(In an article titled ‘Deeper into the Revisionist Garbage Can’ the People’s March (the undeclared organ of the People’s War Group, April-May 2003 issue) has posed a critique of the Seventh Congress of CPI(ML) Liberation. Below is a rejoinder by Kavita Krishnan, member of Editorial Board of Liberation)
The article begins with an outright lie: supposedly quoting from the 7th Congress proceedings, it claims that the Party reaffirmed its ‘supreme commitment’ to its coming ‘overground in its 5th Congress held in Kolkata in December 1992.’ These words are certainly not to be found in either the Congress documents or in the General Secretary’s inaugural speech. Has the writer found them in some newspaper report or has he fabricated them in a childish attempt to trivialise the CPI(ML)’s goals? Comrade Anarchist, your party’s ‘supreme commitment’ may be to remaining underground and in the jungles; for us remaining underground or overground is a flexible matter of tactics depending on the real situation, and our supreme commitment is reserved for the revolutionary transformation of our society.
Date, time, facts and such trappings of reality are no matter to the anarchist writer – most of the time, he is quoting from the Political Organisational Report (POR) of the 6th Congress held in 1997 and from the policy resolutions passed in that Congress. Just as the PWG lags behind 30 years in its grasp of Indian realities, the writer is unfortunately 5 years behind the times in analysing the CPI(ML)’s 7th Congress!
The writer’s first complaint is that the CPI(ML) 7th Congress’ central agenda was ‘not the furtherance of revolution’ but ‘resistance to saffron subversion and US aggression and war’. Is the Is revolution simply an empty phrase to be piously repeated? Doesn’t ‘revolution’ involve creatively formulating concrete tasks for concrete situations? Well, that is precisely the problem with the anarchists – they are fond of left phrase-mongering and preaching to the convinced. Isn’t it the job of a revolutionary party to formulate slogans to inspire and mobilise masses on specific tasks of the revolution? Doesn’t today’s situation demand a Left resistance to saffron fascism and US imperialism? Or do you think it is enough to have a lose-knit forum for the job of waging resistance and a communist party should concern itself only with the highest task of revolution? For the anarchists, specific tasks and slogans are of no concern – it is enough to keep parroting the phrase of ‘revolution’. Further, the writer has quietly omitted any phrases that are inconvenient for his own aim of mudslinging. So while the Congress’ central slogan was ‘Red Resistance’, the writer has dropped ‘Red’ while quoting it. The writer goes on to claim that Comrade Dipankar’s inaugural speech, reflected ‘desperation’ to seek recognition and unity with the CPI/CPM. Well, comrade, in fact the section you have quoted is a ‘very special appeal to every section of the Left’ – and that is addressed not only to the CPI/CPM but to the PWG as well if only you would like to count themselves among the Left! The question ‘Why can’t we, the heirs of Bhagat Singh, wage a powerful and unified resistance to defeat the disciples of Golwalkar and admirers of Hitler’ is one which every Indian communist needs to introspect and answer. Of course, you can count yourself out if you don’t like to consider yourself an heir of Bhagat Singh!
The PWG’s tunnel vision prevents them from grasping the spirit of Comrade DB’s passionate, urgent appeal for a ‘fighting coalition of the progressive forces of Indian society, … powered by the vision of socialism and communism, and led by the red banner of resistance and revolution’. In fact Comrade Dipankar speaks of veteran Comrade Abani Lahiri’s reminder that for the Left to fail to offer such a united challenge to the fascist and imperialist offensive would be a real ‘historic blunder’. Will the PWG remain unconcerned as the CPI or CPM towards this blunder or will it respond to the appeal to correct the blunder? That is the question.
Semi-Anarchists’ Semi-feudalism: Static and Frozen Indian reality is complex and contradictory – and the PWG is unable to grasp its complexities. For instance, the writer cannot understand why the CPI(ML) programme speaks of the ‘semi-feudal’ character of Indian society, while also saying that stubborn ‘feudal remnants’ inhibit the development of capitalism in India. The writer seems to take ‘semi-feudal’ to mean ‘basically feudal’ (so he thinks it is contradictory to speak of ‘feudal remnants’ in a semi-feudal society).
