ABSTRACT
In India, political violence or its potential is a constant presence and has been so since the founding of the republic. Separatist groups continue to dot India, including a widening insurgency called the Naxalites that takes its inspiration from Mao Zedong. Kashmir remains an international flash point of continued conflict. Terrorism and low intensity war all loom. And India and Pakistan have continued, with varying intensity, to joust or battle across a border that has long been perhaps second only to Korea for its danger of massive war. Nor is political violence in India limited to separatists, Jammu and Kashmir, and the IndoPakistani conflict: the Indian state and populations within it have committed violence against political opponents, Muslims, and others on a regular basis and have ignored or deemphasized violence committed by rightwing Hindu forces (Amnesty International 2007; Kalhan et al 2006; Nussbaum 2007).1
