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Red Flag Flying on the Roof of the World  Part - 2

Inside the Revolution in Nepal: Interview with Comrade Prachanda

What happened was that, after one month, we saw a big change in the rural areas. Big changes started in the rural areas. Some people fled. Some new people came forward. Thousands and thousands of people went underground. In Rolpa, in one month, thousands of people went underground. Not only party members but also masses went underground-in Rukum, in Jarjarkot, in Salyan, in Kalikot. That kind of situation developed. So the process of transformation was very big in those rural areas.
 

But in the cities where there are more intellectuals, the process of transformation was very, very low, and in some cases, we can say, unsatisfactory. We were not satisfied with the petty bourgeois reactions. One example is what happened just after the initiation of People's War, in the capital city, in Kathmandu. There was government repression everywhere. Artists, journalists, professors, lecturers-everywhere, those who had sympathy with us-were arrested. And at that time, what happened in the city ?
 

Wherever we went people said, "You should not stay here, the police will come." There was so much terror among the different sections of intellectuals. For a long time they had been with us. But at that point, they were so afraid, they had so much terror, that even for us, they did not dare to fight-to give us shelter. So for 22 days we had to move about continuously in the city.
 

But when we got a report from Rolpa, Rukum, Gorkha, Sindhuli, Kabre, the rural areas, there was confidence among the masses and the revolutionary cadres. The sentiment there was, "Yes, we have done a big job. Now new life has started." There was new mass support and mass upsurge in the rural areas. But in the city, the intellectuals were vacillating so much, they were so terrorized, and we saw that this was a question of class. Which class thinks that now we are taking destiny into our hands ? This was the situation, and so we had to wage ideological struggle in the cities.
 

RW:What about the proletarian forces in the city?
 

Prachand: The proletarians were in a better position. During this tough time they were the forces in the city-laborers, workers-who helped the party, saved the party. Workers from our All Nepal Trade Labor Organization helped us very much. They were not so terrorized. Their feeling was, "OK, this is a new thing." And another important section was women-this is very, very important. Women in Kathmandu were the other force who, in that time of terror, boldly supported us and gave us shelter and helped us move around. The women helped us at that time. There was also help from students because we had good organization among the students all over the country. And at that time the students were also not so afraid. They felt enlightened, that this was a new thing for Nepal that our party had done. This kind of thinking was there among the students. So it was mainly laborers, women and students who helped us. But the intellectuals, who had a lot of knowledge of philosophy, theories, etc., these people were wavering so much they could not help very much.
 

And after one year, we saw further big transformation in the rural areas. Thousands and thousands of mass organizations were built up, and in new areas the party's influence spread and new organization developed. Some petty bourgeois revolutionaries, due to terror, fled to India, to Arab countries and other places. Others stayed strong. And at the same time, in the rural areas, there was a mass upsurge of women, and thousands of full-time cadres came forward. People who we did not know beforehand became heroes, really. Just one year after the initiation, for one month, I was in Rolpa, Rukum, Jarjarkot, Salyan, and I saw, and our party saw, that a new thing had developed. The people were not only fighting with the police or reactionary, feudal agents, but they were also breaking the feudal chains of exploitation and oppression and a whole cultural revolution was going on among the people. Questions of marriage, questions of love, questions of family, questions of relations between people. All of these things were being turned upside down and changed in the rural areas.
 

We came to understand Mao's vision that the backward rural areas will be the basin of revolution-the real base of the revolution. We saw in Rolpa, Rukum, Gorkha, Sindhuli, Kabre, the seeds of the new society, the examples to inspire people. Everywhere in the country, in the revolution, the masses feel proud of their Rolpa and Rukum. And we see, at the ground level, on the mass level, that the transformation process is not only in the party and mass organizations, but among the masses as a whole. The chains of feudal oppression, mainly feudal relations, are breaking.
 

RW: Yes, especially between men and women.
 

