FOUR COMRADES: Statues of Lenin, Stalin, Mao Tse-tung and Naxal leader Charu Majumdar at Bangaijote on the outskirts of Naxalbari. (Below) Kanu Sanyal

As one follows the broken road along the river Manjha to the small hamlet of Sebdellah, the only signs of civilisation are the electricity poles jutting out of lush green fields and an odd motorised vehicle.

It is hard to imagine that this serene hamlet in the Naxalbari area of Darjeeling district in north Bengal once reverberated with cries of revolution and liberation. Today, when the government is having a hard time combating the Naxal rampage in Lalgarh and its adjoining areas, Sebdellah continues to be quiet. It may have spawned the Naxal movement in the late 1960s, but now it has few sympathisers here.

Kanu Sanyal, the man who led many of those “mass struggles,” continues to live in Sebdellah. Frail and ailing, the 79-year old leader now spends most of his time lying on the floor of his one-room house. The huge black and white framed pictures of Karl Marx, Lenin, Stalin and Mao Tse-tung on his walls seem to be his only company.

The Naxalbari movement was launched by Charu Mazumdar, Kanu Sanyal and Jangal Santhal in the summer of 1967. The revolutionaries led the peasants and occupied large tracts of land of the jotedars (landlords) and distributed them among the sharecroppers and the landless. Scores of landlords gave up their lands and fled the area in fear. Those who resisted or even asked questions were simply eliminated.

But 42 years down the line, what has been the impact of the movement on Naxalbari and the villages around it? Sanyal replies, “Nothing has changed. Only the oppressors have,” he says. The oppressors could be anybody, says Sanyal — the government, landlords, industrialists. Progress, development and modernisation are empty words for Sanyal. “Progress means being free from exploitation. I don’t see that in Naxalbari, or for that matter, anywhere in the country,” he says.

Sanyal is dismissive of the Maoists in Lalgarh and other parts of the country. “What they are practising is terrorism. Nobody knows their ideology, and more importantly, there is no mass participation,” he says.

Other old timers in the area are equally contemptuous of the Lalgarh Maoists. “If we had to hold a protest march or raid a landlord, one whistle was enough. The whole village would get together. Can the Maoists of today do the same? They themselves live in jungles. How can they think of a revolution,” asks P.P. Sharma, 67, a former Naxal activist.

The fact is that Naxalbari and its surrounding villages are no longer fixated on land and revolution, although basic issues like roads, electricity and drinking water still remain major concerns. “Nothing much has changed since those days except for some new roads and an increase in population, which is because of the huge influx of Bangladeshis in the area,” says Gulabuddin Ansari, a 50 year-old grain crusher in Hathgisiya village. As a youngster Ansari had actively participated in the Naxal movement.

If change has come to one place, it is the Naxalbari block headquarters itself. It is a small but bustling place with a 20-bed hospital, a telephone exchange, noisy markets and shops selling the latest models of television sets and mobile phones.

“Naxalism is just a word for us. I only understand the importance of this place when people in Calcutta and elsewhere raise their eyebrows when I say that I am from Naxalbari. For them, it is as if Naxalism still exists here. The reality is that we have moved on,” says Pradip Prasad, who runs an NGO working in the field of AIDS and drugs.

With the Nepal border just a few kilometers away, smuggling is the most profitable business for many of the locals. “I can earn anywhere between Rs 300-400 a day just by peddling goods between Panitanki and Naxalbari,” says Mangal Burman, 25. Panitanki is bang on Nepal border.

The police too admit that Naxalism is hardly an issue here anymore. “Our main problems are smugglers and drug traffickers,” says an official at the local police station.

The most important pilgrimage for Naxalites in the area is Bangaijote on the outskirts of Naxalbari. A memorial has been erected here to honour nine protestors, including five women and two children who were gunned down by the police on May 25, 1967. Named ‘Tienanmen Square,’ with ‘of India’ squeezed in almost as an afterthought, the memorial is built in the same shape as the Monument to the People’s Heroes in Beijing. The place also has the busts of Lenin, Stalin, Mao Tse-tung and Charu Mazumdar.

But Sharma points out that most of the locals are ignorant of the significance of the memorial. “Ninety nine percent of the people in Naxalbari do not even know that these places exists,” he says.

The talking point here is not Naxalites or their latter day avatars — the Maoists. Politics interests people the most and the panchayat elections that are to be held today happens to be the hottest topic of discussion.

But if there is one thing that Naxalbari and the villages around are united in, it is in their respect for ‘Kanubabu’ as Sanyal is popularly called. “Kanubabu did what politicians rarely do. He stuck to his ideals,” says Gulabuddin Ansari.

“I always wanted to live among the people and that’s what I am doing. I don’t see it as a sacrifice or anything like that,” says Sanyal when asked about the reverence with which people treat him even today.

Sanyal is really the last vestige of Naxalbari’s Naxal heritage. The rest has been consigned to history.