Anubhav Sengupta (Centre for the Study of Social Systems, School of Social Sciences, JNU)

PhD Title: Dynamics of Mobilization among Student-Youth in Naxalbari Politics, in West Bengal

It is a thick ethnographic investigation based on direct participatory observation and depth-interviews conducted among youth and students, active in Naxalbari politics in West Bengal. What I mean by Naxalbari Politics is a continuing trend of radical politics that began with the peasant uprising in Naxalbari village and surrounding areas in 1967, seeking a political resolution of issues such as landlessness, exploitation etc. In today’s date, the trend is mostly continuing in the form of Maoism in India, who directly draws their lineage from Naxalbari. The research problem that I try to invest myself into is: how youth-student mostly from middle class (and predominantly upper caste, Bhadralok) background ends up being a part of a movement which speaks of revolutionary overthrow of the state, under the leadership of proletariat, having agrarian revolution as its main axis?

The research problem I empirically tried setting up in the fairly recent context of preceding decade, when West Bengal as a state witnessed massive change in its political map. After uninterrupted rule of more than thirty years, a left front government led by Communist Party of India (Marxist), started facing stiff resistance on the question of landlessness, displacement, SEZ etc. At least three resistance sites opened up in a space of five years beginning with Singur in 2006, via Nandigram in 2007 till Lalgarh in 2009. Progressively the resistance of the people intensified. While the protesting mass of Singur restricted themselves in the normative order of liberal democracy; by the time of Lalgrah, the state repression, which was all too blatant in Nandigram, the resistance took the shape of parallel structure to the state, questioning its very sovereign legitimacy. If in Nandigram, there was a rumour; in Lalgrah it became a common knowledge that it is a Maoist-led movement. The state also resorted to severe repression in the area through deployment of paramilitary forces and other such coercive mechanism to counter Maoist challenge. While debates surrounding Maoism may continue, what drew my interest in the area has been increasing activity in the section of population called youth-student.

Youth-students’ activity in contemporary phase can never be compared (in terms of scale) to the phase of 1967-72 when a sizeable section of youth-student left institutions, familiar settings and went or wanted to go to village to fight for the oppressed. However their participation or inclination towards Maoist politics as an alternative to mainstream politics in recent years has also burst the mythical bubble in which youth-student participation in 1967-72 has been kept wrapped by the sociological and political literature--- something which was just an exceptional event belonging to West Bengal’s violent past. I sincerely believe (and as somewhat vindicated by my fieldwork for a year) that this contemporary phase rather provides us with the unique opportunity to approach the question of dynamics of youth-student politics in balanced manner by investigating sociological criteria such as their motivation, aspiration, organization, successes and failures etc. While I lay no exact claim of explaining the earlier phase (i.e. 1967-72) given its own specificity; but I do hold my research may help in shedding light on general areas of sociological concerns such as structure/agency, process/subject, student movement/youth sub-culture etc.

Acknowledgement

SYLFF fellowship has been a really enabling factor for my research and I first try and put those points as briefly as possible. Second, I list few recommendations for the fellowship to improve research quality.

An ethnographic work always requires some flexibility in terms of financial resources and time. I had been awarded the SYLFF fellowship right around the corner I was supposed to leave for my fieldwork in 2013. The assurance of a continued financial resource for the period of one year, (at least) was a big boost in terms of planning and executing my fieldwork as elaborately as possible. Without the support, I sincerely believe, I would not have been able to continue my field work in the extensive manner in which I have been doing. This is because my fieldwork often requires me to travel around in West Bengal to meet various activists residing in various parts of the state or in the city; moreover the travel, back and forth --- to be in touch with my supervisor located in JNU, New Delhi and then return to my field work in Kolkata --- also requires a sizeable amount, readily available under my disposal.

The best thing about the support from SYLFF is necessary but tedius bureaucratic procedures that as research scholar I could avoid in accessing my fellowship. It is sanctioned for a long period of one year and the office order is issued promptly, ensuring that I am left with simple task of claiming the fellowship when I am required to. This is a huge help for an ethnographer who has to spend time away from his/her university, coordinate with the time which is not always under his/her control but rather depends on respondents’ convenience.

SYLFF as a prestigious fellowship also enables one research scholar to mine the double meaning a fellowship always carries but often gets lost. Being awarded the fellowship means also to be connected with the other fellows around the world. So it is just not about the financial aspect but the aspect of belonging in an academic community, which also comes with the fellowship. I regularly check the website dedicated to SYLFF fellowship and thereby remain connected with the current work undergoing across the world. While I could do the same without being awarded the fellowship; but the sense of belonging that the award of fellowship brings with it, has directed my confidence in positive direction.