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POLITICAL RESOLUTION
Adopted at the 19th Party Congress
I
The 19th Congress of the Communist Party of India meets in a political situation which is essentially different from the one that prevailed only a year back. There has been a momentous change in the political scene.
This was mainly due to the people’s desire to put on end to the communal politics of the NDA regime which caused revulsion among the vast majority of our secular minded people and a feeling of insecurity and apprehension among minorities, coupled with the mounting anger of different sections of the toiling masses against the anti-people economic and other policies of the NDA government.
The result was that the BJP and its NDA allies were voted out of power. The country was saved from advancing along the road to a fascistic order.
A secular majority was elected to Parliament, so that a secular coalition government could come to power, led by the Congress which got the largest number of seats, though only a little more than a half of what is required for a majority. Money-Power, muscle power, rigging and mafia influenced the results here and there. But taken together, it was the political maturity of the voters that prevailed.
Left Parties emerged with the largest representation so far in parliament. This enabled the Left not only to act as a unifying and motivating factor in the formation of a secular government, but also to ensure it has a stable majority and a credible progressive programme. Initially our view was that the entire Left should join the government. However, the Left parties together decided to stay out of the government and support it from outside. This arrangement today enables the Left to keep a vigilant eye over the functioning of the government.
The people’s vote has brought about not only a change of government, but also the possibility of a change of direction. The political tactics pursued since the Chennai and Thiruvananthapuram Party Congress had borne fruit. The defeat of the BJP/NDA government, the installation of a secular government, the increase in Left representation, and the formulation of the Common Minimum Programme vindicates the political and tactical line of the CPI. Today the background is vastly different from the earlier congress at Chennai and Trivandrum. We have now opportunities to forge ahead.
The Common Minimum Programme (CMP) drawn up with the active participation of the Left reflects the change of direction of policy. The CMP reflects the common measure of agreement on the urgent immediate needs and problems of the country and its people, and indicates the way by which the country is to come out of the communal alienation and the economic and social disaster brought about by the NDA regime. At the same time it shows the way to overcome the international isolation of our country from the developing world to which the previous government had led it. The CMP is a political and practical document, setting forth the tasks of this government. It forms the basis of the Left’s support to the government. As long as the UPA Government implements the CMP and take scare of its priorities, so long it will continue to enjoy the Left’s support and positive cooperation. Any departure from it is bound to result in conflicts. The formation of the
UPA government, the Left support to it and the formulation of the CMP constitute a tactical response to the prevailing situation.
As a supporting party the need arose for coordination with the government. To serve this purpose a UPA-Left Coordination Committee has been set up. By keeping out of the Government and yet supporting it from outside and with the UPA-Left Coordination Committee in place, the Left is in an unique position where it can openly spell out its concerns, voice its distinct opinion on policies and keep a vigilant eye on the general performance of the government. At the same time it can mobilise the masses against all deviations, and for enforcing its implementation. This is an unusual and unique situation, which provides opportunity for the Left.
If whatever the Left is voicing has to become effective, there has to be mass backing, a people’s movement on specific issues. It is not a dormant mass that will ensure the implementation of the CMP or guarantee the stability of the UPA-Government. It is people’s active involvement that alone will overcome all obstacles, opposition, hesitation, or attempts at sabotage from reaction and vested interests both from within and without the UPA. Coordination between the UPA and the Left is necessary but is not enough in itself. Mass mobilization and mass intervention are essential. Implementation of the CMP can give a certain measure of relief to the suffering masses. Such a movement led by the Left has necessarily to demarcate itself from the movements launched by the BJP-led opposition whose sole aim is to defame and destabilize the government.
The verdict of the Indian voters conveys the message that basic agricultural development and necessities like food, shelter, drinking water, power, education for all children, access to health services and security of life are the priority areas that have to be tackled. It is the task of the Party to make these felt needs into real demands backed by mass movement.
The focus of discussion and action by the Left has to be on these issues. They have to concentrate mainly on issues concerning agriculture and rural development which are the keys to India’s democratic advance. Issues such as distribution of all ceiling land and government waste-land among the landless, completing all pending irrigations projects, water harvesting and provision of drinking water, watershed programming, providing easy credit to kisans, remunerative prices for their produce and arrangements for state purchase, subsidised ration for BPL families and expansion of PDS so as to keep prices under control, comprehensive law for agricultural workers, national employment guarantee act which undertakes public works and provides work to the unemployed, extension of primary education and health centres, encouragement and protection of all traditional and employment generating industries in the rural areas, etc. – these should be in the forefront of the Left’s agenda. At the same time the Left must defend all trade union rights won through struggles and sacrifices, including the right to strike.
The Left should appear as a positive factor for India’s development, even while opposing moves which are meant to serve the interests of foreign and domestic monopolies to the detriment of our economy. Propaganda deliberately spread by the bourgeoisie, as if the Left is an obstacle to growth and development must be dispelled. The Left stands for India as a prosperous, developed country, with a resurgent agriculture and vibrant economy which generates jobs, and where social justice prevails.
Tsunami:
The tsunami disaster which devastated our South-eastern coastline and took an immense toll of life and property evoked a tremendous response from all sections of the Indian people. India has also extended a helping hand to other affected countries. This has earned a lot of good will for India. Tremendous effort require to be made for rehabilitation and reconstruction, both by government and private agencies. Certain permanent arrangements have to be made for early information about such natural disasters. Unfortunately an unhealthy trend of discrimination has been displayed in the matter of relief to the dalits. This must be strictly corrected at the stage of rehabilitation. The tribal people in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands have been the worst hit. Prompt steps have to be taken for restoring their habitat and ensuring their survival.
Fishermen all along our coast, who have lost everything, have to be fully rehabilitated, so that they can once again pursue their livelihood. The Party units that are their should devote their energies to this purpose.
II
The Character of the UPA Government and the Congress
The UPA government is a bourgeois government. The Left support to it is a specific response to the existing situation. The aim and tendency of the government is to pursue the neo-liberal policies which are primarily aimed at creating a “Free Market” economy, an unrestricted capitalist economy. Repeated statements by the leading party of the coalition, viz. the Congress about going ahead with ‘economic reforms’, upholding policies of liberalisation, privatisation (disinvestment) and globalisation point in that direction. Their allies in the UPA acquiesce with these policies. This is their economic outlook and policy. They are at present somewhat restrained and hampered in this, firstly due to the opposition from the Left; secondly, due to a certain degree of popular resistance; and thirdly, due to the defeat that overtook the BJP/NDA regime which brazenly pursued these policies. This has made the Congress a bit wary and cautious, and speak about ‘reforms with a human face’. This is the basis of the contradiction in the situation.
Congress leaders have not fully learnt a lesson from the defeat of the previous Narsimha Rao-Manmohan Singh Government. Nor have they learnt fully from the collapse of the Vajpayee government. Indeed, the pressures from the IMF, World Bank and WTO have increased though the present world order and the Indian political set-up curbs their efforts to some extent.
The UPA Government is amenable to pressure from both sides in the coalition set-up. Its policies are the result of both yielding to and resisting International Finance Capital. It depends upon the Left’s strength to drive it in the direction that the Left wants to in the given situation. Therefore this is a transitional period. Much depends upon the Left’s ability to influence its policies and practices on the one side, and on the other side the capacity of the Congress to consolidate its own position even while working within the coalition framework.
After touching the lowest depth in the terms of number of seats in Parliament in three elections, the Congress has accepted the inevitability of both pre-poll and post-poll coalitions with other secular forces. Its attitude towards the two Communist Parties however remains one of trying to marginalize them as much as possible.
The pre-poll alliances with regional parties in some states enabled it to improve its seats. But in states where the Congress alone had to fight with the BJP or the Left, its poll performance was dismal. Even so, most of its second-rung and state leaders continue to think that they can come to power on their own strength and hesitate to have any adjustment with other secular parties. At the Centre, while accepting the inevitability of a coalition to share power, many of its leaders and ministers do not accept the ‘coalition dharma’ of consulting other partners and the supporting parties. Their mindsets remain tied to the old understanding and style of work. They function unilaterally and pursue their own policies. All this is contributing to the rise of conflicts and contradictions.
In states like West Bengal where the Left is strong, the Congress has not hesitated to enter into opportunist alliance with the ‘Trinamool Congress’ – an ally of the BJP, in panchayats, and municipal bodies, with a view to counter the Left. Similarly in Kerala, they entered into clandestine arrangements with RSS/BJP elements.
As the leader of the coalition the Congress today feels that it is on an upcoming trail. It has come to think that it can dictate terms to other parties who are influential in those states. This too is giving rise to unwarranted tension among secular forces and parties.
It is this attitude of the Congress which led to its ignoring the other partners of the UPA as well as the Left, while sharing out seats and putting up candidates for the assembly polls in Bihar and Jharkhand. The strength of the BJP and its NDA ally viz, the JD(U) was underestimated, and the results were disastrous, for the secular parties, the Left and the Congress. In Jharkhand the BJP has been able to return to power, and Bihar has to undergo a period of Presidents rule. Our Party’s electoral tactics in Bihar and Jharkhand also need to be reviewed.
III
The BJP and its Allies: The Struggle against it:
The NDA led by the BJP pursued a thoroughly anti-people economic policy, combined with its aggressive communalism, and its brazen arrogance while carrying out these policies. It rode roughshod over the common people and completely ignored the rural mass. The Gujarat genocide in 2002 carried out with satanic furry by the BJP/VHP, which took the toll of more than 2000 people, destroyed houses and shops belonging to Muslims, exposed the ugly face of its communal agenda. The BJP’s communal propaganda and practices was its weapon to divide the people and carry through its economic programme of serving the interests of monopoly capital and other vested interests. There is a link between communalism and reactionary political, economic and social policies. To fight effectively against BJP’s communalism we have also to expose its links with reactionary policies, its disregard for the unemployed, the farmers, the workers and so on. Its sham pretence of patriotism and nationalism can be rubbished by exposing the anti-national character of all its policies. People cannot be inspired to fight communalism only through lectures on the virtues and necessity of secularism. This should be closely combined with economic, social and cultural issues, as pursued in a communally surcharged atmosphere.