The problem is that Indian society is unwilling to simplify itself to suit our Anarchist. The term ‘semi-feudal’ is used to characterise societies that are in transition between feudalism and capitalism. India, as compared to China at the time of revolution, is however in a considerably advanced stage of this transition phase. There is growing capitalist penetration even in the countryside. To take into account this specific feature of Indian society, we have spoken of feudal remnants which stubbornly coexist despite the growth of capitalism. As our Party Programme notes, “The persistence of feudal remnants not only assures the availability of cheap labour power and raw materials for both Indian big capital and imperialism, it also provides ground for the persistence of medieval obscurantism, casteist frenzy, communal fanaticism and barbarity in different spheres of life.”
Comrade Anarchist seeks to erect a Chinese Wall between New Democratic revolution and People’s Democratic Revolution while we use the two expressions interchangeably. It is against the old models of bourgeois democratic revolution that Lenin and Mao talked of a new type of democratic revolution or a people’s democratic revolution. While the old democratic revolution was led by the bourgeoisie with an active participation of the proletariat, the new or people’s democratic revolution presupposes proletarian leadership with active involvement of considerable sections of the peasantry and the middle classes. In the era of socialist revolutions, the new democratic revolution in a country can only be seen in the perspective of the world socialist revolution. The abolition of feudal remnants also sharpens the struggle against big capital and thus paves the way for an uninterrupted transition from the democratic to the socialist stage of revolution. These are basics of the stage of democratic revolution, but in their obsession with the underground and armed struggle, the anarchist ideologues remain confused even about the general outline of revolution, let alone flesh out the details through the thick of the concrete conditions of a complex reality.
The PWG is unable to grasp coexistence of semi-feudal society and a high level of capitalist development, or the existence of a parliamentary framework in a semi-feudal society. But this paradox is the Indian reality that communists must come to terms with if they are to formulate the correct strategy and tactics. The writer tries to will away the existence of this paradox by rigidly repeating the dogma that a semi-feudal society cannot have a functioning democratic structure or a parliamentary framework. According to him, only those countries that have ‘gone through bourgeois democratic revolutions’ can have a functioning democracy. In such developed countries, he says, though the state is in essence a dictatorship of bourgeoisie, still bourgeois democratic traditions exist except during periods of open fascism, whereas these traditions are totally ‘absent’ in semi-feudal, semi-colonial countries, where parliament is a ‘mere appendage of highly autocratic rule’. So, he says, ‘the very act of participation in elections’ in such a semi-feudal country, ‘creates illusions of a functioning democracy’.
Well, comrade, the ruling class in India has done a good enough job of sowing these illusions, and in the people’s consciousness, elections and parliamentary framework certainly form a key arena of political struggle. We, the communist revolutionaries, in no way share these illusions. You have only noted our Programme’s observation that “the affairs of Indian State are generally conducted within a constitutional and parliamentary-democratic framework”, but have once again omitted to mention the very next observation – that “like our political independence, parliamentary democracy in India too rests on a rather fragile foundation. At the slightest provocation of any popular unrest, the integrity of institutions, the sanctity of the constitution, the inviolability of democratic rights are all reduced to empty phrases and the essential reactionary and autocratic character of Indian State comes out clearly into the open”. The question is – how can communists seriously take up the task of dispelling the deep-seated illusions about parliamentary democracy, and persuade people that democracy can only be realised in a people’s democratic state achieved through a democratic revolution that has overthrown the rule of big bourgeoisie-landlord combination?
Will these illusions be dispelled if communists confine themselves to the jungles and blow up a police station or a factory or two, once in a while? We agree with you that the parliament is nothing but a ‘pigsty’, but does it follow that the masses think so too? It is worth taking a closer look what Lenin had to say on the subject of how to decide whether or not parliamentarism is politically obsolete. He posed the right question – “how far the broad masses of working people are prepared (ideologically, politically and practically)” to reject the bourgeois-democratic parliament? He said parliamentarism may be “politically obsolete” for communists, “but – and this is the whole point – we must not regard what is obsolete for us as being obsolete for the class, as being obsolete for the masses”. He points out that the revolutionary vanguard of the working class might be fully justified in abhorring and detesting parliament. But, he says, “it would be not only unreasonable, but actually criminal to yield to this mood when deciding how this generally recognised evil should be fought”.
