The author of Red Sun: Travels in Naxalite Country, explains the past and present of Maoism, and its inevitable growth, if we don't look out
A top economist with a global investment firm asked me recently: “Why would anyone want to follow a mass murderer? Even China has let the chap go.”
He meant Mao Zedong, whose callousness and paranoia cost China several million lives and decades of opportunity. The “anyone” referred to India’s Maoist rebels in 14 states, numbering tens of thousands, from indoctrinated propagandists to armed cadres. When I suggested that it was easy to be blind-sided by India’s economic growth and astounding progress in some areas, he switched off.
(This story appears in the 31 July, 2009 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)