In the Parliamentary and the state assembly elections held thereafter, the BJP has been beaten but not broken. Its cadres are frustrated and demoralized. Its leadership circles are plagued with squabbles. Gone is the boastful claim that it is a disciplined party, - a party with a difference. But it would be a blunder to underestimate its strength and its potential to stir up divisive and communal tension. It has large presence in parliament and in several state assemblies. It rules in four states. Apart from this it has made deep ideological and physical inroads in vital organs of the state and civil society. To meet the new situation and rally its cadres, it has once again made Advani its President by carrying out a coup at the top. Under him the BJP has been latching itself on to any issue that comes its way, building it up into a confrontation with the government and paralyzing parliament on several occasions. It gives every issue a communal twist and tries to whip up a communal frenzy. The most vile instance was the haste with which BJP leaders jumped into the fray when distorted and mischievous census figures were published, intended to show that the muslim population had suddenly jumped up. They loudly cried that at this growth rate muslims would soon outnumber the Hindus in India! The recent criminal case launched against the Kanchi Shankaracharya is another glaring example. Abandoning all vestiges of respect for law, the entire Sangh Parivar came out on the streets virtually challenging the applicability of criminal law on religious leaders, and demanding that the Kanchi Seer be set free. The demand boils down to the view that Hindu religious leaders should be regarded, as above the law and to arrest any of them constitutes an attack on Hindu religion.
The BJP has now openly gone back to its old aggressive Hindutva, talking about Hindu ethos and culture. Even God has been dragged in, with Advani claiming that his Party is the ‘chosen instrument of Divinity for protecting the Hindus’.
Vajpayee’s laboured attempt to equate this ‘Hindutva’ with ‘Bharatiyata’ is only to camouflage its ugly essence, its real face. The Sangh Parivar would act at the ground level, while at the top Vajpayee will dress it up as the embodiment of ‘Bharatiyata’ and ‘cultural nationalism’!
‘Hinduism’ and ‘Hindutva’ are two entirely different concepts. Hinduism is a religion which more than 82% of our people belong to while Hindutva is politics – the politics of a group, a party, of the Sangh Parivar and its constituents who have political aims up their sleeve. Its aggressive communal character, its fundamentalism of hate and hostility towards other religions, its quick attempt at picking up any issue that comes up and of giving it a communal twist, its complete abandon of any moral values or ethics, its fascist aims and objectives have to be recognised. It is the core of the Sangh Parivar’s fascist ideology, its driving force, its cutting edge. There is nothing religious about it.
The overwhelming majority of our people are secular-minded. That is the biggest guarantor of our secular polity. The rise of Hindu fundamentalism in certain section in the name of Hindutva has given rice to Muslim fundamentalism in some sections. The one fuels the other, and both tear the fabric of secularism in the country. Both have to be countered.
BJP’s Allies:
The allies of the BJP are now in a quandary. They were battered even worse than the BJP in the last election. Not all of them were communal in outlook, nor do they accept the BJP’s commitment to Hindutva. But opportunism and the greed for a share of power drew them towards the BJP at the time. They satisfied their flexible conscience by having a so-called National Democratic Agenda of Governance, though the partners of the BJP in the Sangh Parivar were free to continue in their way.
In course of time, even this veil was torn asunder. The NDA remained nothing more than a signboard while the BJP virtually took over. Today with the opposition BJP’s strident advocacy of Hindutva, and with Vajpayee competing with Advani in advocating it, and standing up for Narendra Modi, the allies do not know which way to turn. For the time being, BJP leaders are not worried about their allies except to keep them as props in the coming assembly elections. They are more concerned about rallying their own frustrated and mutually quarrelling cadres. The allies have little options left. However, political wisdom demands that all of them should not be considered as lost forever. In the rapid twists and turns of politics, one or the other may break out sooner or later of the bondage to the BJP, and range itself against the BJP and the Sangh Parivar. The break-up of the NDA would be a major development in Indian politics.
The Sangh Parivar’s All-out Attack Against Communists:
The Sangh Parivar has picked on the Communist Parties as their special targets. It attributes the hands of the Communists behind every happening. It has launched a virulent campaign against the Communists, resorting to all sorts of lies and provocations. It has declared its intention to take on ‘Marxism’ in an ideological fight.
Behind this anti-Communist campaign is the realization that the Communists and Left are the most consistent and relentless fighters against the Sangh Parivar’s ideology of communal fascism, its demagogy on religion and Hindutva, its reactionary politics of serving the interests of the landlords and monopolists and its alliance with imperialists and reaction all over the world. It considers that the Left is the most formidable obstacle in realizing its ambitions.
The CPI and the Left have to return the compliment of the RSS by stepping up their attack on the Sangh Parivar in the ideological, political, social, cultural, economic and other fields. Ideological guards cannot and should not be let down. This battle can be missed only at the Left’s peril.
IV
Regional Parties and their Role
Regional parties have acquired an important role in India’s political scenario. They represent and voice the urges and demands of vital sections of the people in the particular state/region. They also articulate the urge for empowerment of the people of that region. Their rise has partly to be attributed to the failures of the main national parties in voicing and fulfilling the legitimate urges and demands of various sections of the people. Disparity in development also contributes to this.
There is the Akali Dal which while voicing the urges of the Sikh masses, especially the peasantry, openly mixes religion with politics. There is the Shiv Sena which like the BJP is committed to Hindutva. There are others who while being broadly secular, were driven by opportunism and a lure for power to gang up with the BJP during the NDA regime. Some of them do not know how to come out of the NDA though they would like to. There are the Dravidian Parties in the South, who have a history of their own but have interacted with national politics for quite some time. The TDP came up as a reaction to the ‘Telegu pride’ hurt by the Congress leadership of the day, and as an alternative to the Congress which had lost support among the people then.
The Left should closely watch the developments among these regional parties and have a positive attitude towards those who are breaking away from the NDA. We should also watch their approach towards economic policies.
With the large mass of OBCs, dalits and tribals being drawn into politics, and into the vortex of the political struggle for empowerment, regional parties basing themselves on large regional caste groupings have also come up. These parties have one or two numerically powerful castes at the core, and are able to rally round them other scattered castes. The minorities in some states who have felt neglected and only used so far by the major national parties, have also rallied behind them in some states and regions. These parties have been able to dominate the political scene in a number of states, and brought a sense of pride and self-respect, a feeling of empowerment among the castes and other sections, whatever little benefit this has brought to them. They have good grass-root base. They have been able to rally that mass, which is the potential mass of the Left. Not having a specific ideology of their own, they are influenced by the prevalent bourgeois ideology.
It should not be an attitude of hostility but an attitude of understanding which can enable the CPI to reach out to the sections behind them, and eventually draw them towards the Party. We have to reckon with the urges of these sections. This does not preclude criticism of any specific failure or misdeed wherever these caste-based parties are in power. Our failure to fight against any manifestation of misrule, and to lead class struggles as against their caste appeal has cost us in states where they are in power. The masses behind the regional parties can be drawn towards the Party through class and mass struggles, along with struggle for social justice and upliftment. We should at the same time take precaution to see that our ranks and cadres are not infected by caste-based policies of these parties. For this their class consciousness and ideological level have to be raised.
The regional parties cannot be ignored. They are ruling parties in some states, and no coalition governments at the Centre can be formed without their help and cooperation. Some of them can play a positive role in politics. The CPI and the Left must assess each regional party with care. It is true; initially the CPI has suffered the most with the advent of these caste-based parties in terms of losing a part of its base. However we should adjust our attitude towards them looking to the present and future, and keeping the peoples’ and Party’s interests in mind.
V
Economic Policies: BJP: Congress: Their Effect
The economic policy of the BJP/NDA government was one of complete subordination to the neo-liberal policy of liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation. It pursued this with total commitment and zeal in the garb of carrying through ‘economic reforms’. This philosophy fought for no restrictions on capital, and on dismantling government control over resources and on doing business. It stood for free flow of capital across borders with no tariffs, unfettered foreign investments, deregulation, privatisation of state – owned enterprises, tax concessions to big business and so forth. This was enthusiastically hailed by Big Business at home and abroad. It is customary with the Sangh Parivar to talk in two and more tongues and thus fill both the ruling and opposition space. They set up at the same time a ‘Swadeshi Jagaran Manch’ which voiced opposition to these policies. The BJP Government ignored the protest from the ‘Manch’. Profit-making PSUs were sold for a song and disinvestment of every Blue-Chip undertaking was very much in the air. They did not even hesitate to sell off water sources and biodiversity. While old public assets were disposed off, hardly any new assets were being created. Neo-liberal theories about the glories of ‘Free Market’ economy had their enthusiastic converts among economists, journalists, business circles and political associates during the BJP regime. Employees were sent out through VRS, closures, retrenchments, down sizing and so on. Unemployment soared to new heights.
The opposition Congress generally acquiesced with most of these policies, under the influence of the very same philosophy, of which it was the initiator. But being in the opposition there were occasional ‘feeble noises’ about the BJP-NDA rulers not doing it the ‘right way’.
The Left alone put up a stiff resistance. They were branded as ‘out of date’ fellows, ‘conservatives’ who have not learnt to ‘move with the times’.
In this economic regime, agriculture and the kisans, traditional industries and self-employed artisans especially in the rural areas, were grossly neglected even though an overwhelming 69% of India’s population depends on agriculture for sustenance. The states’ investment in agriculture sharply declined. With it, the share of agriculture in total Gross Capital Formation (GCF) also sharply declined. The share of irrigation in total plan outlays came down to a mere 6.77% in the Tenth Plan, and much of the funds allocated went to major and medium irrigation while minor irrigation schemes were not taken up.
