IT was 1979. The struggle in the Poonpoon-Masaurhi belt of Patna district was reviving after setbacks — this time in the form of militant mass movements. A peasant committee was formed, the armed unit was re-organised, and it armed itself through a raid on the Akbarpur police camp. The landlords, rich peasants and enemy agents who were actively involved in ‘encirclement and suppression campaigns’ earlier, and had actively collaborated with the police, were warned and asked to submit before the committee. Dwarika Singh, one notorious landlord of Deokuli village, was one such tyrant. He had actively collaborated with the police in killing and looting, in getting many peasants/activists arrested, and in compelling the harijans and other labouring masses of Deokuli to leave the village. But far from mending his ways, he arrogantly started ganging up again, and was duly punished by death.

Meanwhile, the area was hit by drought and the people demanded that it be declared as such, voicing the demand through mass meetings rallies, deputations and demonstra­tions. In other words, this time the rural poor refused to be starved to death. En masse (ranging from 50 to 1,000), they approached the landlords and well-off peasants of many villages and asked them to contribute foodgrains. While many well-to-do middle peasants, irrespective of their castes, contributed voluntarily, some landlords and rich peasants had to be forced to contribute.

Alarmed at this primary assertion of the rural poor, the landlords began desperate attempts to gang up against them. But their efforts to win over the middle peasants, even those of the Kurmi caste, met with failure. Then they launched a new propaganda : ‘Harijans are extorting grains from the Awadhias (a sect of the Kurmis)’. Soon afterwards Ramsharan Singh (later president of the Congress (I) in Bihar), Nawal Kishore Singh (Patna district Congress (I) president). Bhola Singh (the then president of Bihar Lok Dal), Bipin Bihari Singh, Godhan Singh and Laddu Singh (later principal convicts in the Pipra carnage), Girish Singh (a landlord of Kamalpura village) and others formed a Kisan Suraksha Samlti (Association for the Protection of the Peasants). Armed members of this Samiti used to meet frequently and plan armed raids on this or that tola. And indeed, they conducted several successful and unsuccessful armed raids — burning, looting and killing all the way from Sahbajpur to Pipra, But these raids did not go without resistance — poor people from neighbouring villages would rush to the spot with whatever arms they had. Open letters were issued to all erring individuals, warning them not to associate themselves with the enemy. Appeals were made to the peasants, particularly those belonging to the Kurmi caste, not to get deceived by these armed gangsters. In this process, three ringleaders of this gang were punished by death — two of them were landlords and the other a rich peasant. Broad sections of Kurmi peasants remained passive and a small section even came in our support. Frustrated in its efforts, the Kisan Suraksha Samiti — virtually a united front of the Congress(I), Lok Dal and the CPI ( or one can say, a united front of landlords, rich peasants and a small section of corrupt middle class Kurmis), and formed with the specific object of finishing off the Naxalites by rallying the rich and middle peasants behind the landlords — finally ended up disintegrated.

The late 1980 harvesting season witnessed a wave of crop seizure movements and the sowing season in 1981 was marked by widespread strikes for wage-increase. These were followed by some successful mass movements aimed at occupying some small plots of vested land, ahars (water reservoirs), tanks etc. as well as securing fishing rights in the river, and curbing criminal acts (like rape) committed by the landed gentry. Finally came the Lahsuna incident (for details see Chapter-11) and the subsequent upsurge.

Meanwhile some Kurmi landlords, bad gentry and professional criminals had again taken initiative to form an armed gang. They accumulated a huge quantity of arms, recruited some Kurmi youths (mostly lumpens from well-to-do families) and by early 1982 launched a professional armed gang, named the Bhoomi Sena. As usual, the Bhoomi Sena went on a “loot all, burn all, kill all” spree. To mobilise the entire Kurmi middle peasantry, they however changed their propaganda. To a rich, well-to-do Kurmi peasant, they would say, ‘The life, liberty and property of the Kurmis are at stake. What remains in our life if there is no prestige and dignity ?’ And to the middle peasants or other middle strata the approach would be somewhat different : ‘You see, input costs are rising and you are the worst sufferers. And these Naxalites are instigating the labourers to demand higher wages. Those who are well-to-do can afford higher wages, but you will be ruined’. Further they would add, These Naxalites won't spare anybody. Moreover today they are demanding higher wages and crops, tomorrow they will take your land also’. They used to publicly chant slogans like, ‘Mazdur kisan bhai-bhai, Naxali beech mein kahan se ai (Agricultural labourers and peasants are like brothers, why allow the Naxalites to come in be­tween?)’. They fully utilised some of our mistakes like seizure of crops of some middle peasants, capturing some vested land under the occupation of middle peasants, killing or heavily punishing certain persons who should have better been handled in a different way, or taking the wage move­ment to the extreme, even at the cost of many plots of land lying uncultivated.

Initially the Bhoomi Sena conducted its activities in the blocks of Poonpoon, Masaurhi, Naubatpur, and partly, Dhanarua in Patna district. During the hey-day of their activities they extended their operations to the Patna-Gaya border area in Jehanabad sub-division, too. During 1982-85, they killed at least 65 persons, mostly rural poor (38 in Poonpoon alone), including 4 of our Party members (one being a fighter of an armed squad), set 216 houses ablaze, and drove out 325 families from 13 villages of Poonpoon, Naubatpur and Masaurhi blocks. In the process, their heavy hand fell on their caste brethren also. They used to extort a massive amount of levy from Kurmi peasants, and also used to force them to provide shelters, chicken, liquor, and at times even women. And the Kurmis who sided with the peasant movement were simply done away with —Lalbabu Singh (mukhiya), Sharada Singh and Premchand Sinha (student leader) being three glaring victims.

However, the Bhoomi Sena was dealt a heavy blow by our armed squads. Many of their leaders were executed. Their efforts to expand their activities to other parts of Patna and Gaya did not succeed either. In Jehanabad, they were given a serious blow by the armed squads of CPI (ML) (Party Unity). For all practical purposes, they are now confined to 7 to 8 villages of Poonpoon and Masaurhi blocks of Patna district, where, too, they are now in a process of retreat. Their disintegration has been hastened all the more by their internal bickerings. Their social base among the Kurmis has also become considerably weak. And the landed gentry, too, seems to be divided — one section under the Congress(I) now prefers to collaborate with Bhumihar land­lord gangs, while the other section, inclined to the Lok Dal, chooses to remain independent.

So far as the role of the government is concerned, any careful observer can notice that whenever the forces of the landlords get weakened, the government and its allied machineries enter the scene with their ‘peace mission’ and try to weaken or suppress the forces of the movement while enabling the forces of the landlords to regain their lost strength. That the police generally side with the Bhoomi Sena against the Naxalites has also been admitted by Shashi Bhusan Sahay, a DIG of Bihar Police, in his secret report entitled The Extremists in Bihar and the Bhoami Sena.