Revolutionary conflict in federations: the Indian case

Abstract

Federations promise to provide autonomous, representative governance that is flexible enough to overcome potential internal conflict resulting from the dual stresses of governing diverse populations and power overreach. India is the world's biggest federation but also hosts the most violent revolution in modern history against a federal state. Since 2004, 150,000 people have been killed or displaced in the war between the Communist Party of India-Maoist and India's government. Conflict management efforts led not to resolution but catastrophe across Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand as state responses contradicted each other and the centre's efforts. The differences illustrated how institutional mechanisms of decentralisation create, sustain and otherwise alter internal revolutionary conflicts that cross subunit boundaries. Three unique characteristics come into play when federal governments tackle revolutionary conflict: picking from subunit actions like policy buffets, exacerbation of state–subunit fissures and empowerment of local elites who put political self-interest above conflict resolution.

Acknowledgements

Project funding was provided by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Royal Norwegian Embassy, New Delhi. The author thanks Åshild Falch, Åshild Kolås, Rhoderick Chalmers and two anonymous reviewers for their comments.

Notes

 1. There are three borderline contemporary cases. Sudan and Pakistan are federations in name, but are in practice recognised as authoritarian (and quasi-failed) states. Iraq after October 2005 is also technically valid, but predation of international involvement and the Shia–Sunni conflict before the constitutional change render the ruling government's legitimacy at inception doubtful, relegating the conflict to a continuation of the state-building process. There were revolutions in the Malayan Union, French West Africa and other colonies in the mid-twentieth century, but they were directed more against the foreign forces controlling the country than the puppet governments employed to run them. Wars ending the Granadine Confederation of 1858–1863 and First Spanish Republic of 1873–1874 may fit, but there is not enough data for assessment. Data from the UCDP-PRIO Armed Conflict Dataset, conflict minimums of 25 deaths/year and 1,000 total fatalities.

 2. See map of India in Appendix.

 3. Bennett and Elman, ‘Complex Causal Relations’.

 4. Donini, ‘Local Perceptions’.

 5. Riker, Federalism; Treisman, Architecture of Government.

 6. On benefits/drawbacks see Diamond, ‘Thinking about Hybrid’; Bermeo, ‘Import’; Saideman et al., ‘Democratisation’. On power-sharing see Lijphart, ‘Power-Sharing Approach’; Hartzell and Hodie, ‘Power-Sharing’. On subunit stability see Riker, Federalism; Filippov et al., Designing Federalism; Hale, ‘Divided We Stand’. On minority demands see Lijphart, ‘Constitutional Design’; Amoretti and Bermeo, Federalism and Territorial Cleavages. On ethnic federalism see Erk and Anderson, ‘Paradox of Federalism’; Turton, Ethnic Federalism; Lake and Rothchild, ‘Containing Fear’; Abbink, ‘Ethnicity and Conflict Generation’. On decentralisation see Wallensteen, Understanding Conflict Resolution; Lake and Rothchild, ‘Territorial Decentralisation’.

 7. Østby, ‘Horizontal Inequalities’; Stewart, Horizontal Inequalities.

 8. Bakke and Wibbels, ‘Diversity’.

 9. Taylor, ‘Force and Federalism’.

10. Kohli, ‘India’; Singh, ‘Challenges to India's’; Baruah, Durable Disorder.

11. Bednar et al., ‘Political Theory’; Stepan, ‘Federalism and Democracy’.

12. Watts, Comparing Federal Systems; Filippov et al., Designing Federalism.

13. Weiner, ‘Indian Paradox’; Manor, ‘Making Federalism Work’.

14. Gates and Miklian, ‘Strategic Revolutionary Phases’.

15. Ames and Keck, ‘Politics of Sustainable Development’.

16. Stepan, ‘Federalism and Democracy’.

17. Treisman, After the Deluge; Obydenkova, ‘Institutional Tools’.

18. Manor, ‘Making Federalism Work’.

19. Toohey, ‘Conflict Between Indigenous Populations’.

20. Wilkinson, Votes and Violence.

21. Shah, ‘Introduction’.

22. See in particular the (in)famous ‘greed vs. grievance’ debate and Keen, Complex Emergencies on how varied economies of conflict can influence actors in ways that can appear counter-intuitive on the surface. Although (as will be shown) the Maoists exploit natural resource management, framing the conflict within a greed/grievance dichotomy is unnecessarily limiting, simplistic and a false choice as concerns conflict resolution in this case.

23. See in particular Brass, Politics of India; Flather and Zielonka, Recasting Indian Politics.

24. Tillin, United in Diversity?.

25. Hönig, ‘India Between Scylla and Charybdis’, 3–4, 10.

26. Indian Constitution available at: http://lawmin.nic.in/coi/coiason29july08.pdf [Accessed January 2010].

27. Singh in ‘Political Economy’ posits the interesting potential of a ‘third front’ of Indian politics that would unite regional parties around a mandate of increased decentralisation, but it has yet to gain much traction.

28. Good overviews include Austin, Indian Constitution; Matthews ‘Republic of India’.

29. Given its similar abbreviation and location, the CPI-M is often mistakenly juxtaposed with the CPI-Maoist. The two are not aligned.

