Salwa Judum, the entity the state helped create to combat Naxalism, is an example of a cure that is far worse than the disease it was ostensibly designed to combat. It violates every principle of domestic and international law. The state has a responsibility to protect. It cannot outsource that function to private armies, for whose actions it takes no responsibility. Even in anti-insurgency operations the state has a moral obligation to preserve the distinction between combatants and non-combatants. And a democratic state cannot sit idly while tens of thousands of people are displaced. The displaced of Dantewara are as much citizens as inhabitants of Delhi suburbs would be. In leaving them at the mercy of the Salwa Judum, we have licensed a self-defeating practical policy. We have violated the bedrock norm of Indian constitutionalism: equality of citizenship.

There is no doubt that Naxalism constitutes an enormous and growing menace to Indian democracy. There is something deeply offensive about the easy exoneration of Naxal violence that comes from some quarters. But we have to be clear about a couple of things. First, the state has had no clear strategy for dealing with this violence. Indeed, one of the remarkable things is its fundamental confusion over what it wants to do. To use the only metaphor that gets traction these days, it gets bull and bear runs mixed up. It tries conciliation, but just when that seems to be working, it withdraws from talks and opts for a police solution. Even more frequently, just when anti-Naxal operations seem to be on the verge of paying off, these operations are mysteriously suspended. It would be foolish to pretend that this is an easy problem to tackle. But it would be equally foolish not to wonder about the state’s strategic intent. It is almost as if Naxalism, like so many other insurgencies, has become an ineluctable part of the political economy of some regions, with wide state complicity sustaining it.

... contd.