Naxalbari | Marx, Mao, Majumdar and a town that birthed insurgency

KHemu Singh was 17 when he picked up a artillery, 1967.Sonam Gyentsen Wangdi had non in time been max born when his padre Inspector Sonam Wangdi was killed.Jharen Roy grew up hearing stories of how his family’s grain stores were looted and how they were driven from their village.Six decades later, and almost three months after the government declared India free of left wing extremism (LWE), the movement’s origins and human cost remain etched in the lives of the three men. They have never met, yet each inherited the rebellion in a different way.All three incidents happened in the town of Naxalbari in West Bengal, about three hours from the hills of Darjeeling, and the birthplace of LWE. Today, apart from nine red sandstone statues of Karl Marx, Mao Zedong, Charu Majumdar, and other Left icons , there is little to suggest that this unassuming town gave birth to one of the country’s longest-running insurgencies. A cafe nearby is open late into the night, serving young patrons—many of whom may not know that Naxalism derives its name from Naxalbari.Yet it was here, in the summers of 1967, that a peasant uprising changed the course of Indian history. A rebellion that began in one corner of India would go on to spread across state borders, inspire generations of armed revolutionaries and, at its peak, roil 106 districts(2006 data; almost a fifth of the districts at the time) until its end this year.For Khemu Singh, now 76, the rebellion remains a memory of idealism and collective action.Living quietly in Naxalbari, the former insurgent appears indistinguishable from any other elderly resident -- but in 1967 he was among the young peasants who helped launch the movement. Singh ,who worked closely with the movement’s founding leaders, Charu Majumdar and Kanu Sanyal, remembers a time when peasants, angered by exploitative zamindars (landowners) , believed revolution was within reach.He said, “Much before the violence started, leaders like Kanu da and Charu da had started visiting the villages. The zamindars were oppressive. People like Kanu da were an inspiration. Their speeches ignited a fire within us. The police action started on May 24, 1967 but incidents of villagers coming together to gherao (surround ) the zamindars and loot their food started in March. We would hold one red flag, walk the village and shout Inquilab Zindabad. That was enough to mobilise the village. If police tried to enter, one shout was enough to assemble hundreds of villagers. My early comrades, all dead except Shanti Munda(who lives nearby), were charged up and joined the movement. It was a different summer. Anything was possible.”Many villagers still recount stories of Singh travelling to China for arms training in the 1970s, a piece of local folklore he dismisses as urban legend.He claims it was Kanu Sanyal and others who travelled to China twice and even met Mao Zedong , while he spent years underground and in prison before returning home in the early 1980s. “I was once nearly killed in a police encounter. One IB officer intervened and saved my life. Kanu Da often said Mao told him the movement would be successful in India. I returned home only in 1982 when the Left Front government came to power and dropped the Naxal cases.”Singh said the uprising was a collective effort of poor farmers rising up to the mighty zamindars who soon realised the power balance had shifted. He remembers how some zamindars even handed over their licensed weapons before leaving the houses. “In our village, we got 11 such weapons. We used them to chase away other zamindars, loot their godowns and distribute the grains equally to everyone. Our village was the first and the real liberated zone. This news spread like wild fire.”While Singh remembers a revolution in the making, Jharen Roy inherited memories of fear.Inside a fading home near Naxalbari’s market square, the 64-year-old speaks of stories passed down through generations. His grandfather, Kundun Roy, was among the first zamindars targeted during the uprising. Their home was attacked, grain stores looted twice and family members assaulted. “I was very young then and have only heard the horror stories. The peasants murdered so many zamindars here. My kaka(uncle) Jitender Nath Roy was murdered. They threw his body in a river.”Roy has heard stories of how Naxals forced wealthy zamindars to leave their houses and large tracts of land. Many elderly residents who meet at Roy’s tea shop in the town speak of how rich the family was back in the day.“We had to move in to a rented house in Siliguri. My father told us Naxals would storm the house for food grains. Many times, even when the demands of cash were met, the Naxals would come and attack. They even took one double barrel gun from our house,” he said, pinning the blame on ground level cadres who did not follow the peaceful way of socialism.“Kanu Da and others were true in their belief of empowering farmers but it was the ground cadres who committed atrocities. If the leaders sent them to get just cash, the cadres on the ground would come and even take your ducks and chicken,” he said.Yet the violence that uprooted his family did not turn Roy away from socialism. If anything, it deepened his belief that the movement had strayed from its original ideals. Today, Roy remains one of the few committed socialists in a place that has moved on from the Left. A member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), he even contested the recent assembly election from Naxalbari but lost badly. Naxalbari chose the BJP candidate giving him 166905 votes, Jharen got only 8585.For Sonam Gyentsen Wangdi, the rebellion of 1967 has always been personal.Wangdi, a senior bureaucrat who briefly worked as a journalist in New Delhi during the early 1990s, never met his father -- Inspector Sonam Wangdi. On May 23, 1967, the inspector was killed by peasants in Naxalbari, making him the first police casualty of the Naxal movement. Wangdi was still in his mother’s womb at the time.According to the citation accompanying the President’s gallantry award conferred posthumously in 1968, the officer chose to address the mob peacefully rather than retreat. He was struck by four arrows and died from his injuries.Growing up, Wangdi learnt about his father’s heroics through family stories and newspaper reports; the road outside their house was named after him. His 86-year-old mother, Lhadom Bhutia, now struggles to remember those events. “It is painful and I don’t want to remember,” she said softly at her house in Darjeeling town.She still receives a pension and monetary allowance attached to the gallantry award. The citation said a mob of 300/400 persons armed with bows and arrows had assembled to commit acts of violence. To prevent bloodshed, Inspector Sonam Wangdi advanced towards the mob to pacify them. He was unarmed. “His sincere bid to avoid bloodshed cost him his life,” it said.The killing of the police officer remains one of the defining moments of the uprising.For his son, it is a story preserved in an official citation. For Singh, it is the memory of the day when the movement crossed a line.“I remember it clearly,” Singh said. “There was a farmers meeting in Lalghati village. In the adjacent Borojorujot village, women had blocked roads and were protesting. Someone came running to Lalghati and spread a rumour that police were attacking women protesters. The armed mob then went to Borojorujot and shot the arrows. It killed Sonam Wangdi on the spot. Until then, villagers were only targeting zamindars. It was the first time an officer was killed. Everything changed after that.”The following day, police opened fire on villagers near Borojorujot, killing 11 people in what became one of the earliest and most significant confrontations of the movement. Thousands of civilians, security personnel and Maoist cadres would eventually lose their lives ; nearly 14,000 people, including security forces, have been killed in Naxal related violence since 2006, according to government data. The action continued until March 30, 2026 when the government finally declared India Naxal free.Looking back, Singh believes the movement lost its way.“The cause of guerilla Maoists in Bastar was right,” he said. “But they abandoned the people and relied only on guns. How can you win a people’s war when the people lose faith in you?”Roy arrives at a similar conclusion from the opposite side of the conflict. “The ideals may have been right,” he said. “But violence destroyed everything.”And Wangdi, whose family paid the most personal price, speaks not of revenge but reconciliation.“People from both sides have lost a lot in this insurgency,” he said. “I do not wish ill for anyone. I forgive them. The movement is over. May there be peace.”India is now Naxal-free. In Naxalbari, the cluster of red sandstone statues of the Left icons stands by the roadside, the only few visible reminders of a history etched in blood. As cars drive past the statues and young people gather at a cafe nearby late into the evening, the town that gave Naxalism its name is moving on.