Lenin reminds us that the Bolsheviks “have become convinced by very long, painful and bloody experience of the truth that revolutionary tactics cannot be built on revolutionary moods alone. Tactics must be based on a sober and strictly objective appraisal of all the class forces of the particular state … as well as the experience of revolutionary movements. To show how ‘revolutionary’ one is solely by … repudiating participation in parliaments, is very easy; but just because it is too easy, it is not the solution for a difficult, a very difficult problem … To attempt to ‘circumvent’ this difficulty by ‘skipping’ the difficult job of utilising reactionary parliaments for revolutionary purposes is absolutely childish. You want to create a new society, yet you fear the difficulties involved in forming a good parliamentary group, made up of convinced, devoted, heroic communists, in a reactionary parliament! Is that not childish?” (Lenin, ‘Left-Wing’ Communism, An Infantile Disorder).
Lenin wrote the above words in 1920 to share the experiences of the successful Bolshevik revolution, in an attempt to correct the sectarian “Left-Wing” mistakes being made by some sections of communists in countries like Germany, Italy and Britain. The PWG might dismiss these experiences out of hand, as being irrelevant in a semi-feudal country like ours. But for Marxist-Leninists who objectively recognise that unlike in China, parliamentary illusions do have deep roots in people’s consciousness in India, and do not blot out this reality by putting on dogmatic blinkers, Lenin’s words must be just as much a guide to action as Mao’s experience of people’s war in China.
The writer says that while the CPI(ML)’s Political-Organisation Report speaks of the threat of fascism, its Programme ‘seems to have great faith in Indian democracy’. Let us take a look at the section of the Party Programme that he has quoted: “It is true that under normal circumstances, Indian polity allows communists to work through open, legal and parliamentary means. It is possible for communists to secure victories in elections at various levels and also win majority in local bodies and even state legislatures. While tilting the balance of class forces through protracted and vigorous political struggles, the Party is prepared to utilise such opportunities independently or in coalition with like-minded forces provided the Party enjoys the strength to ensure the fulfilment of its own commitment to the electorate.” (emphasis added)
Just prior to this, the Programme notes that “To accomplish people’s democratic revolution in a vast and complex country like India, a communist party has to be especially skilful in mastering and combining various forms of struggle and every available avenue of work. The Party therefore strives to develop a comprehensive revolutionary practice through an organic combination of illegal and legal, secret and open and extra-parliamentary and parliamentary forms of struggle and organisation.” Today, if fascists are using the parliamentary system precisely to subvert constitutional democracy, does it make sense for the anti-fascist resistance to exclude the parliamentary arena and leave it for the exclusive appropriation of the fascists and other forces of bourgeois politics who only excel in appeasing the fascist offensive?
Comrade Dipankar’s concluding remarks at the 7th Congress had reminded of an SP in Jehanabad who threatened the CPI(ML) – “Either become CPI/CPM, or MCC-PWG”. This reflects the attitude of the Indian ruling class which would like communists to be either stuck in a parliamentary quagmire or confined to a marginal existence in the jungles. It is only when communists combine both parliamentary and extra-parliamentary struggles and emerge as a mass political force that they pose a challenge to the ruling class. And mind you, the CPI(ML) began participating in elections in the 80s on its own terms and through its own independent assessment and not through any negotiated deal with the state. We are committed to using every possible means, both legal and illegal, to advance the political assertion of the working people.
For the PWG, the central question of revolution is reduced to a quarrel of armed struggle vs. elections. How does the CPI(ML) conceive the question of armed struggle? We have no hesitation in accepting that, unlike PWG, we do not equate isolated armed actions or dalam actions with ‘armed struggle’. True, our programme does not rule out the possibility of a relatively peaceful transfer of political power in exceptional national and international circumstances – but at the same time it is emphatic in its rejection of the parliamentary path and in calling upon the party of the proletariat to “prepare itself for winning the ultimate decisive victory in an armed revolution.” We are perfectly aware that only in a situation of an intensive and comprehensive advance of the people’s all-round assertion, which presupposes intensive armed struggle as well, is it possible to tilt the balance of social and political forces decisively in favour of the revolution and visualise a relatively peaceful transfer of state power.
At the present moment, we humbly say that we have not reached that final phase where a serious bid can be made for snatching the ultimate victory through a decisive armed struggle. We assess that we are in a crucial preparatory phase, where political struggle and mass resistance rather than military war have a bigger role. Our emphasis is on getting rid of people’s dependence on a few isolated armed squads, and on unleashing all-round people’s initiative including taking up arms to defend themselves in the face of enemy attacks. In other words, we are for painstakingly building up a mass armed resistance, a truly protracted people’s war rather than dalam war isolated from people.
