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Urban Naxals Have Left the Jungle. They’re in Our Classrooms
Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently warned that while Naxalism is vanishing from forests, it is “taking root in urban centres.” He was not exaggerating. What India once fought in Bastar and Lalgarh is now being played out in lecture halls, seminar rooms, and student unions. This is the rise of Urban Naxalism, the ideological front of Maoism. The guerrilla with the gun now depends on the activist with the megaphone. And the chosen targets are clear: our universities.
Why Universities?
At the Bharat Manthan 2025 conclave in Vigyan Bhawan, Delhi University Vice-Chancellor Prof. Yogesh Singh put it bluntly: “Universities too must take a solemn resolve that we will eliminate Naxalite ideology from our campuses.” His words capture a brutal truth: young students are impressionable. They come searching for ideas, identity, and belonging. Maoist strategy documents openly admit this. They direct cadres to infiltrate universities and build “legal organisations” that cloak propaganda in the language of dissent.
Once inside, the game is calculated. Radical slogans become “debate.” Secessionist posters are defended as “freedom of expression.” Anti-India theatre is staged as “student culture.” The goal is not intellectual inquiry but indoctrination, not curiosity but corrosion. Universities, which should be temples of knowledge, are being converted into laboratories of subversion.
When Freedom Gets Twisted
No democracy survives without dissent. But romanticising violence is not dissent, it is betrayal. Writers and activists have at times described Maoists as “Gandhians with Guns.” Others narrate the lives of guerrillas with sympathy, painting them as tragic heroes rather than armed criminals.
Yet behind every Maoist ambush lies a grieving family. Behind every road blown up lies a school that never got built. Behind every landmine lies a village condemned to poverty. When universities glorify such violence, they mock the sacrifices of security personnel and betray the very communities they claim to champion. The classroom must never become the jungle.
Education as the First Line of Defence
This is why education reform is not just an academic agenda but also a national security imperative. NEP 2020 is more than an academic blueprint; it is a safeguard. By focusing on employability, innovation, and cultural pride, it offers young people constructive paths that radical ideologies cannot.
Prof. Yogesh Singh’s message was unambiguous: universities must actively fight extremist ideas. They cannot hide behind false neutrality. They must promote critical thinking rooted in India’s civilisational ethos, not borrowed ideologies of division. Neutrality in the face of poison is complicity.
The Danger of Narratives
Urban Naxalism today is not only about guns; it is about narrative warfare. Disinformation campaigns during the anti-CAA and farm law protests showed how easily street unrest can be amplified by Maoist-style networks. Fifth-generation warfare is fought with hashtags as much as with bullets. The battlefield has shifted from the forests of Dantewada to the feeds of social media and the corridors of universities.
In this new war, the classroom is not innocent. It can either become a breeding ground for disaffection or a seedbed for nation-building. Every poster, every seminar, every protest has consequences. If captured by extremists, they plant suspicion against the state; if guided by wisdom, they prepare young Indians for service, innovation, and leadership.
Exploiting Fault Lines
Urban Naxals thrive by inflaming fault lines, caste, language, religion, region. Instead of bridging divides, they widen them. Imported frameworks like Critical Race Theory are weaponised to recast India as irredeemably oppressive. This is not scholarship; it is sabotage. Instead of healing old wounds, they seek to reopen them until the body politic bleeds. Universities, tragically, have sometimes become their chosen operating tables.
Collusion with Foreign Agendas
This ideological project does not thrive in isolation. It finds sustenance in foreign scholarships, NGO linkages, and “research projects” funded by agencies with clear political agendas. These conduits allow external actors to insert their narratives into India’s academic bloodstream. What appears as intellectual freedom is often the soft arm of hybrid warfare. For a nation aspiring to global leadership, allowing classrooms to become echo chambers of external propaganda is suicidal.
Resistance to Development
Urban Naxals also resist development. They call new roads “exploitation,” mining “theft,” and industry “colonisation.” Yet it is these very projects, roads, schools, jobs, that lift tribal and rural communities from poverty. By opposing them, Naxals weaponise underdevelopment, ensuring a steady stream of disillusioned youth for their cause. Their strategy is not liberation but perpetual dependency, not justice but sabotage.
The Way Forward
The Modi government has already weakened the insurgency in the forests by combining security with development. Roads, mobile towers, and welfare schemes have cut Maoists off from their traditional bases. But the urban front remains a challenge. That is where universities must step in, with vigilance against extremist networks, civic education that builds resilience, and opportunities that channel youthful energy into innovation rather than nihilism.
The Choice for India’s Universities
The fight against Urban Naxalism is not just about security forces. It is about what kind of universities India wants. Do we want campuses that prepare innovators, entrepreneurs, and leaders? Or campuses that turn into stages for rehearsing revolution? Do we want universities that build India’s future, or those that conspire to dismantle it brick by brick?
As Prime Minister Modi warned, the red shadow has shifted from jungle to city. And as Prof. Yogesh Singh declared, universities must take the pledge: “We will eliminate Naxalite ideology from our campuses.” A Naxal-free India will only be possible when we also have Naxal-free universities.
These pieces are being published as they have been received – they have not been edited/fact-checked by ThePrint.