A colourful procession of people's guerilla fighters--both men and women--in olive-green uniforms and caps, with guns and rifles slinging from their shoulders and red banners and placards in hand, shouting full-throated slogans, marked the commencement of the All India Special Conference of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) (People's War). The procession started at 8.30 A.M., on 15 November 1995 from the "Naxalbari-Srikakulam Martyrs Entrance" and winding through the pathways of the sprawling "AP and Dandakaranya Martyrs' Valley" it reached the "Mandwa Martyrs' military Parade Grounds" in about an hour. The Valley resounded slogans such as: "Build Guerilla Zones"; "Advance People's War"; "Fulfill our Martyrs' dreams"; "Build Village Committees"; "All powers to Village Committees"; "Smash feudalism"; "Down with imperialism"; "Down with all hues of revisionism"; "Long live World Socialist Revolution"; "Long live CPI (M-L) (People's War)"; "Long live the unity of Communist Revolutionaries"; and "Red Salutes" to numerous martyrs, particularly, comrade Charu Majumdar, Saroj Dutta, Vempatapu Satyam, Adibhatla Kailasam, Panchadi Nirmala, Padmakka, Swaroopakka, Swarnalatha, Puli Anjanna, Suryam, Shankar, Balanna and so on. Revolutionary songs intermingled with loud slogans in Telugu, Hindi, Gondi, Tamil, Kannada, Marathi, Bengali, Oriya and English provided a very inspiring and rousing start to the historic Conference.
At the Parade Grounds a delegate from Dandakaranya hoisted the Red Flag, as all the comrades--both delegates and the Protection and Defence groups--saluted the Red Flag going up high in the sky. After singing of the flag-song, the comrade who hoisted the flag addressed the gathering, first in Gondi and then in Hindi, explaining the historicity of the Red Flag and pointing to the momentous tasks facing the Party and the people's armed forces at the present juncture.
Then, the secretary of the COC made a brief introductory speech announcing the beginning of the historic Conference and pointed out its great significance as successor to the 8th Congress--the founding Congress--of the CPI (M-L) under the stewardship of comrade Charu Majumdar in 1970. He particularly exhorted the comrades to realise the immense importance of the Conference which is being held at a crucial time when confrontation between ourselves and the enemy classes is intensifying with every passing day and when imperialism world-wide was irretrievably enmeshed in crisis and heading towards its doom.
After completing the flag hoisting ceremony all the comrades went in a procession to the Martyr's Column built inside the compound of the Conference Hall.