Gorkhaland Movement (Ethnic Conflict and State Response)

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The book deals with the Gorkhaland movement, an ethnic movement that has endured for more than a century, in the district of Darjeeling. West Bengal. It addresses the micro details of those processes and strategies through which the state has responded to the Gorkha Movement. The strength of the book, if any, lies in its attempts to problematise the issue of state- ethnicity relationship keeping in view the ongoing research activities taken place in the field of conflict resolution and peace studies. Covering the most recent developments (till August 2012) the book furnishes a critical analysis of the State led negotiation process towards the containment of the Gorkha Ethnic Conflict. On the whole, the book seeks to offer a sociological perspective of conflict resolution with the help of Movement as a case study.

Swatahsiddha Sarkar (b. 1975) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology, University of North Bengal (Darjeeling, India) Besides having a handful of published research articles in academic journals and edited volumes, he keeps up keen interest in the field of Identity Politics and Ethnicity. He has been associated with Gorkha Ethnicity and Politics for more than a decade. The author is an M.Phil. in Himalayan Studies and recently awarded the Ph.D. Degree (Delhi School of Economics, Delhi University) for his Doctoral Thesis on Gorkha Ethnicity and Movement in the Darjeeling Hills. He has co-edited a volume on Ethnicity in India (Levant, 2013).

The idea of the present book grew up out of my association with the CCRHS, New Delhi as a Fellow for the period 2010-11. Not to mention that the necessary funds needed for the completion of the present study were generously allocated by the CCRHS, New Delhi. I am thankful to the entire CCRHS fraternity, especially to Ms. Varsha Gewali, Ms. Meha Dixit, Mr. Faizan Ahmed and Mr. Sunil Gupta who took keen interest in the present work. The book came out initially as a project report of the CCRHS and I am thankful to the entire CCRHS team for allowing me publish the reworked version of the project report. Although, the work is financially assisted by the CCRHS, it does not reflect the viewpoint of the organization in anyway.

My departmental colleagues have helped me a lot by raising several critical points whenever I discussed issues with them. Prof. Sanjay K. Roy's contributions deserve special mention, who identified several debatable points raised in the present study and offered valuable suggestions to rework them. I am indebted to him. Field assistants like Kumar, Sophia, Karma, Smriti, and Pooja have taken the pains to complete the interviews of the informants and in collecting relevant data from the field. I am extremely thankful to them. Mr. Pintu Majumdar and Mr. Gour Gopal Barman have helped in data processing while Mr. Subir Das Mohanta gave the present effort a printable shape.

**Contents and Sample Pages**

**Contents and Sample Pages**