What does the PWG have to offer in the name of “armed struggle”? In Bihar, the PWG entered the scene five years back with tall claims of ‘wiping out Ranvir Sena’, but there have been more instances of hobnobbing with the Sena rather than confronting it. The degeneration of the PWG is such that in the Patna-Jehanabad belt, the only area in Bihar where it has a presence of some significance, it has become a convenient banner for the remnants of the erstwhile Bhoomi Sena, and in some areas even for elements of the Ranvir Sena. It is our comrades, above all, who have been at the receiving end of the PWG guns. It is not the squads of the PWG, but relentless mass resistance and powerful political initiatives by our comrades which have lowered the morale and strike power of the Ranvir Sena considerably.
In the cases where the anarchists do attack the state rather than revolutionaries, what is the pattern? Whether in Jharkhand or Bihar, in Orissa or Eastern UP, the daredevil squads of the PWG-MCC’s always retreat back to their hideouts after carrying out assault and raid operations on police stations and outposts leaving the dalit-adivasi rural poor to face the brunt of the intensified state terror that invariably follows such actions. It is the CPI(ML) alone which steadfastly stands by the rural poor through every such juncture and organises and equips the masses to put up a bold resistance to state repression. Sandwiched between Cyberabad and Separate Telengana
So much for armed struggle – now, on the subject of elections, or rather boycott of elections, we have some questions for the PWG. The article claims boycott of elections to be a ‘vital and necessary step to pull the masses out of the parliamentary quagmire’. Why then, is there no instance of a mass, popular response to the boycott call in your areas of work and influence; instead why is terror required to ‘enforce’ your boycotts? Why does your ‘boycott’ routinely degenerate into organised, high polling in favour of this or that bourgeois party, either in power or opposition? Lenin spoke of the “two monstrosities” (anarchism and opportunist social democracy) being “mutually complementary”. True enough, both the extremes, the opportunist pragmatic Left and the phrase-mongering anarchists meet at a common point: both develop overt or covert alliance with bourgeois political forces and facilitate them, and leave the masses at the mercy of bourgeois deception and hegemony while doing everything possible to weaken and disrupt the CPI(ML)-led independent political assertion of the rural poor.
Can you explain how come the state and its anti-people economic policies enjoys maximum freedom in Andhra Pradesh – a ‘stronghold’ of the PWG? Can you explain why Chandrababu Naidu is able to come up as a darling of MNCs and a ‘model’ chief minister of liberalisation in a state where you are, by your own admission, at your strongest? You may hold negotiations with the Andhra Government, but will you at least introspect as to why have you failed to pose a political challenge by mobilising mass militant resistance to Naidu’s anti-people policies? Why is your ‘people’s war’ in the land of Telengana a mere caricature of the 1940s movement? Even as Naidu goes about implementing the economic policies of market liberalisation and commercialisation driving hundreds of cotton growers and ground nut farmers to commit suicide, and the Telengana statehood movement comes up to occupy the main opposition space precisely in the PWG’s so-called guerrilla zones, the PWG remains as clueless as ever about translating its mass influence into any kind of active resistance!
Ridiculing CPI(ML)’s call for a Left Confederation, the PWG asserts that all talk of a “Left resurgence” is a ‘utopian dream’. The task of genuine revolutionaries, according to them, is ‘to liberate the masses from the deadweight of these revisionists and bring them into the revolutionary and democratic stream … This entails penetrating, consistent political work amongst the working class, to release its initiative and its potential revolutionary role.’ (emphasis added)
No doubt, this is the task. But the question is, how is it to be achieved? How do you propose to do ‘penetrating, consistent work’ among the masses who remain organised under the banners of different Left parties and mass organisations? It is precisely with the aim of sharpening and consolidating the ‘political strike-power of the working class’ that our Party Programme ‘lays special emphasis on developing unity in action among all Left forces in the short run and unifying all Indian communists under the banner of a single party in future.” Once again, let us refresh our memory of Lenin, who writes that long periods over several years, the Bolsheviks were united in the same party as the Mensheviks, but even so, “never ceased our ideological and political struggle against them as opportunists and vehicles of bourgeois influence among the proletariat”. He also writes of the need to make all sorts of compromises and forge all sorts of alliances with bourgeois allies, who may be “temporary, vacillating, unstable, unreliable and conditional”. Those who fail to understand this, he says, “fail to understand even a particle of Marxism”.
