A Country Flash that Created a National Movement.
The term Naxalwadi is derived from a small village called Naxalbari, which is within the Darjeeling district of West Bengal. Not an abstract political word, it is grounded in the realities of rural India in the 1960s, which were harsh indeed. Naxalbari was characterised at the time by severe land inequality with poor peasants and tribal communities, as sharecroppers on the estates of the great landowners, living in a state of debt and deprivation.

Agrarian background of Exploitation.
The agrarian system that was dominant in the area gave landlords power to dominate land, crops, and labor, with little security and rights given to cultivators. Reforms about land were not realized, even though they had a law on paper. This lack of connection between the law and practice stirred crime in the increasing resentment among peasants, particularly those who relied on the land to sustain themselves.

The 1967 Uprising
The turning point was made in 1967 when the land rights struggles became open resistance. Peasants under the leadership of radical communist leaders, including Charu Majumdar, Kanu Sanyal, and Jangal Santhal, started taking land, crop harvests, and organizing armed resistance against the landlords. The movement rapidly spread, with the people calling for land redistribution and social justice as a unification of the villagers.

Response and Aftermath by the State.
The government reacted by using police force, and this led to violent confrontations andthe deaths of civilians. The revolt in Naxalbari was crushed, but the effects were felt well beyond that. The event was a strong icon of the rebellion against feudalism and government.

Birth of Naxalwadi Ideology
Out of this revolt that was based in the village came the name, Naxalwad, i which means one who believed in a struggle to get social and economic equality through revolution. The Naxalbari movement also motivated the same kind of uprisings throughout India and was the point of departure in the later movements of the left extremist movements.