Affluent and well-to-do farmers and also government agencies resorted to irrigating their fields through tube wells and wells, in an unplanned way, which resulted in fall in the water-table and depletion of subterranean water resources. Conjunctive use of surface water and ground water is the correct alternative. Droughts took over in many regions with uncertain monsoons, and the rate of growth in agriculture became negative. Only in the last year of BJP rule, a very good monsoon led to a high growth rate, particularly in the background of no growth in the previous year. This was torn out of context and tom-tomed as a great achievement of the BJP government.
Lack of proper government purchase to assure fair price for local produce and reduction of subsidies for agriculture, while opening doors to subsidised imports from abroad led to heavy distress and indebtedness of farmers and consequent suicide deaths of thousands.
Small and traditional industries were also treated in a similar cavalier fashion, and self-employed artisans were left to their fate.
Experience shows that there is a strong link between the lack of road connectivity and poverty in India. 40% of rural habitations are not connected to all weather roads. The BJP regime forgot this and only went in for the grandiloquent ‘golden quadrilateral’ scheme.
Internally, these policies served the interests of monopoly capital, bureaucrats, a section of the upper middle class, whose affluence created among them an attitude of ‘rank consumerism’. The gulf between the top layers, - 10 to 20 percent of India’s population, and the rest 80 to 90 percent grew wide. The BJP saw only the top, and launched their ‘India Shining’ propaganda blitz, never knowing the misery affecting the broad masses below.
Externally, This was reflected in India’s foreign policy, its subservience to American Imperialist moves, and downgrading the Non-Aligned Movement.
The Indian voter incensed by these policies and their effect on their livelihood just as much as by the BJP’s communalism, handed out a defeat to the BJP and its allies. One can see the opposite of this in the case of Left Front governments.
Achievements of the Left Front:
The performance of the Left Front Government in West Bengal, especially in the sphere of land reforms, ‘Operation Barga’ and panchayat raj has ensured its victory in consecutive 6 elections, at every level. Despite a step-motherly attitude by the Centre for long, it is at present taking significant steps for industrial development. There is a concerted attack by bourgeois sources to slander it, and to bring about its defeat. These have to be rebuffed. Of course there are shortcomings. But there is no alternative to Left Front Government in West Bengal than a “Better Left Front Government”.
In Kerala and Tripura too, successive governments, led by the Left have contributed to establishing the credibility of the Left and their powerful hold on the people.
VI
The Common Minimum Programme: Its Character
The new UPA government which has come to power after the polls, had to work out a Common Minimum Programme, which strengthens the country’s secular polity, and would undo some of the mess left behind by the previous regime, correct the distortions and change the priorities of development. As long as the UPA government implements the CMP and works within its framework, it will continue to have the full support and cooperation of the CPI. There shall be no comfort provided to the BJP by any conflict between the UPA and the Left. But while stressing and ensuring the implementation of the CMP as the immediate task in the present situation, there is need to go ahead with the campaign for a more far reaching Left Democratic Alterative both in the economic and political spheres, so as to lay the ground for advance in the coming period. The CMP is not a Left programme. The change in direction does not seek to alter the socio-economic system in any way. There are quite a few gray areas in the CMP which can be interpreted and utilized by the champions of neo-liberalism. Even without that they are at their jobs. On the other hand there are numerous provisions which are of benefit to the people. Thus the fight for the implementation of the CMP is an arena of mass struggle, of class struggle, for bringing relief to the masses and for advancing along a democratic path of development, by even going beyond the parameters of the CMP. It is a struggle for strengthening the country’s sovereignty and independence in conducting its domestic and foreign affairs.
VII
India’s Economy: The Reality
While speaking about India’s economy ruling circles draw attention to the figures about foreign exchange reserves, extent of FDI and FII that have poured in, the point which the Sensex mark has reached and so on. Foreign exchange reserves have crossed $123 billion; Sensex have long since crossed the 6000 point; FII will have reached 8 billion dollars by the end of 2004; exports have risen by 24 per cent, though imports have grown at a bigger pace; G.D.P is expected to grow at 5.8 per cent (lower than what was expected); inflation has soared to nearly 7.5 to 8 per cent mainly due to oil prices. But these figures do not give the real picture about how our people live. Official spokesmen continue to speak about ‘economic fundamentals’, claiming they are sound and healthy. But one must also speak about the ‘human fundamentals’, which happen to be grim and gloomy.
In India, 260.3 million people are still below the official poverty line. The unofficial figure is quite higher. These millions go to bed hungry every day. They do not have sufficient income to meet their daily food requirement. Having food stocks or producing more foodgrains will not mitigate their misery. They need work, jobs that would put money in their pockets, with which to buy food on their plates.
This is not the full extent of poverty in the country. In the first place, the criteria determining the poverty line is itself faulty. There are an equal number of people who are supposed to have risen above the poverty line, but only just above it! They are to be counted among the poor.
There is talk of India having achieved self-sufficiency in food. That is misleading. With more purchasing power in the hands of these people, and higher per capita consumption of cereals and livestock products, food availability will fall short. Agricultural growth rate has therefore to accelerate a good deal more, if ‘food security’ for the people is to be assured.
Actually there has been a decline in the annual growth rates of both food and non-food crops over the last two decades. Almost in all countries, agriculture is subsidised. This is more so in developed countries than in a developing country like India. The OECD countries (i.e. the 24 developed countries taken together) spent a huge $327 billion on agricultural subsidies in 2001. For a commodity like rice, the support is 80 per cent of the gross price in the OECD countries. In the USA alone, the average subsidy per farmer was 30,655 dollar. In all, an amount of 97.3 billion dollar or Rs. 4,18,400 crores was paid as subsidy. This was well over the total value of all farm products in India taken together. Recently, the Bush Administration further hiked the subsidy by as much as 80 per cent over the next few years. This has resulted in a further downward push in the prices in the international markets. And yet, pressure is being brought in the WTO on India for reducing the meagre (by these standards) subsidy that is paid to agriculture, while the developed world firmly resists doing so in their own countries, and demands a quid pro quo for even reducing it a bit. Naturally, our farm products face a devastating competition in our own domestic market.
Both public and private investment in agriculture as a percentage of GDP has come down from 2.2 per cent in the beginning of the nineties, to less than 1.4 at the end, and has declined further thereafter.
Agricultural rate of growth has naturally declined, and became even negative in the year 2002-2003.The failure of monsoons made it acute.
Agricultural workers have access to wage employment only for 137 days each year and the average non-agricultural employment in rural India is 152 days. There is a strong co-relation between poverty, wage labour and feminization of the rural wageworker. The average wage employment for female is about 15 per cent lower than for males in agricultural and 18 per cent less in the non-agricultural employment in rural India. The average wage employment in the countryside is only for 160 days a year. Women are the worst sufferers during drought, flood or any natural calamity. Lack of ‘food security’, health security, poverty and unemployment hit them the most.
These facts emphasise over again the need for prompt and effective implementation of the ‘Food For Work’ scheme, and for passing the ‘National Employment Guarantee Act’ and the comprehensive Legislation for Agricultural Labour, which find place in the CMP. In implementing these, the female section of the population must have their proper share.
Half the rural population in the country is illiterate. About 40 per cent has extremely low incomes. Only 8 per cent of rural incomes is spent on health and basic education. No more than 43 per cent of the households have domestic lighting. Only 25 per cent have access to tap water and a shocking 15 per cent has access to private toilets. A mere 33 per cent has the wherewithal to access even the public distribution system, where it exists.
The incidence of diseases and ill health, with such grinding poverty is truly alarming. Four mothers out of every thousand die during pregnancy, and 67 out of every thousand newborn babies do not survive birth. Lack of basic medical facility and primary childcare, totally inadequate maternity care are responsible for this sorry state of affairs. The Primary Health Centres haves been ruined. The mass of poor, especially the rural poor are thus deprived of any easy access to health care. Private hospitals and nursing homes are proliferating, while government and municipal hospitals are in bad shape.
The Union and state governments together spent only 3.7 per cent of GDP on education, and 1.01 per cent on health in 2001-02 and went below 1 per cent in 2002-2003. Commercialisation of education and health services have made them totally inaccessible to the mass of our people. The target that has been fixed in the CMP is to raise expenditure on education to 6 per cent of GDP and on health to 2 to 3 per cent.
The issuing of the Patent (Third Amendment) Ordinance, which will be replaced by an Act in the next session of Parliament, in the name of meeting the WTO obligations (but actually going much beyond it), will enable the MNCs to take advantage, and considerably raise the prices of drugs and pharmaceuticals, seeds and plants. It harms our national interests. The Left Parties have vigorously opposed it, and intend to oppose the Bill in Parliament, unless suitable amendments are carried out. Likewise, the ‘Seed Bill’ introduced in Parliament favours the traders of spurious seed, instead of protecting the farmers. It requires change.
VIII
Unemployment, the Single Big Factor
Unemployment is the single major factor in India’s poverty and distress. The measure of its extent can be seen from the report and study conducted by official bodies some time back. The composite incidence of unemployment and under-employment as captured by the current daily status basis, stood at nearly 9 per cent of the labour force and at almost 13 per cent for the youths. On the basis of past trends, it was projected the composite measure of unemployment is likely to rise to an average of 11 per cent by the end of the Tenth Plan and 15 to 16 per cent for the youth.
Rural employment which was stagnant for a while, is now declining. The share of the farm sector in total employment has reduced from 60 per cent to 57 per cent. Employment growth in public sector and government departments has sharply fallen, what with VRS, retrenchment, down-sizing and so on. Private Sector has failed to compensate this job loss. While employment in the public sector has gone down by 0.9 per cent during the period 1991-92 and 2000, employment in the private sector has improved by 0.1 per cent. Public sector undertakings had off-loaded 20 per cent of the manpower during this period. Quite clearly, ‘economic reforms’ have meant loss of jobs, increasing income inequality, and consequent aggravation of poverty at one pole.