P: Yes, men and women, really. And our party has tried to develop the leadership of women comrades. There have been problems in doing this, but now we are, step-by-step, working to solve this problem. Masses of women have come forward as revolutionary fighters. And we had a plan right from the beginning that the women and the men comrades should be in the same squad, the same platoon and that all things should be done in this way. We have worked to make new relations between men and women-new relations, new society, new things.
 

In the Western Region, right from the beginning, we did not have any big problems and setbacks in this process of transformation, because thousands and thousands of masses were seeing that here was another life. But in the Middle Region and in the Eastern Region that was not the situation. There were more intellectuals there inside the party. When the party would go on the offensive and be victorious these forces would go, "Oh yeah, we should do this." But when there was some kind of setback and repression then they would say, "Oh, no, this will not do." There was this kind of thing in the Middle Region. Here many of the people in the party were petty bourgeois intellectuals, from a petty bourgeois class background. And there is also a more well-to-do economic situation there-every family has some land, some electricity, roads, educational facilities. All these things are there and many party members are from this class, so there are wavering tendencies.
 

But in this three-year process we have seen transformation also going on in this Middle Region-cultural transformation, ideological transformation. And some of the very best leaders and cadres are developing from this region. This is an important thing we are seeing, new things coming up-some of the older and petty bourgeois people are going downward, and the new masses are coming forward. New cadre are coming forward, and we are trying our best to give responsibility to the new comrades. That is our party's policy. We have to try to do this, not only on the regional and district level, but even on the Central Committee level. Just in the last Fourth Plenum, in the fourth historical plenum, we brought onto the Central Committee seven new younger comrades from the regional level who are really fighting on the ground. You know the comrade who you met in Rolpa in charge of the Task Force?
 

RW:Yes, he's a very good comrade!
 

Prachand: That comrade, just in the Fourth Plenum became a central committee member.

There are so many comrades like this. If we do not do this some of the old comrades have the problem of lagging behind. To keep up with the situation, a quickly developing situation with challenging questions, there are comrades who cannot change their whole thinking. They think just like before, and that is a problem. So our party is trying to give responsibility to those comrades who have been steeled in the process of three years of People's War, and this helps the party to stay on the correct path. Leadership should not be in the hands of any kind of opportunistic tendencies. We are very serious in developing new leadership, and the forces we are developing are very enthusiastic, very good. We see that there have been more than 700 martyrs. But thousands have stepped forward. This process does not harm us, it helps us.
 

When the ruling class started their repressive Kilo Sera 2 operation, we thought it would be a very big thing for our party, that there may be vacillation among the ranks. But ultimately the objective results were that there was not so much vacillation. In some regions there was some vacillation. But in the Western Region, mainly there was not vacillation. Instead there was more confidence, more determination, more confidence to fight. On the mass level, there is not vacillation, therefore we are proud of the masses in our party ranks. In the Middle Region there is some vacillation, there are some vacillating tendencies there. And in the capital city, as you already know, there is vacillation among some intellectuals. But there are also good comrades from among the laborers, women, and students. Very good comrades with commitment and determination.
 

During this three years of People's War, there have also been other kinds of changes. Peoples of the oppressed nationalities-the Mongolian peoples, the Terai peoples and the far western peoples-have been very sympathetic to the People's War. They feel it is the only alternative for them. And this is also a big victory for the People's War and a big defeat for the reactionary ruling class. So many new organizations among the oppressed nationalities developed after the initiation, like the Magar National Liberation Front.
 

RW: Yes, I met one of the leaders of that organization.
 

Prachand: There is the Taru National Liberation Front in the Terai region and the Terai National Liberation Front and the Rai and Limbu and Tamang. And in the capital city there is Newar Khala, the mass organization of that nationality which has had so many programs-like the recent successful Kathmandu shutdown. This new organization, generated by the party, is carrying out the plan of the party. This process is a new thing that has been born. The reactionary ruling class feels that if these forces grow and develop it will be very dangerous for their whole system. Therefore they try to manipulate the people. They try to make some concessions to the oppressed nationalities and say they will do all kinds of things for them. And they say about the Maoists: "They want to divide the country. They want to divide the Mongolians. They want to divide the Rai, Limbu, Terai. Everywhere they want to divide the people. These are separatists and they will break up the country. Don't follow them." This is the kind of propaganda they try to spread. But people don't believe them. The people know that we are taking this national question seriously and, from a political point of view and a national and historical point of view, this is the only solution for the oppressed nationalities. Nobody, not even the ruling class people of oppressed nationalities, dare to oppose our policy. They are forced to say that this policy of the Maoists is correct. There are so many members of parliament who say, "Yeah the policy of Maoists is correct for oppressed nationalities."
 

