.

On 18th April 2002 the workshop to discuss and prepare the perspective paper on the cultural front and sharing of experiences of the cultural squads began. This continued till 5th May 2002. A three-member committee with Com. Ashok, Com. Sonu and Com. Shankar was constituted to conduct this workshop. A total of 9 delegates took part in the preparation of the perspective paper and 15 comrades (till cultural squad commander level) took part in sharing the experiences of cultural squads.

A draft perspective paper was prepared by the central committee and was placed before the delegates. Delegates studied together the draft. Some selective books and articles on culture were also studied and discussed. This study helped the delegates to enrich their understanding and broaden their vision on the cultural front. The delegates suggested some important amendments to the draft. The amendments included on the role of language in culture; imperialist culture; cultural onslaught of Hindu fascists; importance of audio-visual forms etc. After thorough discussions the draft was finalized by the workshop and was submitted to the Central Committee.

This is the first time when cultural squads working in the vast areas of Dandakaranya, North Telangana, Andhra-Orissa border region guerilla zones and some other states came together to exchange their experiences. Since the process of cultural squads taking up armed formations started only after 1996 in Andhra Pradesh, and in 2001 in Dandakaranya, the comrades presented the experiences since their inception till today.

It was formed in 2001 in Dandakaranya. Before its formation the armed guerilla squads themselves used to give performances and perform the cultural tasks. CNM comrades explained how the masses guided them at every step to take up creative and popular forms. Their experience shows that people are the real sources of creativity and there is no dearth of talent among masses. This became amply clear in one instance. In one village when the CNM squad was writing a new song and composing the tune, before they could finish it, the masses who were witnessing this process completed it and started performing that song with dance steps. CNM comrades explained how they are trying to retain the collective spirit of the tribal society in the process of writing songs, composing tunes and choreographing the steps. The gatherings like weekly markets, traditional gatherings, political meetings are the performing places for the CNM squads.

During this presentation and discussions, many new aspects pertaining to the tribal society of Dandakaranya were understood. The CNM covered a vast area of Dandakaranya and presently were performing in Gondi, Chattisgarhi, Halbi and Marathi languages. Since all the CNM squads are very young, they are in the process of learning from the masses so as to develop CNM as the powerful cultural voice of the masses of Dandakaranya.

In 1995 Andhra Pradesh State Committee finalized the ‘JNM Perspective’. Since then the JNM became an armed Jana Natya Mandali. The severe repression unleashed by the A.P. government after a brief legal period in 1990, made it impossible to perform openly. At present one JNM squad is constituted in each district of North Telangana. These squads are moving from village to village under severe repressive conditions and combing operations.

The delegates explained how the Khammam JNM team adopted popular folk form ‘Sarada Katha’ and wrote songs. In North Telangana since encounter killings are large in number, songs on martyrs and the repression are the main subjects. The enemy is utilizing all its resources and trying to counter the on going armed struggle culturally. The police department of Andhra Pradesh is releasing audiocassettes as part of its venomous propaganda against the revolutionary movement. They are even singing the same JNM songs with modifications and trying to tarnish the image of revolutionaries. So the gigantic task of building a strong cultural movement amidst barbaric repression, lies on the shoulders of the North Telangana JNM squads. The NT JNM has recorded many audiocassettes and released a few in a limited member. These cassettes were on topics like women, Chandrababu’s hi-tech rule, etc. They said that still a lot of efforts are necessary to go into the broader masses.

The AOB JNM squad is functioning in the border region of Andhra Pradesh and Orissa. This has a mountainous task because of the different languages spoken in this area. In this area Telugu, Oriya, Kui (spoken by Kond tribals), Savara (spoken by Savara tribes), are the languages of tribal and non-tribal people. Noteworthy activity of this squad is they carry a small TV and VCP with solar batteries and show cultural performances apart from live performances. In each programme people from 3 to 4 villages gather and participate till late night. They also shot a docu-drama on video on patriarchy. This video-film shows how patriarchy manifested in the primitive, feudal and capitalist societies. This JNM squad along with the AP JNM squads is bringing out a cultural magazine "Toorpu Kanuma" — two issues per year. One significant aspect of this squad is that the majority of this squad are women.

Com. Bhaskar who became a martyr in the boat tragedy in the Krishna river in March 2002 was to represent ST JNM in this workshop. In his absence another comrade presented the experiences of this squad, which functioned under the guidance of martyr comrade Diwakar (Dharmanna), a popular JNM artist. He explained how the team had to travel 30 to 40 kilometers after each programme to escape from the enemy. Tying cloth around the rim of the daphli in order to create a low volume so that they could perform in the villages without being detected by the enemy. ST JNM published a collection of 300 songs in Telugu written by cultural artists and guerilla squad members of Nalgonda, Medak and Mehboobnagar districts.

Joint Regional Committee JNM:

This squad mainly performed in the Nallamala region and Guntur districts of Andhra Pradesh. They look up issues like famine, electricity etc.

During the process of sharing of experiences, many questions relating to the practical, organizational aspects were raised. They were — how to select the tunes; the relation between the tune and content; about the cultural, organization and military work division in a cultural squad; duties of the cultural squads when they attend various camps; about using print and electronic media; teachers for the cultural front; on participating in programmes organized by others; mentioning the writers name with the song in publications etc. The delegates passed resolutions on these aspects and forwarded these for the approval of the Central Committee.

A training camp was held between 9th and 18th May for the cultural squads. This was a brief training on the basics of daphli, singing, dance steps and street play. Immediately after roll call the session started with training in singing and dance. Basic tips on music and dance were taught for two hours everyday. Then after breakfast the session was on street plays. In this the first and foremost aim was to make the artists get rid of their inhibitions while acting. Theatre exercises to develop alertness, acting talents were practiced. In this process the students made and performed street plays on different topics. DK CNM comrades created two plays, one on the practice of human sacrifice which is still prevalent in some areas of Dandakaranya and second on the designs of the Hindu and Christian religious preachers in the tribal areas in order to exploit them. NT and AOB JNM performed a street play on the draconian act POTA. Since this was a very short-term training camp, this for could not be well developed, there was still a lot to be done.

‘Daphli’, is a simple musical instrument, which gives powerful support to the song. Once the performing artists learn the basic techniques and lessons on ‘daphli’, performances will become lively. Though there are singers in the squads, on the instrumental aspect it is very weak. To overcome this shortcoming everyday the students were taught basic techniques of ‘daphli’ for three hours.

This training camp though very basic, helped to open up the initiative and created an urge to learn more. The cultural guerillas are very young and energetic, and fully utilized this opportunity.

While the camp was on, two important occasions occurred — April 22, CPI (ML) party formation day and Lenin’s Birthday; and on May1, May day came. These two days were observed with revolutionary enthusiasm. Meetings were held and special bulletins of ‘Guerilla Vaani’ wall magazine were brought out. Apart from this, another issue of ‘Guerilla Vaani’, was brought out on the Gujarat carnage.

On the 20th night this camp came to a close with a renewed vigor and enthusiasm to build a strong revolutionary cultural movement in the country. The cultural guerillas assured a bright future for the revolutionary cultural movement and returned with an aim of building a cultural army to liberate their country.

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