There is a link between growing unemployment, and increase in the incidence of child labour in many sectors. The more the unemployment, the more is the utilization of child labour. This is a matter that requires to be addressed from several ends.
Jobless growth is the new mantra of the liberalisers and globalisers. They hold out no hopes in the present, leaving it to the ‘trickle down’ theory to promise a better day ‘in the long run’, i.e. in the remote future!
Small-scale sector is a significant source of employment generation. Government policies aimed against this sector as well as the self-employed have seriously affected employment, and brought distress among the large mass of artisans.
It is admitted that “the trend of a slow down in employment growth and increase in the incidence of unemployment is of greater concern, especially if one considers the backward regions, scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, other weaker sections of the population including women, as also the youth and the educated”.
There is lot of interest shown on ‘outsourcing’. This can only provide casual jobs to a few lakhs who have special qualifications. It is not a substitute for general employment growth in the country. It should be noted that ‘outsourcing’ is one way of allowing MNCs to make super-profits by transferring some jobs to lower-paid areas. It is export of ‘jobs-from high-paid areas to low-paid areas.
The effect of Globalisation has been bad not only for India, but in most countries the world over. Not only has it not touched the fringes of the problems affecting the poor, it has led to greater disparity in incomes, and an aggravation of poverty. The Human Development Report 2002 of the United Nations says that 2.8 billion people lived on less than $2 a day, with 1.2 billion eking out a marginal existence at $1 a day. On the other side, the assets of the top three billionaires are more than the combined GDP of all the least developed countries and their 600 million people.
The Human Development report has assessed that India occupies the 124th place in the global comity of nations. This is a stark reminder of the low level of various human indices in India.
Globalisation is a phenomenon that cannot be warded off. However steps can and should be taken to prevent the ill effects of imperialist globalisation. This is an attempt by imperialist and developed countries to economically dominate the developing countries and also at the cost of their own working class. A government that has the interests of the people at heart has to take appropriate measures for this purpose. There should be attempts to reach bilateral and zonal agreements on trade, commerce and other spheres of economic development. For instance by strengthening SAARC, building good relation with ASEAN and so on.
A welcome sign is the growing worldwide movement against globalisation,— a movement that has brought millions out on the streets. Rallying together people of different ideologies, from all continents, they have spoken out against the evil of imperialist globalisation, and against the inevitability of what that brings to the people. Out of their life experience they have come up with the optimistic idea: Another world is possible! We have to align ourselves with this idea, and try to give it a clearer perspective,— a scientific basis, with our Marxist world view.
Imperialist-driven globalisation benefits the few, against the many, who are cast aside, marginalized. It is aggravating disparities between people, and between countries. With each day, it is sowing the seeds of tension and conflicts, which may burst out in acute form in the future.
Unemployment and inequality has grown in all regions of the world during this period. It shows that the present much-vaunted ‘capitalist order’ is incapable of solving people’s basic problems.
IX
The Rosy Picture Painted by Official Sources: Its Critique
Official spokesmen ignore all these microeconomic indicators which show how our people live. They give reports which invariably paint a rosy picture of the national economy. They feed us with some macroeconomic figures. Thus, we have been told by the Finance Minister that the economy is buoyant with only fiscal stress and with revenue and fiscal deficit not measuring up to the stated targets. They flaunt the so-called mandate imposed by the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management (FRBM) Act, which can serve as a ground for cutting down on necessary subsidies and social security funds, as well as restricting and even denying funds for measures like employment guarantee etc. This is an attitude of fiscal fundamentalism.
The Government review takes credit for a GDP growth of 7.4 per cent in the first quarter of the current fiscal against 5.3 per cent in the same period of last year, agricultural growth in the first quarter at 3.4 per cent against 0.1 per cent, the index of industrial production (April-September 2004) at 7.9 per cent against 6.2 per cent in the comparable period of last year, export growth at 24.4 per cent in dollar terms against 8.8 per cent and import growth at 34.3 per cent against 21.4 per cent, and so forth.
However, these bright figures are not reflected in the common man’s life. Prices are running high – inflation being in the range of 7 to 7.5 per cent, and all manner of deprivations continue. Even though inflation rate is going down, prices of essential commodities continue to rule high, - sugar price being as high as Rs. 20 to 22 per kg. Such a demand as 9.5% interest on GPF, which will benefit 3 to 4 crores of subscribers and their families and which will be only 2 to 3 per cent more than the inflation rate is not accepted by government.
To achieve a GDP growth rate of 8 per cent in India, it is necessary to ensure a growth rate of 3 to 4 per cent in agriculture, an industrial growth rate of about 10 per cent, and a growth rate of 8 to 10 per cent in the services. This calls for appropriate policies and mobilization of resources.
Priority has to be given to Agriculture and Rural Development. The CMP has indicated specific proposals for this sector. They need to be sincerely implemented. This requires that kisans and agricultural labour are organized and mobilized for struggle on each of the proposals. The momentum of the movement must take it beyond the parameters laid down in the CMP. Focus on agriculture, rural development and elimination of poverty and funds spent on them, is not an obstacle to growth, as this will help to increase demand in this vast sector (70 per cent of our population) which in turn will raise industrial demand.
Industry has to take the lead in development. The public sector has played a significant role in India’s industrial development. Certain faults and shortcomings have crept into it. They undoubtedly call for serious corrective measures and reforms. But the liberalisers and privatisers are using the failures to launch a slanderous attack against the PSUs as a whole. They want to do away with them. The bourgeois government must be forced to take a proper view on the public sector.
According to the Department of Public Enterprise, the 230 PSUs in 2001-02 made a net profit of Rs. 26,045 crores, registering a return on investment of 16.21 per cent. Investment in that year was Rs.324,632 crores and their net worth was Rs. 232,265 crores. Their foreign exchange earnings by export of goods and services were Rs. 20,866 crores. Contribution to Central Exchequer by way of excise, customs and tax etc. was Rs. 62,753 crores. A 77 per cent increase in net profit was shown by 166 PSUs during the first half of the fiscal 2002-03. In that period 150 PSUs made a loss of over Rs. 10,000 crores. Such are the facts. The public sector in India retains the potential of motivating and driving the over-all industrial development. Therefore, moves which are meant to emasculate them, to transfer ownership through direct sale or disinvestment, or diluting equity to dangerous limits, to deliberately make them sick, and so forth have to be rebuffed.
Growth in services is a positive factor. But one cannot ignore industrial growth and hope to ride on the back of the service economy.
At the same time, in order to accelerate development, and build up and expand the productive forces of society, every step has to be taken for expansion of the private sector, the cooperative sector, the self-employed sector, the FDI sector and so on.
We are not opposed to FDI and invitation to foreign capital per se. We require it for our development. But this should be in spheres of our choice, our needs, for fresh investments rather than for acquiring control over existing undertakings and in sensitive and core sectors, which can jeoparadise our own economy and our security. They should add to our productive sources, and create new job opportunities, rather than take them away.
It is mainly by increasing our domestic savings, by mobilizing our rich domestic resources, that we can basically advance our development. FDI, Foreign Capital can only supplement these efforts. This has to be done, by raising our revenues by raising taxes on corporate houses, on affluent institutions and individuals, on unearthing black money, realizing the so-called Non-performing Assets, the income tax arrears and defaults etc. There is enough resources available if we tap them, and not allow the defrauding of public exchequer by certain corporate houses. There cannot be a policy of ‘sops for the corporate sector, and higher impositions on the common man’.
Further, both in the interest of employment generation and export, it is necessary to recognise that the small-scale and self-employed sectors have an important role to play in the country’s development. A move is afoot to invite MNCs and foreign capital in the retail trade sector. This is a harmful step. It will destroy the chain of retail shops etc. that serve the people, and deprive millions of their jobs and source of livelihood. Retailers and those in the small scale sector are our potential allies in the democratic revolution. We have to stand up for them.
It is not enough to talk of development without its social objectives. It is necessary that the less privileged and disadvantaged sections of our people benefit out of the development. They must be involved and drawn into the development process. It must touch and improve their lives. Only then it is growth with social justice. It is at the grass root that the impact of development must be seen and felt.
In this context there has arisen the justified demand for reservation of jobs for scheduled caste and tribes in the private sector, — firstly, to ensure it in those undertakings which have been privatised from their earlier public sector status, and secondly, to explore juridical means to introduce it also in the private sector. For this a dialogue should be initiated in right earnest with the captains of industry and their various organisations. As the main productive force of society, the contribution and place of these sections in moving the wheels of economic development should be recognised.
There is frequent talk of ‘labour reforms’ as a concomitant of ‘economic reforms’. The talk of labour reforms precisely means that development should be at the cost of labour, by depriving labour of elementary job security, and so forth. It is good that the CMP has taken a stand against it. But nevertheless it is taking place in various ways. There is a sword hanging on employees in the ‘Special Economic Zones’ where no labour laws will apply. Vigilance has to be exercised by workers’ organisations, so that the workers are protected.
X
The Alternative Path
There has been a growing demand for an Alternate Path of self-reliant and sustainable development and growth with justice based on India’s specific situation. The CPI at its 18th Congress had boldly indicated in its Political Resolution what should be the elements of such an Alternative Path. The Common Minimum Programme has included some of the provisions, which if sincerely implemented can bring about a certain departure from the disastrous path followed by the NDA regime. But it obviously does not go far enough. The Alternative Path suggested by the Party in the interest of the democratic development of India’s society should stress certain features. A few of these are:
* Land reforms, which implies distribution of all ceiling lands, bhoodan land and government waste land to the landless must have top priority. The possibility of lowering ceiling in areas which are coming under irrigation should be explored. Suitable legislations, if necessary be enacted to achieve this. But the main thing is to struggle for it by mobilizing the landless. All attempts to do away with ceiling laws or bypass them through lease and contract, corporatisation, farm houses transgressing into agricultural lands etc. should be firmly opposed.