There are also some problems because we have not been able to develop a big wave of struggle of the oppressed nationalities. But new things have been born among the oppressed nationalities, and this is a very big force to sustain the People's War and to make the People's War victorious.
 

RW: The People's War is about destruction of the enemy. But it is also about construction. One of the biggest achievements of the three years of People's War is how the masses are beginning to exercise people's power. One important contribution of Mao is that he showed us that the process of protracted people's war is also a process of training the masses to run society in a new way, to ideologically andpolitically train the masses in MLM and to begin transforming themselves and society-even before the seizure of nationwide power and the building of a new socialist society. Could you talk about the importance of exercising people's power at this stage of the revolution?
 

Prachand: We had mentioned in our initiation document that initiating the People's War means not only crushing the enemy-it is also to change ourselves, to change the masses. The great Karl Marx stated that the working class would have to go through 15, 20, 50 years of civil war, not only to crush the enemy but also to transform itself, to make itself fit to exercise new power. We quoted this, and we quoted Lenin about how the process of civil war will come with an extremely complex situation. And by facing this situation, the party will be able to exercise power. We also quoted comrade Mao about how the process of People's War is not only to crush the enemy, but also to clean our own dirtiness and all our bad habits-bad things we have had for a long time. To clean all these things, that is also the aim of the People's War. Right from the beginning, we tried to give the masses this message, and we tried to train the whole party in this direction. And in our country where the proletarian class is very weak numerically, the laborers who work in factories in Kathmandu or other cities have also not totally broken with bad habits.
 

Therefore in this type of country, protracted People's War is also part of forming a new type of revolutionary party. This is a lesson of history. Without this kind of revolutionary struggle, a revolutionary communist party is not possible in these types of countries. We train the people in this thinking. We have said that, ultimately, the process of destruction is not only a process of destruction, it is also a process of construction. Without destruction there will not be construction, as Mao and other great leaders have said. But which is principal? After the initiation we said, for us, destruction is principal, construction is secondary. And when we reach the point of seizing and exercising real power, at that point, questions of construction will be the main point. But even then, there will be a question that without destruction there will not be any construction. Like Mao said, people usually think that war is very destructive, war is very bad, it kills people, all these things. But people do not understand that war is a great process of construction. War has a very big cleansing effect. We also try to teach the people and train the cadre to understand this.
 

And we must also learn war by waging war. The intellectuals' instinctive tendency is that we have to learn all these things, we should read everything, we have to do all these things, and then we can make war. These kinds of tendencies were there right from the beginning. But we said, no, this is not Maoism. This is not Marxism. This is not dialectical materialism. This is not according to the scientific theory of knowledge. The question is learning war through war.
 

Comrade Mao said: We had nothing at first. We had only millet. We ate millet. We had some rifles, and we fought, and we captured all these things. We were not clear at that time what to hit and what not to hit. We went to hit and we learned how to hit.
 

We also try to do things in this way.
 

You asked about the question of people's power. In the Western Region, in some districts, there was a kind of power vacuum just after one year. But at that point, we were not in a position to exercise power in an organized form. We had not defeated the police enough. This was the kind of situation there.
 

RW: You mean like the government Village Development Committee (VDC) chairmen
 

were gone, but the police were still strong?
 

