A passage from Arun Dotti Roy's walking with the comrades.

It's easier on the liberal conscience to believe that the war in the forests is a war

between the government of India and the Maoists, who call elections a sham, parliament a pigstie,

and have openly declared their intention to overthrow the Indian state.

It's convenient to forget that tribal people in central India have a history of resistance

that predates Mao by centuries.

That's a truism, of course, if they didn't, they wouldn't exist.

The Ho, the O'aron, the Coles, the Santles, the Mundas, and the Gans have all rebelled

several times against the British, against Zamadars, and moneylenders.

The rebellions were cruelly crushed, many thousands killed, but the people were never conquered.

Even after independence, tribal people were at the heart of the first uprising that could

be described as Maoist, in Naxalbari village in West Bengal, where the word Naxalite now

used interchangeably with Maoist originates.

Since then, Naxalite politics has been inextricably entwined with tribal uprisings, which says

as much about the tribals as it does about Naxalites.

This legacy of rebellion has left behind a furious people who have been deliberately isolated

and marginalized by the Indian government.

The Indian Constitution, the moral underpinning of Indian democracy, was adopted by parliament

in 1950.

It was a tragic day for tribal people.

The Constitution ratified colonial policy and made the state custodian of tribal homelands.

Over night, it turned the entire tribal population into squatters on their own land.

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