ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an expansion of the Maoist base through a revolutionary people's war by offering a social reading of patterns of governance in rural Nepal, while recognizing Maoists' predilection towards violent political action. In 1971 an armed peasant struggle was initiated by Nepali Marxists-Leninists in Jhapa, a border region of West Bengal. The government suppressed the movement ruthlessly and many cadres of Nepali Maoists were killed. But the Jhapa movement gave birth to both leaders of Maoist revolutionaries and parliamentary communists. These Communists known as the Communist party of Nepal remained convinced of the idea of Maoism and further split after the fall of the Gang of Four in China into two groups: the original fourth convention and Mashal or torch, led by Mohan Bikram Singh. Maoist violence thus effectively destroyed the clientelist obligations that had bound peasants to landlords, government officials and moneylenders.
