‘Urban Naxalism bigger enemy of India than Pak’

Nagpur: “Urban Naxalism is bigger enemy of India than Pakistan as it poses internal security threat to the country compared to cross-border terrorism,” claimed director, screenwriter and author Vivek Agnihotri here recently.
He was speaking on ‘India’s integrity and Urban Naxals’ at a webinar organized by department of humanities of Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj Nagpur University.
Agnihotri, who has authored a book ‘Urban Naxals: The making of Buddha in a traffic jam’, explained how Naxalism started from Naxalbari, a village in West Bengal, in 1960s.
He said, “Today, India’s biggest problem, which should be the country’s strength, is our youth. India has the world’s largest youth population. There is bubbling energy among students that keeps the country young. The youth belonging to middle class are aware of the hardships their parents go through. But when they enter college, the proponents of Left leaning ideology “brainwash” them, just like the Taliban groom children to become suicide bombers.” “Thus colleges become the door to Urban Naxalism,” he claimed, adding this is the condition of all universities in metro and mini-metro cities.
“Slowly, they start focusing only on the fault lines in the country like casteism, poverty, women’s rights issues etc. They fail to acknowledge the country’s greatness, where it stands and what the future holds because they have been “brainwashed”. This is India’s biggest threat,” he said.
Agnihotri added, “The style of communism to sprout internal war in a country is by planting the seeds of revolution. The fire of revolution is set in a way that it continues to burn and communist countries like China dominate with fuelling anarchy and keep an administrative influence on internal security.”
RTMNU pro vice-chancellor Sanjay Dudhe chaired the online lecture. Senate and management council member Vishnu Changde and former city mayor Kalpana Pande were also present. Dean of humanities Prof Nirmal Singh was the convener.
Dudhe said, “Country faces two types of threats — internal and external. External forces can be dealt with as these are recognizable. But it is not easy to tackle internal ones. Earlier, presence of Naxalites was limited to tribal communities living in forests. But now they are pervading cities in order to advocate their ideology among the masses and they are targeting students.”