Capitalist relations have largely penetrated into agriculture. But there are vast regions, especially in the Hindi belt, where the old feudal relations, landlordism, and religious institutions continue to exist and hold the peasants in bondage. They have large landholdings in their possession. It is land redistribution which will strike a blow at the social, economic and ideological base of landlordism of the old type. It would rouse the potential of the basic rural masses and revitalize our rural scene.
Minimum wages and social security to agricultural workers and poor peasants have to be assured. They have to be freed from usury and indebtedness, through comprehensive legislation. For this a national drive must be launched against money lenders for enforcing the legal rate of interest. Simultaneously a social security law for the vast mass of unorganised labour has to be worked out.
Attempts to oust and evict the tribal people and other forest dwellers from so-called forestland should be militantly resisted. In fact they are not the destroyers but ‘protectors’ of the forest. They can be relied upon for afforestation and for guarding it. Land pattas should be given to the adivasis and dalits, the landless who are tilling the land in such areas.
Based on land reforms, agricultural development should be undertaken through increased public and private investment and more budgetary provision for agriculture, completion of all existing irrigation projects, utilization and expansion of water resources, water harvesting and repair of nearly 500,000 water bodies which are in disuse; road connectivity and creating assets through an expanding rural employment guarantee; assuring remunerative prices for produce by fixing minimum support prices and providing for government purchase; taking steps for raising agricultural production and productivity through application of research and experience in use of seeds, bio-fertilisers, use of power, consolidation of holdings giving preference to small and marginal farmers, grant of subsidy where necessary and ensuring that it reaches the peasants.
The overall objective should be to improve the quality of life of our rural masses and increase the purchasing power of our toiling peasantry, so as to reverse the trend of demand fall which is affecting our industries and other sectors as well. This will considerably expand our domestic market and enhance our domestic resources. It will help reduce the migration from the rural areas to urban centres.
The benefits of all welfare and development programmes should reach all sections of our people, especially those at the bottom, development cannot be at their expense.
Water management is a key issue in agricultural and rural development. Flood prevention-cum-irrigation-cum power generation schemes, digging and desilting of ponds and rivers, harvesting of rain water, recharging underground water, provision of drinking water in all villages, etc. have to be undertaken. For this urgent job thousands of workers have to be mobilized. Facilities and permission given to MNCs. to take hold of our water resources, which are commercializing these for profits, should be forthwith terminated.
The job of the kisan sabhas, khet majdoor unions, youth and women’s organisations in the rural areas is thus well cut out.
A crucial task in democratic development is to take urgent steps for universal elementary education as also scientific and technical education, secular in content and form and which will inculcate a scientific temper without which it is foolish to think of a modern, developed India competing with other developed countries.
A comprehensive health and education programme, mobilizing tens of thousands of doctors, nurses, health workers and teachers for the job, is a necessity. Education and health care are not costs or a drag on the budget, but investments for development.
A system of subsidies has to be introduced which protects the livelihood of the poor, especially those below the poverty line, encourages productions, reduces cost to the producers, and helps competition with other countries.
Development implies that the contribution of industry, of manufacturing followed by services should relatively increase in the GDP. This implies that the public sector should be reformed, and consolidated, while all help and encouragement is given to the private sector to grow and expand. While stressing every means to generate domestic resources, foreign capital and necessary high tech has an important supplementary role to play in India’s development, in building its productive forces. FDI should be in fields that are needed in our national interests. We need FDI and do not shut our doors to its entry, except in sectors essential to our security and economic sovereignty.
All encouragement has to be given to small-scale, self-employed, traditional industries, and independent artisans, as these generate vast employment opportunities. Employment generation has to be a priority task in adopting an alternative path of development. Rural Employment Guarantee does not solve the issue of employment, though it has to be so modeled as to create assets while giving employment to those who are without employment. To generate employment there has to be a vast expansion of education and health services, absorbing several hundred thousand teachers and health workers. The artisans, the self-employeds have to be given loans, access to raw materials and markets etc. The problems of the urban poor have also to be attended to.
All facilities should be provided to the slums in cities and urban conglomeration. They should not be demolished without first rehabilitating them on alternate land.
Serious attempts should be made to curb wasteful expenditure, and enhance revenues, by enhancing the tax base, raising these on the affluent and corporate houses, recovering the huge Non-performing Assets, and Income Tax arrears, checking black money etc. Corruption must be fought.
State cannot abdicate its responsibilities in all these spheres, as the liberalisers and ‘free marketeers’ would want it to. State intervention in developing infrastructure, in allocating resources, and in regulating the marker forces, is very important.
A necessary condition for development is to develop our foreign trade. Today India has less than 1 per cent of world trade. Stress has to be given to diversify our trade, mainly in the Asian, Latin American and African countries. At the same time we must concentrate on our regional groupings. India is at the centre of the SAARC and a very close associate of the ASEAN. All political and economic obstacles to develop trade in the SAARC region, which continues to be the area of greatest poverty and backwardness with only relative differences in level between countries have to be removed. For this, there should be frank dialogues with the countries of the region. The SAARC and ASEAN regions contain the greatest resources and potential for growth. They also contain the largest land mass and the biggest concentration of population. The SAAFTA needs to be activated.
Within the WTO, every step should be taken to consolidate the G-20, led by India, China, Brazil and South Africa. To deal separately with the European Union and the USA within the WTO is to lose out in the bargain. The need is for these developing countries to unite, and if a country of more than 100 crores like India stands firm and takes the lead the other countries will also stand up together.
The alternate path we propose will conserve and rejuvenate the environment and eco-system, protect and enrich our cultural and social diversity, generate employment and above all keep man in the centre of the development process.
These are the main spheres for striking out on an Alternate Path for Development. Implementation of the CMP is the beginning. The above economic tasks indicate the path of further advance, beyond the CMP.
A turn towards this direction is only possible through mass struggles of workers, kisans and agricultural labours, engineers and technicians, youth and students, women, teachers and professional sections of the population, through their organisations. It is necessary to raise these struggles to a political level, through an ideological-political campaign. This will become the battlefield of change and transformation, with the perspective of a change in the correlation of class forces. Campaigns, movements and struggles by the toiling masses are the keys to advancing towards an alternate path.
XI
The International Situation
The political and economic developments in India, are taking place in the international context. The main features of the present international situation are as follows:
v growing aggressiveness of American imperialism behaving as the only one superpower. It is at the same time encountering opposition from several countries (including developed countries), and from people worldwide;
v rise in terrorism and terrorist attacks in several countries, who are being targeted;
v a concerted drive by the developed capitalist countries to impose their neo-liberal policies of liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation of ‘Free Market’ economy, on the developing countries, in the name of ‘structural adjustment programmes’ and ‘economic’ reforms’;
v phenomenal growth of finance capital, emerging as International Finance Capital. Along with it American dominance in Corporate World, and growing scams and crisis in the world capitalist system.
v Massive peoples’ movement, qualitatively unique, against the distress and misery which the ‘capitalist order’ is perpetrating,
v A sharpening battle between the Left forces and the Rightists with the former making headway in several new countries, while the Rightists are also consolidating in some others. Noteworthy is the victory of the Left in Latin America – the U.S. backyard, achieved through long-drawn bitter struggles and tremendous sacrifices against American - aided and armed forces of the Right. Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Uruguay have achieved notable victories electing Left presidents in keenly-contested elections against direct interventions, and huge funds, arms etc. poured in by the U.S. Despite all efforts by the U.S., Cuba stands firm, records glorious successes particularly in health and education, and acts as an inspiration to all those who stand for democracy and socialism, and against imperialist conspiracies.
v The emerging of Peoples’ China as a mighty economic power, following the path of Socialist Market economy, and Vietnam’s progress along the road of Socialism.
The question that is more and more being posed before the thinking public all over the world is: Has the capitalist system through all its stages of development, including the latest stage, which it is claimed is a stage of ceaselessly growing economy, solved the main problems that haunt mankind?
Has it eliminated or at least reduced poverty?
No!
Has it done away with the sufferings of hunger and starvation? No.
Has it brought down unemployment? Absolutely No!
Has it reduced the ravages of disease and epidemics, and provided a modicum of health security for the masses? Certainly not!
Has it brought down child mortality? No!
Has it made education available to all, to every child, who should be --
At school and not at the sweatshops? Answer is again No!
Facts which show the heartrending picture of world poverty under the system speak for themselves!
The contradiction between social production and private appropriation is becoming deeper. Even as the world produces and consumes more, the rich-poor gap widens.
The very future of the world and of succeeding generations is being threatened.
The manner in which driven by the craze for earning super-profits, resources of this earth are being denuded and the entire ecosystem is being destroyed; the speed at which the air, the terrain, rivers, lakes and seas are being polluted, spell disaster for the future of entire humanity. The most industrialized nation, the one which is responsible for the maximum damage to the environment, viz. the United States of America, has refused to sign the ‘Kyoto Protocol’.
Marxism-Leninism with its internationalist outlook can alone comprehend all these developments.
Under the Bush Administration, American imperialism is acting even more aggressively than anytime before. It is today the world’s most powerful economic and military power. As the world’s only superpower after the demise of the Soviet Union, it considers itself to be in a unipolar world. It has announced the doctrine of ‘pre-emptive strikes’, branded countries as ‘rogue states’ and termed tem as an ‘axis of evil’, has claimed to be the ‘moral governor’ of the world, the upholder of human rights and democracy, has ignored the United Nations, and so forth.
