So far, the Indian state has not mobilised massive resources to -battle the Maoist threat, leaving the task to relatively disorganised and inefficient state authorities. But if it does so, it may not be able to apply the draconian but effective methods used in Kashmir, Punjab and the Seven Sisters. The Maoist area of operations is simply too large and spread out.

Furthermore, all it would take for the Maoists to inflict serious damage to India’s economy and self image would be for them to engage in urban as well as rural terrorism. It worked for the Nepali Maoists. According to the Institute for Conflict Management, a think tank in New Delhi, the Naxalites are indeed preparing to take the struggle into the cities. It would not be hard for them to hide among the millions of migrants crammed into the slums. Moreover, extraordinary opportunities for urban terrorism and assassination are offered by the fact that Indian society is one in which even middle-class people can afford to employ domestic servants. Already there is growing anxiety among wealthy urban Indians about robberies and murders by servants, many of whom are migrants from the same rural areas falling under Maoist influence. In Nepal, Maoist recruits were given training by army deserters and Gurkha veterans; India’s urban centres include a much bigger potential fifth column for the Naxalites.

Of course, it would be a mistake to underestimate the strength of the Indian state or the resilience of a society with many more democratic outlets and institutions than Nepal. India’s sheer size allows it to survive catastrophic natural and human events that would shatter other polities. But it would also be a mistake for international observers to ignore the potential for revolutionary activity in a society so profoundly divided. Indeed, the international media’s preoccupation with India’s very thin upper crust – the 150m or so who can now afford a mobile phone, a fridge or perhaps even a scooter, the 1m or so wealthy people who are middle class by Western standards, the 100,000 dollar millionaires, and the 1,000 or so who are extremely rich by any standards – has obscured the travails of the remaining 900m inhabitants, many of whom live lives untouched or even made worse by rapid economic change.