LEADER OF SRIKAKULAM GIRIJAN ARMED STRUGGLE AND VETRRAN COMMUNIST REVOLUTIONARY COM. PYLA VASUDEV RAO PASSES AWAY

Veteran communist revolutionary of India and one of the foremost leaders of the glorious Srikakulam Armed Struggle Com. Pyla Vasudev Rao breathed his last at 10:00 AM on April 11, 2010 after fighting cancer. He was 78 years’ old at the time of his death; of these he had party life of 58 years of which the last 42 years were spent in underground.

Born in 1932 in Rittapadu village of Srikakulam dist, Com. Pyla joined the united CP in 1953 when a party unit was formed in his village. He resigned his job in 1957 and devoted himself to building party organization and peasant struggles. He was elected joint secretary of the district peasant organization. On Party’s instruction he took up teacher’s job, many of his students joined the revolutionary communist movement. He became a professional revolutionary in 1962 and also a member of the district committee of the party. He sided with CPM in the struggle against Dange revisionism.

In response to the clarion call of the Great Naxalbari Peasant Armed Struggle, the Srikakulam Girijan Armed Peasant Struggle started on 25^th November 1968 and on the decision of the party, Com. PV went underground. As a member of the Srikakulam leadership, Com. Pyla became part of the CPI(ML). He participated in the 1970 CPI(ML) Party Congress (first after Naxalbari). In Srikakulam movement he worked along side with Comrades Panchadi Krishnamurthy, Vempatapu Satyam, Adibhatta Kailasam, Subbarao Panigrahi and others.

Between 1969-’70 many important leaders of Srikakulam leaders were martyred and the movement suffered huge losses and setbacks. CPI(ML) PC was reorganized of which Com. Pyla became the secretary. Opposing line of individual annihilation, Com. resigned as PC secretary and joined with other Srikakulam comrades revived CC led by com. S.N. Singh. Since then he was a member of the Central Committee of the Party. In 1974, APRCP led by Com. CP Reddy merged with CPI(ML) led by Com. SN Singh and Srikakulam movement became part of the state movement. Com. Pyla was elected state committee secretary in 1976 when Com. P. Ramanarasaiah was killed in a fake encounter.

He was re-elected to the CC in 1980 Special Congress. For long the Party in AP was identified with his name.

Com. Pyla consistently practiced and supported the revolutionary mass line and struggled against rightism and revisionism. He resolutely opposed the interpretation equating mass line with legalism. He was an ardent votary of armed agrarian revolution and of building areas of sustained resistance. He greatly valued the role of armed squads in building resistance struggle and fought against the trends that he perceived to be opposed to this. Till the end of his life, Com. PV consistently upheld revolutionaries’ separation from neo-revisionist CPM after Naxalbari and formation of CPI(ML) in 1969 unlike some leaders who then or later criticized the formation of CPI(ML) and refused to treat it as revolutionary communist party of the country.

His died at a time when the peasants of India are rising in many parts against the decadent rule of the ruling classes, against landlord oppression and forcible displacement. Srikakulam Armed Struggle continues to inspire the revolutionaries and struggling people of the country. Srikakulam Armed Struggle which reached highest point in terms of resistance and people’s participation in all the struggles inspired by Naxalbari, continues to serve as a beacon light for the present revolutionary movement. Com. Pyla as one of the leaders of that movement continues to live in the memory of the revolutionaries and struggling people of the country.

To pay homage to this veteran communist revolutionary leader CPI(ML)-New Democracy organized memorial meetings at Hyderabad and Delhi on April 20, 2010.

Long Live Com. Paila Vasudev Rao !

(AIKMS statement issued on April 19, 2010)

Police and landlords have launched a vicious attack on the poor people of Umri and neighbouring villages over last two days registering false cases on them, posting PAC and attacking their houses and launching a completely false propaganda attack on AIKMS workers.

On 17th April sheep of some poor farmers were grazing on the pond land of Umri to which local landlords Mithilesh and Radhey Shyam took objection and attacked the poor people. Kondhiara thana police arrived and settled the matter, but late at night CO Bara, Janardan Tiwari intervened and forced registration of a completely false FIR against 7 activists under provisions of dacoity and attempt to murder. The complaints given by the poor people have been totally ignored and no FIR has been registered. Yesterday evening a copy of the complaint of the poor people was taken by the CO from village Sadwan and the moment he left the poor people were attacked again by the landlords. Even this incident has been registered as an FIR against the poor.