After having dismembered Yugoslavia, it falsely accused Iraq of harbouring ‘Weapons of mass destruction’, and launched a full-scale war against that country. In point of fact it is the US which has the largest arsenal of W.M.D in the world. A year and a half after it launched the war in Iraq in which it proclaimed a quick victory, and with more than a lakh and a half men, women, and innocent children killed and several cities and places of world heritage and culture willfully destroyed, its army of occupation faces strong resistance from the Iraqi people. It has imposed a puppet government in Iraq and is planning to hold a spurious ‘election’ with 1,50,000 U.S. troops occupying the country, so as to give a cover of legitimacy to this government. Despite pouring in troops, US-UK have failed to put down the Iraqi people’s resistance against the occupation.
All its presumptions of unipolarism, its arrogance of launching a unilateral attack on a small country under false pretences have backfired. Its close allies in the G-8, in NATO have refused to underwrite its misadventures. It is increasingly challenged in all international fora, by other countries, by the European Union, who no longer tolerate U.S. bossing in Europe. The EURO is a challenge to the dominance of the Dollar. It stands isolated, except for its ‘loyal ally’, Tony Blair’s Government. Finally it knocked at the door of the U.N. for pulling its chest – nuts out of the fire, for help in restoring ‘normalcy’ in Iraq, and for bailing it out of the quagmire in which it had sunk, though at the same time continuing to dictate the course of events.
Millions of people in all countries of the globe, for the first time, came out in protest against the U.S. even before the War was launched, and continued to do so as the war went on, demanding ‘No War, We want Peace’! They exposed the real design of the imperialists, which was to grab the rich oil resources of Iraq.
Concepts of ‘unipolarism’, of one superpower dictating to the world have been struck a mortal blow. It has been shown that the U.N., with all its imperfections and limitations cannot be bypassed by powerful countries. Experience has shown that with the progress of time, and changes in the correlation of forces in the world, multipolarism is a fact. The U.N. structure built in 1945 has with the passage of time now become out of date in several respects. It calls for reforms. The demand for changing it, for reforming the U.N. – for example, including countries like India as permanent members in the Security Council with a veto, is fully justified.
The world has not ‘become safer’ after deposing Saddam Hussein, as claimed by Bush. In fact the threat of terrorism has grown after Bush’s misadventure.
The American declaration of conducting a ‘global war against terrorism’ has been exposed as a thin disguise for carrying out its aggressive designs against other weaker nations, of subordinating them to its will, and of grabbing their resources.
Events have also shown that the U.S. has double standards in the matter of terrorism. Some terrorism are good, while others are bad. For example, America supports the terrorist mafias which operate from Florida and are working feverishly against Cuba. It fully backs up the ‘state terrorism’ practised by Israel against Palestine, in defiance of several U.N. resolutions. It has an ambivalent attitude towards terrorist attacks in India, and the sources from where they originate. The ‘prisoner abuse’ by the US and the US attitude on it has knocked the bottom out of its talk about ‘human rights’.
While terrorist threats have to be met, and terrorist attacks have to be firmly dealt with, efforts have also to be made to remove the causes and the mentality which make them possible. Theories about ‘clash of civilisation’, ‘Christianity versus Islam’, of identifying terrorism and terrorists with an entire community, and so on are all false. These are typical alibis found by imperialism to push ahead with its designs.
After Iraq, the Americans are targeting Iran, Syria and North Korea, threatening diplomatic, and even military action against them. America’s 40 years’ old blockade against Cuba continues even after the U.N. has adopted resolutions no less than 13 times asking it to withdraw the blockade. Almost all countries in the world (179 out of 192) with only the U.S., Israel, and Marshall Island voting against, have supported the resolution. It shows how much the U.S. respects the resolutions of the U.N!
Along with peoples of the world, the Indian people, save a few pro-American fringe who were close to the BJP/NDA ruling circles, were totally opposed to the War in Iraq. They opposed any idea of committing Indian troops to America’s war, which the state Department was pressing for. The pro-US fringe was talking of the ‘benefits’ that would follow, looking for the ‘jackal’s share in post-war contracts and in oil exploitation! But the people’s mood compelled the BJP/NDA rulers to agree to have an unanimous resolution passed in parliament deploring the attack and forbidding any troops to be sent there. Once again, when after America’s ‘pyrhhic victory’, the question came of sending some armed personnel for ‘police duty’, and the BJP was in two minds about it, the Left warned against any such move. Incidentally, in consultation with the Left the new UPA government and the Election Commission declined to send any personnel for monitoring the phony election that is to take place.
Unfortunately there is today reluctance in some top circles to do anything which may ‘displease America’. There is no reason of course to needlessly provoke American hostility. But India must pursue an independent and anti-imperialist policy, which is its tradition. While world over progressive forces are unhappy at the re-election of Bush, these circles in India, are pleased. They calculate that Bush’s re-election as President would be good for India’s national interests!
All this underlines the necessity of stepping up our anti-imperialist campaign, - rousing the anti-imperialist consciousness and vigilance of our people. It underlines the need to have a clear-cut, frank and well-defined foreign policy. We must return to the path of Non-Alignment, and pursue an independent foreign policy of peace and Non-alignment. There is yet a lack of clarity in this respect, and too many cooks are engaged in cooking the foreign policy broth.
In this context, the death of the great fighter for Palestine’s independence, - Yasser Arafat has cast a shadow. American intervention in that region in the name of the ‘peace process’ and Sharon’s aggressiveness is likely to grow. India’s continued dealings with Israel are also causing confusion and worry on that score, particularly in matters of defence and security.
We must note with satisfaction the big advance made by China, Vietnam, Cuba and other socialist countries in this period. Taking into account the specific characteristics of China, it has embarked on the path of building socialism, integrating it with the market. So also is Vietnam. The world has been compelled to sit up and take note of this phenomenon, though some fruitless attempts are made to spread confusion about it.
Most of the Communist and Left Parties in different countries have been able to get over their temporary disorientation following the demise of the Soviet Union. Many of them are making significant gains in the national elections, and playing an active and militant role in the working class struggles and people’s movements. There are more frequent meetings, consultations and conferences among them on specific issues facing the world, and exchange of mutual experiences. This is a positive development in the growth of the world communist movement. The prophets of doom who spoke about the ‘end of history’ and the ‘Demise of Marxism’ are keeping their mouths shut.
In our own neighbourhood, steps are being taken to settle all long-pending issues. It is a positive development that Indo-Pak talks are on an even keel, dialogue between India and China for settling the border dispute are progressing well. These must be sincerely pursued. It is obvious that there cannot be dialogue for peace and settlement of disputes on the one hand, and a frenzied buying of arms by both countries on the other. US is offering sophisticated arms to both India and Pakistan, egging them on to a virtual arms race. Rumsfield’s recent visit to both Islamabad and Delhi was for this purpose. Bush flatters both by calling Pakistan ‘a frontline state’ and India as an ‘emerging power’ a ‘regional power’, and so on.
For the last few years ‘terrorism’ has raised its ugly head in our country. Terrorist organisations based in Pakistan have resorted to ‘cross-border terrorism’ on the issue of Kashmir. Fundamentalist forces within India also joined in these terrorist attacks. In recent months, in the context of Indo-Pak talks, and a commitment from both sides to solve all issues through talks, there has been a certain reduction in infiltration and terrorist attacks. But while firmly dealing with such attacks vigilance must be exercised together with sincere efforts at dialogue to solve all issues, if the terrorist threats have to be removed.
Talks between India and Nepal, between India and Bangladesh have to be initiated. Any help that India is giving Nepal which goes to strengthen the monarchy and the army and thus helps it to fight the Maoists and harm the CPN(UML) should be discontinued. It is a short-sighted policy, to think that because India is also beset with the Maoist problem, we should militarily help the Nepalese king and army to fight the Maoists in Nepal. Such interference will in the present context embitter our relations.
We stand for the integrity of Sri Lanka, and for a peaceful settlement of the conflict between the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE.
Talks for strengthening economic cooperation and trade within the SAARC Region should take place in a constructive spirit, and India’s association with the ASEAN should be further developed. The progress of SAAFTA directly depends on the progress of India-Pak talks, and improvement in the relations with our neighbours.
There is a gradual shift in the power centre from the West to the East. The 21st century should become Asia’s Century, with the two most populous countries viz. India and China in the forefront.
The strategic concept of India, China and Russia, along with the Shanghai-5 has to be built up for ensuring peace and stability in Asia and the world.
XII
Some Problems of Democratic Advance.
India’s Democratic Revolution has to take into account class, caste, tribe, ethnic and gender factors. While class divisions and class struggle will play a decisive role, the other factors cannot be ignored, especially the role of dalits and tribes. To do so, is to obstruct India’s democratic advance.
Dalits: In recent years, parties speaking particularly in the name of the dalits (and other associated backward classes) have sprung up both in the northern and southern states. The scheduled castes constitute more than 15 per cent of our population. They are the most downtrodden classes in society. These parties are becoming a significant factor in India’s politics. The stirring among the dalit masses is an expression of the spread of awareness among them, even in the rural areas, where the rapid growth of the print and electronic media has today reached out. While reservation in education and jobs has helped create an educated middle class from their midst, it has also given rise to an urge for empowerment and a sense of self-respect. Today, the dalit mass is quick to respond to any atrocities committed against them, which in the past had largely gone unnoticed. This is a democratic urge.
Almost all the dalit parties derive their inspiration from such progressive social reformers as Dr. B.R. Ambedkar and has predecessors Jyotirao Phule and E.V.R. Periyar. Mahatma Gandhi’s political sagacity drew the attention of the Congress towards this mass, who first found in them a big vote bank. In places where the Communists paid special attention to this downtrodden and opposed section, both from the class and caste point of view, militant cadres and sections from amongst them found their place in the Communist Party. But this alerted the bourgeois leadership in the country, and also the self-centered middle class leaders from among the dalits who are under bourgeois influence. They are generally wary of the communists. Anti-communism is part of the ideological baggage of some of the dalit-based parties.
