THE late 60s and early 70s witnessed the first serious attempts at integrating revolutionary Marxism with the concrete conditions of Bihar under the impulses of the new­born Naxalbari upsurge and under the leadership of the new-born Communist Party, the CPI(ML). The protracted struggle of the Bihar peasantry entered a new phase in its development.

The first breakthrough was made in the Musahari block of Muzaffarpur district in North Bihar. But the struggle there soon collapsed under strong pressures from the trinity of landlords, police and neo-Sarvodayites led by JP. The Party, having already undergone a split and the dominant section of the State Leadership itself being the forerunner of Menshevism, was no match for the massive onslaught of the enemy. On their part, the revolutionary ranks of the Party went ahead with their attempts to develop peasant struggles over a wide range of districts, both in northern (Purnea, Darbhanga, Bhagalpur, Munger) and southern (Hazaribagh, Ranchi, Palamau) parts of the State, but they could not achieve any notable success.

Quite unexpectedly the movement was then found to gather momentum in Bhojpur and to a lesser extent in Patna. Unexpected, because practically the entire district committee of the CPI(M) had already come over to the fold of Naxalbari, and yet the movement could not grow beyond the stage of propaganda. However, the entire complexion underwent a great change when a new brand of leadership sprang up. This leadership had its root in the prevailing agrarian and social conditions in the district and it sought to provide popular forms of outlet to the mounting yet pent-up grievances of the people, including a very big rally on the demand of Harijanistan. Leading elements among these indigenous forces were already influenced by Naxalbari and Mao, and had hazy ideas about revolutionary Marxism. Combined with ex-CPI(M) leaders and guided by the Party, this core of local leadership then went on to usher in a new phase of militant peasant movement.

Heroic guerilla actions of the vanguards against notorious landlords, combined with attempts at developing revolu­tionary committees to mobilise the masses for seizing land and crops provided a militant, mass character to the movement right from the beginning, and gradually Bhojpur created a niche for itself in the history of peasant movements in modern India. This was the phase of complete under­ground and illegal activities, with stress on armed struggle in the form of guerilla actions against individual landlords and enemy agents as well as police camps for seizure of modern arms, and on combined resistance of armed units and the people against landlords and the police. The movement went on despite heavy odds, but gradually lost much of its momentum by 1976; Patna too had already suffered serious setbacks. However, as we shall see, this was to prove but a temporary phase in what has come to be recognised as one of the most protracted and militant peasant movements in the history of modern India.