Prachand: Yes, the police were strong. There were no VDC chairmen working there, but the police post was still there. This was the particular kind of situation there one year after the initiation. And after two years, the question of power became a burning question. It was coming onto the agenda, and we started to study the question of exercising power. We discussed at what level we could organize the process of exercising people's power. And after two years, two and a half years, we saw that, in the main region, mainly in the Western Region, the local police were mainly defeated. They stopped going into the villages in the rural areas. They were so afraid that they did not go into the villages. They stayed in their offices, at their post. And even then, sometimes the police would sleep outside the post. They would put a candle or lantern inside the post, and when the Maoists came to attack the post, then they would be outside in the forest. This kind of thing happened. This was the kind of situation at hundreds and hundreds of police posts. Our squads succeeded in carrying out some important ambushes and some important raids and that terrorized the police. They suffered a kind of defeat. And at that point in the villages there were not any Village Development Committees and there were not any police.
 

But at first, our exercising of power was not well planned, it was not well defined. It was not well done. In the process of two years of People's War, in the main region, a power vacuum developed, and our comrades should have begun exercising power. They did not understand what they were doing, that we needed to exercise power. But they had to do everything. The masses were demanding this. Among the masses there were some quarrels that needed to be settled. There were the questions of marriage, education, and land-mainly land questions-that needed to be settled. All these things. At one point, when we studied what was going on in the field, we found that the squad commander was becoming the political leader. Power was in the hands of the squad commander, not the party DCS (district committee secretary) or area secretary. People saw the squad commander as their political leader. The squad commander would give speeches and attack the rural agents. And everything he did-he was in uniform. So then the people think, he is our leader. Power was in the hands of the squad commander. At one point, for three to four months, that was the situation. And we said, this is not a good thing. The guns should be led by the party. The guns should not lead the party. This is the Maoist view. This was not a mistake on the part of the squad commanders. It was not well planned, it was not well discussed. It was spontaneous. Then the party center discussed all these questions, and the questions of united front and the questions of power were defined.
 

RW: This was two years after the initiation?
 

P: Two and a half years. The spontaneous exercise of power started just after two years. For four months, not only in the Western Region, but in some areas in the Eastern Region and some rural areas in the Middle Region, there was a power vacuum; and in fact power was administered by the people themselves, by the people's army, the squads. That was the situation.
 

RW: So the party's organized plan and strategy for exercising people's power is fairly new?
 

Prachand: Really we can say this started after the Fourth Plenum, when we said: now we are going forward on the road of making base areas. Then we had a well-defined plan of exercising people's power.
 

RW: So this was at the end of 1998 ?
 

P: Yes. But before then, a general vision was there-that we should have a united front, that we have to exercise power. A general vision was there, but a complete plan was not. And before our plan was completed, real power was in our hands. You have already heard how our comrades tax the local businessmen, how there are people's courts, land distribution, and collective farming, divorce, marriage-all these things the people do. We saw this new people's power develop. At first, we did not teach the masses-they taught us how to begin exercising power. It cannot be dictated from above. The masses themselves, through the process of People's War, through the process of struggle, gave birth to the forms of new people's power. They started to do all these things.
 

Just after starting this whole process, we completed plans to make a united front, organize mass gatherings and have the masses elect leaders to exercise people's power. We said we should follow the three-in-one principle [forming leadership groups which combine the party, the army and united front masses]. We saw that we needed to study more and more the process of making revolutionary committees, like what happened in the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China-that we should learn from how they formed revolutionary committees and applied the three-in-one principle. We are now in a preliminary process; it is not yet refined. But we are seeing big things happen. And now, what people think, when they see this whole process, is that they have power and they feel proud. The masses feel that we have power now: we can distribute land, we have collective farming, we can divorce, we can make arrangements, we can break all the chains, we can tax the businessmen, we can manage the forests. We can do all these things by ourselves-no VDC, no police. Our united front is here, our squad is here. The people really feel this. And this great feeling is the basis for the victory of People's War. This is the basis the enemy can never crush.
 

