The Booker prize-winning author and activist gains rare access to the tribal people and Maoist guerrillas who - from their camps deep in the Dandakaranya forest - have taken up arms against the Indian state
The terse, typewritten note slipped under my door in a sealed envelope confirmed my appointment with India's Gravest Internal Security Threat. I'd been waiting for months to hear from them.
I had to be at the Maa Danteshwari mandir in Dantewara, Chhattisgarh, at any of four given times on two given days. That was to take care of bad weather, punctures, blockades, transport strikes and sheer bad luck. The note said: "Writer should have camera, tika and coconut. Meeter will have cap, Hindi Outlook magazine and bananas. Password: Namashkar Guruji."
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