Some of the leaders of such dalit parties not only hesitate to clarify their attitude and educate their followers towards capitalism, world imperialism, the threat of imperialist globalisation, but also actively indulge in attacking Communists and Marxist ideology.
On occasions, they have allowed themselves to join hands with the BJP/VHP and its communal politics. This is a great tragedy. These leaders failed to realize that Hindutva is at the same time the most reactionary, casteist, orthodox and pro-chaturvarna ideology, and therefore inherently anti-dalit. They also did not realize that the BJP/VHP is basically anti-public sector and also against reservation.
This is an important issue before the Indian Communist Movement, which is the ‘natural ally’ and destiny of the dalit masses in the country. It is by joining hands with the Communists who work for a classless and casteless society and by gravitating towards the Marxist ideology that the dalits can, along with other democratic sections of the Indian people, hope to ensure the ‘annihilation of castes’ and the caste system, which was the ultimate objective also of Dr. Ambedkar.
Efforts to consolidate the dalit castes as a separate and exclusive political-social mass and prevent them from joining with the secular, progressive democratic movement can only harm the dalit cause.
Abolition of Castes and the caste system is an integral part of the Democratic Revolution. Indian feudalism cannot be totally abolished unless caste system goes. The Indian capitalist order does not have the political and economic will to dismantle the caste system, because caste divisions serve to divide the working people and thus help in exploiting wage labour. The fight against caste atrocities and discrimination against dalits, whenever and wherever they occur, must be carried on by communists. Along with it, we must be alert about fighting for social justice, for extension of reservation in the private sector, and so on. It is by intensifying the class struggle that the ground is cleared for the eventual abolition of the caste system. But caste is an inherent element in Hindu society. So pervasive is the caste system, that it has also affected other religious groups and communities in Indian Society. While in Hindu Society it has the sanction of religion, in others it is a social practice. The battle against castes is thus a battle for the mind and social outlook of Indian society. It is a social and ideological battle.
A short cut to electoral victories and political power is attempted by resorting to all types of caste combinations and appeal to castes. This caste opportunism is strengthening the influence of casteism in society, and harming the democratic movement. Communists should avoid this, and stress the primacy of people’s issues, in political and electoral struggles.
Communists should consciously work among the dalits, and restore all links that may have been broken in the meanwhile. In districts and at state level, they should try and launch welfare associations, libraries, clubs etc., through which political, social and ideological work can be done among them, and a proper orientation can be given. It will help in combating anti-communism among them. Such organisation should also take up their legitimate demands of local development and oppose the spread of divisive exclusivist and anti democratic trends among them.
Minorities: Religious minorities constitute about 17.5 per cent of our population. The largest among them is the Muslim minority that accounts for over 13 per cent. Though the Constitution of India assures equal rights and no discrimination on the basis of faith, it is a tragic fact that the minorities have suffered all sorts of discrimination and harassment, particularly during the last one and a half decade when the Hindu communal forces had intensified their offensive. Due to the discrimination practised at various levels it has put them at a disadvantageous position and given rise to sense of alienation and exclusiveness. There is glaring and persistent under representation of muslims in public employment and even in elected bodies. The fundamentalist forces among them to strengthen their grip on the community exploit this sense of alienation and deprivation.
The demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992 by the hoodlums of Sangh Parivar has left deep scratches on the psyche of the minorities who felt insecure and even expressed lack of faith in the political system itself. This was reflected in continuous fall in the voting percentage in the areas inhabited by minorities in several consecutive elections after 1992.
The six year rule of BJP led NDA and its concerted attack on minorities and their institutions, the ruthless drive for communalisation of education, administration and culture alarmed the minorities and they revived their interest in secular polity. During couple of years the turn out of voters in their localities has equaled to their participation in pre-demolition phase. This change in attitude provides an opportunity to end their exclusiveness and alienation from mainstream.
The minorities, particularly the Muslims, look upon the Left, as the most steadfast champion of secularism and rights of minorities, but this has not helped to sustain and create bases among them. Earlier Left had an identifiable constituency among Muslims, particularly among the artisans. These bases have been eroded for two reasons: First, in the wake of Sangh Parivar’s offensive, we could not sustain the movement of professional communities among the minorities and they were carried away by more emotional issues. Secondly, the threat from Hindu communal forces and weakening of national political parties in Hindi belt drove them to the caste-based parties that strengthened the trend of vote bank politics.
Test of any democracy is how it treats its minorities. Keeping such a large segment of our population away from the democratic movement could make no democratic advance. To end the alienation and draw the minorities to the democratic struggles, the Left, particularly the CPI, has to champion their genuine demands and fight for an end to discrimination in the matter of jobs and other welfare schemes. Constructively, we should take up the cause of proper implementation of various government schemes aimed at welfare of minorities. Concentrated work in the selected areas and revival of organisations exclusively working among professional communities particularly weavers, artisans and beedi workers will help revive old bases and create new ones.
Tribal People: The tribals constitute not only a substantial part of our population,( 7 per cent) but are among the most poor and exploited sections, and one that is most affected by development-oriented environment changes. Most mega-projects have led to large-scale displacements of tribals without any hope of adequate or proper rehabilitation, with them as the beneficiaries. Rehabilitation must precede and go hand in hand with projects.
Tribals are the victims of the latest government directives (backed by an injudicious Supreme Court Order) to remove all ‘encroachments’ on forest and ‘deemed forest’.
The Party had taken initiative for working among tribals almost 5 decades back. It was among the first to analyse their social, economic and cultural conditions and way of life, write about the history of tribal resistance against their exploiters and revolts against the British alien rule. Communists were the first to define their political rights and aspirations and also set up their organisation. It is with this understanding the Party also lent full support to the demand for Jharkhand. But unfortunately this work was not consistently pursued, and after some years the tribal organizations set up by the Party became defunct. This has harmed the Party’s tribal bases in a number of states.
Today, many elements, - from political groups, NGOs, to individuals are working among the tribals, and organizing them on sectional issues. A few local tribal leaders (and some non-tribals who work among them) have come up. They are organizing local and area-based movements. At the same time there is a process of depoliticisation going on alongside this, of keeping them aloof from political parties.
Some tribal parties opportunistically ally themselves with the BJP, or the Congress, or any other party, as it suits the ambitions of their leaders. In the north-east, tribal groups out of a sense of alienation and frustration have organized themselves into insurgent groups with their sectional and separatist demands. This is a danger to democracy and democratic development. The PWG has been able to penetrate deeply and widely in the tribal areas of M.P., A.P., Chhatisgarh, Orissa, Maharashtra and Bihar by voicing the people’s anger against their misery, against exploitation by forest contractors, police, bureaucracy etc. Their resort to violence and attacks on individuals is creating problems for the Indian Communist Movement. The authorities are trying to put them down through police action, false encounter, and harsh repression. We, on our part, demand a political solution to the PWG problem along with infrastructure development of these regions, etc. Police action is actually proving counter-productive. Meanwhile, the PWG has merged with the M.C.C and formed the CPI (Maoist). This poses a challenge.
The most worrisome development is the spread of RSS/VHP’s activities among tribal masses in some places. Schools, dispensaries, temples have been built with a long-term view of spreading influence. Tribal hostility is being diverted by the RSS from the exploiting contractors, moneylenders and police officers to Christians and Muslims. They are being instigated to attack them. This was witnessed in Gujarat when tribals were largely used by the BJP/VHP to kill and loot the minority people. We can no longer remain indifferent to this development, and leave the ground free for Sangh Parivar to exploit them politically.
The Party has work in a number of tribal-dominated areas. It has a number of tribal cadres. The Party should revive its work in a planned and systematic way among the tribal people. They are a potentially militant section of exploited poor. The Party should counter the Sangh Parivar’s sectarian communal agenda among the tribal people. The Sangh Parivar has determined the place of the tribals in society, by defining them as ‘vanvasis’. However their work of running schools has a positive influence. The Party has to counter the Sangh Parivar not merely by condemning them, but by itself undertaking various constructive works among the tribal people. The Party opposes the forcible assimilation of tribals in Hindu Society, and subsuming their tribal culture into the prevailing culture. While helping them to adapt to modern life and to raise their living conditions, the Party will fight for their Constitutional safeguards and special provisions of the Panchayat (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996. Their right to forests, forest produce, water resources and land under cultivation must be assured. We must fight for them.
In states where the tribal population is in good number, state organisations of tribals (Adivasi Mahasabha) have to be set up, by organising conferences, fighting against eviction from forest lands and for restoration of tribal lands alienated to non-tribals, for rehabilitation of tribals displaced by projects, for delivering them from the clutches of moneylenders and mahajans, for securing them good wages for collecting forest produce, and for tribal cooperatives which would pay them reasonable prices for their produce etc. The now-defunct All India Adivasi Mahasabha should be revived and functioned with two or three tribal cadres assigned to it.
Other Backward Classes:
OBC leaders had been working in radical parties. But the Mandal Report brought them to the forefront. Taking up the banner of ‘social justice’, they rallied the other backward classes around them and organized political parties on that basis. Naturally the dominant caste among them – both in terms of numbers, and education as well as financial or landed status took the lead. This section looks forward to sharing political power. In the beginning most of the backward castes who numbered as much as 52 per cent of the population rallied behind them. Not only the established national parties suffered a certain loss in their backward vote bank, but even the Communist Party suffered some erosion in their base. This phenomenon was seen mostly in the Hindi belt, where castes play a big role in politics, particularly in elections. Very soon, the feeling grew that the benefit of reservation and the empowerment that followed had been grabbed mostly by the dominant caste/castes among the backwards. The most backward defined in Karpoori Thakur’s formula (Bihar) as ‘annexure one’ backwards had not received a just share. (This is true in fact even in the case of the scheduled castes and tribes.) Gradually, this is leading to differentiation within the OBCs. Same castes have become politically the dominant ones. The consolidation of their vote bank has helped to draw the Muslims also who till then were mostly behind the Congress, towards them.