30. Sahni, ‘Andhra Pradesh’.

31. Giddens, Sociology.

32. Goodwin, No Other Way Out.

33. Kamrava, ‘Revolution Revisited’.

34. Oetken, ‘Counter-insurgency against Naxalites’, 135.

35. Global Security Organisation, ‘People's War Group’. Available at: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/pwg.htm [Accessed 28 January 2010]. ‘Fake encounter’ is a term used in India to describe an event when armed forces of the government torture, beat or kill an unarmed victim to extract information, then plant evidence or claim that they acted in self-defence. Andhra Pradesh police often killed and cremated ‘suspected Maoist’ bodies before family members were allowed to view them.

36. Author interview, PV Ramana, February 2010.

37. Saji, ‘Maoist Reverses’.

38. Saji, ‘Maoist Reverses’

39. This section is an abbreviated version of Miklian, ‘The Purification Hunt’. Full sources and citations detailed therein.

40. Including protection from the state, education, courts and other social services. The Maoists exploited federal dynamics to ‘forum shop’ for subunits where they could most succeed in their goals of military victory, service provision, recruitment, political consolidation and criminal riches.

41. A faction of the Congress Party. Karma often votes with the BJP despite his opposition status.

42. In turn lifted from a February 2005 proposal by the District Collector of Dantewara.

43. Author interview, Mahendra Karma, September 2007.

44. The most public examples were the cases of Himanshu Kumar and Dr Binayak Sen.

45. Miklian, ‘The Purification Hunt’.

46. Author interviews, Chhattisgarh DIG Vishwa Ranjan and CRPF Dantewara head Rahul Sharma, September 2007 and November 2008.

47. Express India, ‘No Leader Can Stop Salwa Judum in Chhattisgarh’, 10 November 2008.

48. All interviews in this section conducted in Jharkhand unless noted.

49. Author interviews, Maoist informant, mine owners, DIG of police MS Bhatia and senior reporter, November 2009 and January 2010. Estimates vary wildly owing to the difficulty of obtaining hard figures, but averaging the figures given by mine owners of their own bribes paid of $35,000/mine with over 2,100 mines comes closer to the lower but still substantial $75 million/year.

50. Author interviews, community activists, November 2009 and former Maoist Jharkhand commander, January 2010.

51. POTA was used to arrest or intimidate over 3,000 anti-mining activists, and many activists remain jailed since 2004 under the law. Author interview, SB Pathak, November 2009. In 2002, BJP leadership even released a document entitled ‘Achievements in 22 Months’ that called the Naxalite insurgency finished, serving as their own ‘Mission Accomplished’ moment.

52. Singh, Political Economy; Cherian, ‘Bihar and Jharkhand’.

53. Earlier surrender packages offered a one million Rs. life insurance policy and a ‘free’ government-appointed lawyer for their trial. New offers start at 250,000 Rs. and vocational training, but there is nothing to prevent individuals from ‘joining’ and ‘surrendering’ in multiple states then rejoining the Maoists.

54. Cherian, ‘Bihar and Jharkhand’.

55. Author interviews, community activists and civil society members, November 2009.

56. On Munda, see Nayak, ‘Red Spread’. Author interviews, senior expert and Hazaribag reporter, November 2009.

57. Counter-intuitively, illegal mines benefit local populations more than their legal counterparts, as they provide more jobs, are less invasive to farmland and distribute mining wealth in the community more evenly.

58. Author interview, Bulu Imam, November 2009.

59. Comment, Dinesh Mittal, Mega-Projects and Development Conference, New Delhi, 20 January 2010.

60. One particularly gruesome torture involves pounding nails into the lower legs of citizens to ‘extract information’ and suppress dissent. Author interview, two victims, November 2009.

61. The Telegraph, ‘Chatra MLA Named in Government Official's Murder FIR’, 29 January 2010.

62. Author interviews, police officers, November 2009 and January 2010.

63. Author interview, senior Jharkhand expert, January 2010.

64. Author interview, Bhatia, November 2009.

65. Miklian and Carney, ‘Fire in the Hole’.

66. Sahni, ‘Andhra Pradesh’.

67. Hönig, ‘India Between Scylla and Charybdis’, 16.

68. Weiner, ‘Indian Paradox’; Manor, Making Federalism Work; Wilkinson, Votes and Violence; Keen, Conflict and Collusion.

69. Note the correlation to Keen's ‘sell-game’ in Sierra Leone (Conflict and Collusion). Thanks to Chris Yung for this point.

70. Mining stronghold districts Hazaribag, Chatra, Koderma and Giridih were chosen, but West Singhbum, East Singhbum and Gumla are the most significant Maoist districts.

71. Indian Express, ‘Anti-Naxal Ops a Success, Will be Intensified: Chidambaram’, 23 January 2010.

72. Toyota and Honda ramped up their operations in India in 2009, with over US$ 1 billion in new investments.

73. Agencie France Presse, ‘India takes Propaganda War to Maoist Rebels’, 21 September 2009.

74. Shah, ‘Introduction’.

75. Kolås and Miklian, ‘Managing Intractable Conflict’.

76. Miklian et al., ‘NREGA and the Maoist Conflict’.