| Summary: | This thesis is a study of the interaction between the emergence and development of a
radical peasant movement—the naxalite movement— in Telengana, India and the state
response during 1970-93. The thesis contends that the movement has essentially been a
violent expression of a socio-economic problem that has been endemic in rural India. It
has resulted from the existence of glaring inequalities in wealth and social status between
the rural rich and poor which have developed under specific historical influences during
the modernization process. In the post-independence period governmental policies,
ostensibly aimed at development, far from correcting the problem, have led to further
uneven distribution of economic and political benefits. Throughout the period, the
ideological and organizational influence of the communist parties has provided the
necessary basis for mobilizing forces against the state. The state has responded to the
movement through policies of both persuasion and coercion, although the latter have been
more visible and dominant. The Indian state (both at the centre and state levels), with its
commitment to liberal democracy on the one hand and Gandhism and socialism on the
other, has been put on the defensive for its unconscionable neglect of agrarian socioeconomic
reforms, its overall failure to bring about social justice and its disregard of
human rights and civil liberties. The thesis tries to bring out the theoretical significance
and the dynamics of the peasant struggle as well as the dilemmas inherent in the state
response. === Arts, Faculty of === Political Science, Department of === Graduate
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