This great feeling among the masses is mainly in the Western Region. In the Eastern and Middle Region this feeling is also developing. But the situation for the enemy in these regions is very favorable. The government can go everywhere and crush the people. Therefore there are problems. But even in these areas people are gradually understanding the importance of power. In the Middle Region, many hectares of land have been captured, and thousands and thousands of quintals of grain have been captured and distributed to the masses. And this process makes the people feel like, "Yes, this is ours."
 

RW: In terms of exercising people's power, one of the areas that is less developed is land reform and more collective forms of production among the peasants. For revolutions in oppressed countries, the land question and production relations in the countryside are very key in terms of revolutionizing society. What is the party's vision of this process of revolutionizing production relations in the countryside, as part of the process of construction in the People's War?
 

Prachand: We say that this new democratic revolution is an agrarian revolution. Basically, the character of this revolution is agrarian. But the situation in Nepal is not classical, not traditional. In the Terai region we find landlords with some lands, and we have to seize the lands and distribute them among the poor peasants. But in the whole mountainous regions, that is not the case. There are small holdings, and there are not big landlords. Therefore our main plan in those areas is to develop collective farming and revolutionize the production relations. How to develop production, how to raise production is the main problem here. The small pieces of land mean the peasants have low productivity. With collective farming it will be more scientific and things can be done to raise production. But we cannot do this collective farming instantly. In terms of land ownership, it will be private ownership by the peasant. But the production process will be collective. We are trying to do this in our regions. And, mainly in our developed regions, collective farming has already been established.
 

RW: Can you explain this more, how that is happening ?
 

Prachand: In the developed areas we have already made a plan and started, in some areas of Rolpa and some areas of Rukum and some areas of Jarjarkot and some in Salyan-less in Salyan, mainly in Rolpa, Rukum and Jarjarkot. First we seized some land from landlords who live in Kathmandu, and from usurers and such types. We seized that land, but we did not distribute that land to the peasants. Because to distribute that land piece by piece to peasants will not work, will not help to develop their livelihood, their economic level. So number one are the kinds of land seized from landlords, usurers, etc. Number two are other lands, like public lands which can be cultivated. And number three are lands owned by peasants. These are the three types of lands that are there. When we seize the land from landlords, that land will become collectively owned-there will be collective mass ownership. That land will be the land of the masses, and all the peasants will work on that land, and the earnings from that land will be the property of that locality.
 

RW: How is the grain from that land distributed? Does it become collective funds ?
 

Prachand: Yes, collective funds. The return from that land will be the collective funds of the masses, used for the needs of the masses of that locality. Up to this point we have done it like this. And the fallow land, or public land which can be cultivated-we are trying to cultivate this land collectively and distribute the return to the masses collectively. Collective distribution means according to what percent of the work has been done, according to the number of hours worked. How many work hours a particular family did on that land-the return will be in that percentage.
 

RW: So there is some system of accounting where the peasants work and they get so much credit for hours worked and grains are distributed accordingly.
 

Prachand: Yes, exactly that. Where our mass base is strong and the masses are in the process of struggle, we are starting to have collective farming. Private ownership, but farming collectively. This has already shown effectiveness in the process of production.
 

RW: So this would be like five farmers who each own five plots of land, but they all will work on the land together. Will they collectivize the tools, implements, animals?
 

Prachand: Animals, tools, land-according to the land, according to the tools they use and work hours, in that percentage, according to the percentage of the work done, they divide the production. In this way we can raise the quantity of production. This is what we are doing in the developed areas. But in less developed areas, in the Eastern Region and the Middle Region, we are trying a kind of system that is not exactly an exchange of labor power. But like during the rainy season, if you have less manpower or your labor power is not sufficient and you cannot do well in cultivation, then other peasant families are there to help. My family will help you, and your family will help me, and we will help him. This kind of tradition is there in peasant families.
 

RW: This kind of tradition already existed?
 

Prachand: These kinds of traditions were there, and now we are developing this tradition in an organized way. And in a more organized way we are starting to develop different kinds of collective farming-and measures that lead to collective farming. We are trying to organize this system of farming, and it enables the peasants to achieve a kind of unity among them. They are doing all these things to break the chains of feudalism, and it is a school of cultural transformation. When all our families work together, eat together, sing together, dance together-then it is more communal.
 