Yesterday evening Bara MLA Udaybhan Karwaria reached the area and sat on a road block along with a handful of upper caste landlords. He threatened to liquidate the AIKMS leaders in case police did not arrest them. Senior police personel are camping in the area and instead of addressing the grievances of the poor people they are threatening action against anyone who makes a complaint against the landlords.

These landlords of the area have occupied various Gram Sabha, pond lands and lands belonging to the poor in the area and the entire dispute is related to this. Kunj Bihari Shukla is in possession of various pond lands in Dagwan. In Umri Mithilesh and Radhey Shyam have occupied a large plot of Harijan Abadi land on which the poor people have been agitating peacefully. Workers are also agitating for increase in agricultural wages from 5 Kg wheat per day which the landlord object to. Few days ago Mithilesh had misbehaved with a girl and when the poor people objected he had threatened to attack them.

The PAC has been posted in large numbers in Umri and Jari areas and it has attacked and damaged the house of one of the accused poor person, Bhulai.

BSP administration has launched a massive disinformation campaign and attack on the dalits and poor people of the area in order to help the upper caste landord power to assert itself on the poor people. The entire police machinery is acting in tandem with the landlords. Like in Kaushambi, it is acting purely as an agency of the landlords who are involved in severe and medieval forms of exploitation of the poor. A complete police raj is prevailing and there is complete police lawlessness. An atmosphere of fear prevails in the area with the poor left wondering about safety of their rights.

 (Janhastakshep team consisting of Dr N Bhattacharya, a retired Professor of Delhi University, Jaspal Singh Sidhu, Senior Journalist,  Anil Dubey, Senior Journalist,  and Jagdish Yadav, Senior photojournalist has visited different areas in Punjab, sites of police repression. The following statement was released by the team on April, 20, 2010 at a Press Conference in Chandigarh.)

 A team of Janhastakshep, a Delhi based group of civil rights activists and intellectuals visited extensively in Punjab for three days from April 18, 2010 and particularly the places of recent occurrences and observed the following:

That democracy in Punjab is fast receding with fascist trends coming to the fore. The ruling Akali-BJP government seems to have lost propensity of tackling every issue through democratic process.

It imposes World Bank sponsored agenda, being handed over to the state directly or through the Central government unmindful of the local requirements and aspirations of the people. And when such agenda, meets natural resistance from the people, the state political establishment turns it into a 'law and order' problem and invariably imposes its 'will' with iron hand. Use of repressive measures of every sort by the ruling establishment is most common and being perpetuated by a nexus of politicians, bureaucracy, trade and feudal lords.

In rural area, village panchayats are divided with ruling politicians patronizing one group and pitting it against the other and thus creating circumstances for squandering away the officially allocated development funds and splitting villagers on electoral lines.

Education system being privatized at fast pace with English teaching shops sprouting up, thus leaving the government-run schools for wards of economically weak and Dalits. Higher education being restricted to upper middle class and rich. Any attempt by rural people to get higher education is not facilitated by the state government rather systematically blocked. Existing facilities like concessional bus pass, token college and other facilities are getting withdrawn and all demands of organized students union are crushed as 'law and order' problem. Recently, students raising such demand at ITI Moga were subjected to severe repression by the police and state Punjab Students Union (PSU) president were charged with attempt to murder under section 307 IPC and put behind bar.

Illegal Task Force of SGPC, fired upon the tenant cultivators at village Khanna Chamara in Gurdaspur district on 3 November, 2009 to evict them from its land and two people were killed and several others injured including women and children in broad day light. These landless tenants cultivating the SGPC land for two generations and paying the rent regularly are being forced to leave the land with ruling Akali Dal, controlling the SGPC lending all support to the killers against whom no legal action has been taken till the day. At the same, Akali leaders including the Vidhan Sabha Speaker are reported to have been handed the land for cultivation and commercial activities at nominal rents.