Five splinter groups of the Communist Party of India-Marxist-Leninist will meet either in Andhra Pradesh or Orissa in January 2005 to discuss unification, said Kanu Sanyal, one of the leaders of the naxalbari movement.

Addressing a rally after unveiling the statue of the late naxal leader Tarimela Nagi Reddy at Anantapur town in Andhra Pradesh on Sunday, Sanyal said that the revolutionary parties would come together on a single platform at an all-India conference to chalk out an action plan for launching a fight against the central and state governments for their anti-people policies.

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The participants will also discuss plans to unite all revolutionary parties into one 'CP-ML' unit at the central level.

Sanyal, a close associate of Charu Mazumdar, the founding father of the naxalbari movement that originated in West Bengal in 1967, said that armed struggle was the only means to achieve the revolution to purge the anti-people policies of the government.

Land reforms have not implemented in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar and landlords have been reclaiming lands distributed in West Bengal. The state governments were responsible for this, he said. Sanyal accused the Congress party, which ruled the country and the state for many decades, of failing to take up land reforms.

He said there was no difference between the policies of the National Democratic Alliance and the United Progressive Alliance; both were serving their own interests. The septuagenarian leader accused them of adopting anti-farmer policies instead of solving the problems of farmers and agricultural labourers.

The naxal parties will in particular target the central and state governments for promoting the policies of the World Bank and for pandering to multinational corporations, Sanyal said. He said that revisionists were posing a threat to the communist movement in the country. Nagi Reddy's dream would come true only if all revolutionary parties work unitedly for people's welfare, he said.

Sanyal opposed the term naxalite saying 'no naxalite or naxalism exists today'. Terming the movement of parties like CPI-Maoist (formerly People's War) naxalism would be wrong because 'naxalites' and 'naxalism' were the creations of the media. The revolutionaries were followers of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist thought, he said.

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Sanyal said he neither supported nor opposed the peace initiative between the CPI-Maoist and CPI-ML Janashakti and the AP government. Giving up of arms by the CPI-Maoist depended on how the government reacts to its demands for the implementation of land reforms and other socio-economic measures, he said. In any case, the leader said, it would be better to await the outcome of the talks before jumping to conclusions.

Thousands of people had gathered in the town to participate in the rally to mark the unveiling ceremony of the statue of Nagi Reddy at the clock tower. Apart from Sanyal, others who attended the meeting included Chowdary Tejeswara Rao. Rao led the tribal uprising in Srikakulam district in 1969, which heralded the birth of the naxalite movement in AP, and Bhimireddy Narasimha Reddy, a veteran of Telangana armed struggle against the feudalistic rule of the erstwhile Nizam of Hyderabad.