In the Terai, up to this time, we haven't had a strong mass base, there is not a strong struggle. There is guerrilla action going on in the Terai, in the plainlands. There are big landlords, there is king's land, queen's land-so many big bourgeois lands are there. Up to now what we have done is seize the grain of landlords. We are not yet able, in the Terai, to seize the land. But we are able to seize stored grain. This enables the masses to understand the importance of the People's War, the importance of the revolution. Gradually they are coming to see, "Yes, this is ours." And so we are also developing a mass base in the Terai region.
 

RW: One very important question I wanted to ask relates to the party's Fourth Strategic Plan of developing the base areas. Could you speak about where that process is now and what needs to be achieved in this next period to carry out that plan.
 

Prachand: This is also a very important question. Our Fourth Plenum has sketched out, figured out, the questions of building base areas. To make this plan of developing base areas, first of all we tried to clarify the theoretical conception of base areas, because in South Asia there is a tendency of armed economism, a kind of armed economism-a kind of reformism, armed reformism.
 

RW: Armed struggle with no vision ?
 

Prachand: No vision, exactly. This line exists in India. Some groups say guerrilla zone, guerrilla zone, guerrilla zone. For 25 years they say guerrilla zone, but there is not any perspective, real perspective. And we knew this question of guerrilla zone and base area was going to be a very serious question. We tried to clear up these questions because base areas is a strategic question for protracted people's war. Without the aim of base areas there is no real people's war. Without a strategic view of base areas there is no question of protracted people's war.
 

The question of guerrilla zones is not a strategic question. It is a transitional question-from unarmed masses to armed masses and from the masses without power to the masses with power. To go through this process, the guerrilla zone is only transitional. It is not a strategic question. Therefore we should not confuse the terms guerrilla zone and base area. Our main strategy is to seize, to capture, base areas, to build up base areas. First we clarified this in our plan.
 

Second, in our concrete situation we are not, right now, going to establish base areas. We are not in that position. We are not going to establish base areas in this Fourth Plan. We are concentrating, centralizing all our efforts to build base areas. Our political, ideological, military efforts are all concentrated on forming base areas, but now we are not establishing base areas. We are in the process of building base areas. We need to understand this.
 

RW: Is the distinction between permanent and temporary base areas ?
 

Prachand: Not exactly. We are not using the terms temporary and permanent. We are in the process of building base areas. We are not saying "temporary base area." It may be temporary or permanent. It depends on the force of the people's power-which means our military capacity.
 

RW: What will distinguish a base area? Right now you say you are in the process of forming base areas. But what will be the criteria to say: now we have established a base area ?
 

Prachand: The criteria for having a base area, from the military point of view, is that we have defeated the military capacity of the enemy at that point. Until and unless we defeat a section of the military sent against us, the enemy's armed force-then we cannot say we have a stable base area. We can exercise a kind of preliminary form of base area. But we cannot say it is stable.
 

We see that Mao did not use the term permanent or temporary. What he said is stable base area, unstable base area, base area in preliminary form. These three types of forms Mao experienced and synthesized. Therefore, to have a stable base area we have to crush the enemy's armed force. But before this we can make unstable base areas. We fight with the armed forces, and, for the time being, they do not come. Therefore, we have a base area. But when they come, then they will fight, and that will be unstable. And for the time being, it may be just like a guerrilla zone. Then again, we capture, we defeat the enemy and then it will be stable. This kind of stable and unstable process will be there. We see it like this.
  And you asked about the criteria to have a base area. One is a strong party organization. Strong, consistent leadership should be there. Number two is a good mass base, just like Mao said. A good mass base of struggling masses. And having a good mass base means having not only sympathizers, but masses who themselves are trained in the war. That is the meaning of a good mass base. And you need a strong people's army. Up to this point, we have not said, "People's Army," "People's Liberation Army"-these kinds of terms we have not used. We have used guerrilla squad, guerrilla platoon.