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Journalism of Courage
From A tiny,spartan shed with an asbestos roof,in this small town on the outskirts of Kochi,a 63-year-old has been bringing out Maoist mouthpiece Peoples March. P Govindan Kutty calls the space his office-cum-esidence. Revolution, he adds,will not advance without sacrifices.
Kutty has made his share of the same. The magazine,published in English and reproduced in Hindi,Bengali,Punjabi,Oriya,Tamil and Malayalam,was banned from 2008 to August 2009,after the website http://www.peoplesmarch.com itself had been blocked in 2006. Kutty was arrested,and found himself persona non grata once he came out. More recently,Peoples March has lost top contributors like Maoist leaders Kobad Ghandy (arrested,after which the editorial board was reconstituted),Sudhakar Reddy (killed in an encounter) and Swapan Das Gupta (died in police custody).
Kutty carries on spreading,what he calls,the Maoist message. Even if by making other changes hamstrung by the loss of leaders,Peoples March has changed its periodicity from monthly to once in two months while it has taken to the Net to save cost of publication. Controlled by the Central Committee of CPI (Maoist),the magazines contributors are Naxalites who write under pen names.
A laptop,an LPG cylinder,a cooking stove,a few utensils,cigarette packets and back issues of Peoples March make the inside of the office-cum-residence. A vehicle battery and an inverter help meet the power requirement. At nightfall,Kutty sleeps in the open on a plywood sheet fixed on an iron frame. I use the public toilet in the nearby town. Drinking water comes from the public tap outside. The battery is recharged from an electric shop for Rs 120 every week. Early morning,I go to the gates of the houses in the vicinity to read the Malayalam newspapers before the house owners pick up the copies. Thanks to Internet connection, English publications can be read online, Kutty says.
A diploma holder in mechanical engineering and a former foreman with ISROs Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre,Thiruvananthapuram,Kutty sees nothing exceptional in his circumstances. A revolutionary magazine can be brought out only in this manner, he says.
Kutty had been bringing out his publication from a lodge at Kakkanad near Kochi until he was arrested and the publication banned in early 2008 by the state government. Kutty was charged with publishing seditious matter and exhorting the public to take up arms for violent struggle. He was arrested soon after the Andhra Pradesh Police nabbed senior Maoist leader Mallaraja Reddy from Angamaly near Kochi.
After I was released from jail in August 2009,I was branded a Maoist. The lodge owner was reluctant to give room. Others refused me space on the same grounds, says Kutty.
Left with few options,he returned to his native place Thripunithura,where his father owned eight cents of land. Four of us siblings have an equal right on the land. I decided to build a shelter on a small portion of this land. It required only Rs 12,000, he says.
He also hit back at the authorities by setting up http://www.peoplesmarch.googlepages.com.
It was in the 80s that Kutty got involved with the Maoist movement. He had been suspended in 1984 from the ISRO job because of,what he says,his honesty,and found himself caught in a family dispute that led to the murder of his mother-in-law. While serving life term in an Andhra prison on murder charges,he came in touch with Peoples War Group. After coming out of jail in 1995,Kutty worked in Delhi with the All-India Peoples Resistance Forum and later floated New Vista Publications. In 2003,Kutty took over Peoples March,which was then published from Kolkata,and shifted the production to Kochi. Since the lifting of the ban in August 2009,Kutty has been able to bring out two issues. Standing beside a banner proclaiming Peoples March,Kutty says: Many of the subscribers in foreign countries have requested me to e-mail the magazine in PDF format to save postage charges. The Maoist message would reach the target at any cost.