The most backwards among the OBCs are mostly landless and marginal farmers, artisans, and unorganised workers doing the most casual and low work. Their consciousness is at a lower level. Sometimes they are carried along by the dominant caste. At other times they attach themselves to this or that caste-combination or party to avoid the domination, and so on. As the rural poor, and the unorganised worker, they also come with the Communists, wherever the Party is strong enough to create confidence in them. The process of class struggle and of building mass organisations, especially among these toiling sections can help rally them behind the Communist Party, more easily and faster than other sections. The Party should pay special attention to this.
Women and Gender issues:
The 18th Congress had noted: “Without active participation of women in social and political life, it is not possible to think of rapid advance and radical social transformation in the country. But actually women suffer from inequality in every sphere. Atrocities and discrimination against them have been continuing, and growing”. Feudal and traditional value system oppresses them, and is at the root of most atrocities. The caste-biradari panchayats impose their decisions on this basis. Women are also the worst-effected by globalisation.
For example, the Press reported that in the capital city of Delhi, the number of rapes reported increased from 83 in 1985 to 372 in 1995, and further to 503 till November 2004. This is alarming. Other crimes against women have also gone up.
The demographic imbalance between male and female in our population is a matter of grave anxiety. Every effort ranging from education, propaganda campaign, legislation etc. should be undertaken to correct this, and prevent feticide. Special care has to be taken of the girl child. The media projections and the advertisement media enhance the commodification of women, presenting vulgar images and provoking violence, preaching revivalism on the one hand, and sexualism on the other.
Women’s organisations have grown in recent years and are actively engaged in the struggle for gender equality, and against all types of atrocities and discrimination in jobs, pay and so forth. This struggle has developed into a struggle for empowerment of women.
The CMP of the UPA government has reiterated the pledge to bring in a legislation for 33 per cent reservation for women in parliament and state legislatures. There is resistance to this both from inside and outside the UPA, and is continually getting postponed. We should vigorously campaign for bringing up it forward.
The Left parties are mounting pressure on the UPA to fulfill this pledge. The proposed Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2004, which envisages equal rights to woman in ancestral property still awaits passage from the parliament. Another bill is being prepared to punish ‘Domestic violence against Women’.
Today gender issues are figuring prominently on the national agenda. In the matter of rural employment guarantee, women’s organisations have justifiably raised the demand for ensuring that women get their rightful share in the employment that is given.
Unfortunately the party is not following words with deeds. In a recent survey about members of the present Lok Sabha, it was commented that the CPI has no women members. This was not always the case. More and more women must be put up for polls at all levels.
It is not merely the question of women M.Ps. The Party has to pay serious attention to the question of women and gender issues. Women activists and leaders have to be carefully and consciously nurtured and brought up at all party levels, and in the leadership of mass organisations and for being put up for election at grass-root levels. Party committees have to display a sensitiveness towards the women’s question.
Jammu & Kashmir:
The dialogue that has been broached between the government and all groups of Kashmir people should be pursued with patience and sincerity. With the level of militancy and cross-border terrorism having substantially come down, and with a package of steps being undertaken for development of infrastructure in Kashmir, a favourable situation has been created for a meaningful dialogue with elected representatives and all Kashmir leaders, including sections of Hurriyat and others. The Centre should concede maximum autonomy to J&K, as well as regional autonomy to Jammu and Ladakh within this framework.
The Indo-Pak dialogue, which includes Kashmir as central item should proceed without any third-party intervention. It is bound to take time, but there should be attempt at evolving a solution that is acceptable to all concerned. We should go ahead with Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) so as to create a healthy climate for dialogue and for tackling the issue of Kashmir. The starting of the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad bus is an important step, and more such steps should be taken. The People-to-People Dialogue should proceed. There is a distinct change of mood among the people of both countries, who want that all pending issues should be solved through talks and there should be peace and good neighbourly relations between the two countries.
The North-Eastern Region:
The situation in the North-Eastern Region is serious and has to be considered on a priority basis. The Region is full of natural resources and yet remains backward due to neglect by successive Union Government. Unemployment amongst youth is very high, Militancy and insurgency have grown in several states of the Region. To defuse the situation, it is necessary to hold dialogue with the insurgent groups without any precondition. In doing so, care has to be taken that while conceding the demands of one group several more problems are not created. Solution should be found without disturbing the present borders of the states established through history.
Infiltration of foreigners from bordering countries is a major problem. Border fencing with Bangladesh which will mitigate this problem and also prevent the insurgent groups from operating across the border should be completed.
The Centre has to formulate a special package for speedy development of the economy of the region, and for setting up small and major industries in public and private sector. Flood and erosion control measures have to be undertaken. The North-Eastern Council has to be provided with sufficient fund to carry out urgent schemes.
A major problem for democratic advance is the strengthening of our panchayati Raj system. Elections to the panchayats and parishads have to take place regularly and real power and adequate finances have to be allotted to them. The party organisation in each district has to fight for this. Only this can give ‘Power to the People’, ensure grassroot democracy and bring about real democratic decentralization. The Party must take the elections to three-tier panchayats very seriously.
XIII
Social Movements
There are many social movements, which are being carried on without any initiative from the Party or any of its mass organisations. Some of these social movements take up immediate issues connected with the people, such as drinking water, slum development, rehabilitation of displaced persons, shelter, sanitation and health and so on. Some others are movements that are meant to raise the anti-feudal and democratic consciousness of the common people, such as against superstition, obscurantism, immoral practices, etc. Some are engaged in the campaign against globalisation and its manifestations. Communists should support such social movements, and help the people who are conducting them. They contribute towards the mobilization of the masses and raising their general awareness.
Besides, there are many groups of people engaged in literary and cultural fields, in campaigns for secularism, and peace, against globalisation, etc. Communists should participate in them. An attitude of ‘stand aloofism’ is not correct. The World Social Forum, and its national and state-level forums are just such a social movement.
Alongside these social movements, we have also the activities of NGOs. NGOs are of many types. Some are genuine, working for a particular cause, or specialising on a definite issue. They are useful for the development of the general democratic movement. But there are other NGOs. The source of their funds, and how they are utilized is a mystery. Some of them receive large funds from abroad, spend lavishly and are accountable to no authority here. Their links abroad are unknown. These are the majority. Our activists should not get involved with such NGOs. Their general approach is to blunt the class struggle, and denigrate the mass organisation.
The activities of these NGOs are to draw away activists and sections of people from the people’s movement and from the activities of Party and mass organisations. They objectively weaken the anti-imperialist movement. In no case should we allow NGOs, whatever their character to utilize our Party activists, and interfere with our work of building the people’s movement and organising mass struggles.
Party activities, mass actions are decided and organized through party branches or fractions, through the relevant committees of the Party and mass organisations. It is not individual party members who can decide to associate with a NGO group and take any decision about what is to be done.
The Middle Class and its Role:
The path of capitalist development followed since Independence has vastly expanded the middle class in India. This is a collection of several segments, and is not homogenous. The policy of liberalisation has led to a lot of stratification among them. Disparities within them have also grown. There is a top layer of the upper middle class, relatively affluent, with an orientation towards the west, defenders of ‘economic reforms’, ‘consumerist’ in taste and habits. But the over whelming mass of the middle class is being crushed under the juggernaut of ‘economic reforms’, their security of life and job very uncertain, caught in the pincer of high prices and high taxes. This is the mass of lower middle class who are discontented with the existing order, and seek a change. There is a healthy and progressive section of intellectuals who lend a voice to the lower and middle classes.
The great Indian Middle class, both by its position in society and its relatively higher educational level and access to all sections, plays a significant role in opinion formation among the people. The Party of workers and peasants cannot afford to ignore it. Constant efforts have to be made to interact with it, develop multifarious activities among them, and involve them in ideological propaganda and agitational work, literary and cultural work etc. They can help the Party immensely by their contribution in all the above fields.
XIV
Importance of Cultural and Literary Work:
It was at the initiative of the CPI that the Progressive Writers’ Association (PWA) came to be formed in 1936, and the Indian People’s Theatre Association (IPTA) in 1943. Most eminent writers, poets, cultural personalities, well-known actors, dancers, singers came to be associated with these two organisations. The prestige which they earned and the wonderful work that they did has survived even though for some time the organisations themselves were not functioning well. Their legacy is always with us.
The functioning of the two organisations has been revived to some extent some time back. But this has taken place spontaneously and perfunctorily. Generally, this is on the initiative of a group of comrades. The Party as such has not taken initiative in the matter. The tremendous role that these organisations can play in raising the cultural level and consciousness of our people, in upholding the secular-democratic as against the communal-fascist outlook, in mobilizing the masses against corruption, the fall in moral values, criminalisation in politics, as also their capacity to portray the life and conditions of our people, and the struggle that they are fighting to transform them, is limitless. This is not realized by the entire Party at all levels. Even simple singing squads in a few places prove their value in meetings and conferences. Some states and districts are paying attention to them. But many are as yet doing nothing in this highly important cultural field.
There is no co-relation of the party’s strength and influence in the states and the strength of our cultural work in the states. Our cultural activities are better in some Hindi-speaking states, such as in M.P., Chhattisgarh, U.P., though the Party is weak. In some states, regular journals are also brought out by the PWA, or the IPTA. But in some states, the cultural movement continues to be weak.
It is highly imperative to give up this attitude of indifference and neglect. The central and state leaderships of the Party should take up the work of inviting cultural figures and those who have aptitude in that field to set up the IPTA and the PWA, and create drama groups and singing squads, etc. At the Central and state levels, a few comrades should be assigned to these specific squads, and they should be helped. A few steps have been taken at the central level. But organized effort remains to be made.
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