We are not shy of any alliance or united front that has a working class leadership at its core, and that will advance the interests of that class. Our objection to parties like the CPI and CPI(M) is not that they forge united fronts; it is that they tail behind centrist parties, even Congress, sow illusions about the democratic, secular and anti-imperialist credentials of these parties, surrender and suppress the Left’s militancy and independent assertion in the name of defending the front, and above all, sanctify and glorify the possibility of reforming the system to make it work for the proletariat. We, on the other hand, whenever we forge fronts with other Left groups, or if and when we ally with any bourgeois democratic force, will under no circumstance, cease to give priority to political struggles, militant left assertion on the fields and streets, and complete independence of agitation and propaganda for the Party and for the working people we represent.
The article throws several other stray accusations at the CPI(ML) most of which are too puerile to merit a response. We cannot, however, resist commenting on one such barb. The article claims to reveal a scoop – it offers damning proof of CPI(ML)’s status-quoism. What is it? Merely the statutory provision of ‘faith and allegiance to the Constitution of India …, and to the principles of socialism, secularism and democracy, and would uphold the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India,’ which is a legal requirement for every political party to get registered with the Election Commission of India. The PWG however need not bother about all this because it is happy to exist and operate in its own world of make-believe away from the crucial arena of class struggle where political parties representing diverse class interests remain engaged in a fierce all-out contention for establishing their hegemony, where they battle it out in terms of concrete and immediate ideas, policies and demands.
We can excuse their lack of interest and information about the world of political parties, but what is really their objection? Professing allegiance to “the principles of socialism, secularism and democracy”? This can understandably bother all our bourgeois parties, but why should a communist party be hesitant to declare its commitment to socialism, secularism and democracy? Is it sovereignty which is bothering our revolutionary friends? And is it because the word smacks of ‘authority’ so detested by anarchists the world over? Sovereignty may indeed be an irritant for the comprador bourgeoisie and its political representatives who are routinely mortgaging or compromising India’s sovereignty in economic and strategic affairs by advocating India’s integration with the US-led world order of imperialist globalisation, but why should any anti-imperialist Indian have a problem with the notion of sovereignty in combating imperialist globalisation?
Or, is it national unity which is an anathema to Comrade Anarchist? Comrade, don’t you think national unity is worth cherishing for India’s socialist future and for combating the imperialist project of balkanisation and the communal fascist campaign for a Hindu Rashtra? Our Party Programme talks of “reconstitution of national unity on the basis of a federal, democratic, secular polity recognising the nationalities’ right to self-determination including secession and instilling a sense of belonging, equality and security in all minority groupings.” As Marxist-Leninists, we however do not hold that the recognition of the right of nationalities to self-determination including secession needs willy-nilly to mean secession of each and every nationality, any more than the right of divorce should mean that each and every marriage must end in a divorce. Does the PWG believe that revolutionary communists must first declare a war on national unity and encourage its break-up by uncritically supporting every demand for self-determination and secession? If the PWG visualises Indian revolution as a sum total of several national revolutions where Khalistani terrorism, Taliban-type fundamentalism and chauvinistic insurgent outfits are all to be treated as allies of revolution then it should say so openly. You may busy yourself with the task of launching a ‘Kannada Nationalist Liberation’ movement and such like. We cannot afford such amusements. While resisting draconian laws and state repression, and upholding the right of self-determination including secession, we firmly believe that communists must judge every demand and movement for self-determination only in the light of concrete conditions and specific circumstances.
Why did the PWG suddenly become so ‘obsessed’ with our Party? On the face of it, the write-up is aimed at cautioning the international communist movement and the Indian people against the ‘deceptive’ role of the CPI(ML). Well why do you think that our friends in the international communist movement and the various forces and friends of the democratic revolution in India need this caution in the first place? Are they so credulous and gullible that they cannot independently judge our Party on the basis of not our words, but our actual deeds?
The real problem seems to be lying elsewhere. At one point the author accuses us of being ‘obsessed’ with unity with the social-democrats and not caring enough for joint action with radical petty bourgeois formations like the PWG. Our friend cannot stand the expression ‘anarchist’ while he considers the epithet ‘radical petty bourgeois’ to be a positive recognition. Well we have no grudge on that, but whether you realise it or not your petty bourgeois class character shows everywhere. It shows as much in your aversion to the notion of national unity (for Mao area-wise seizure of power was never devoid of a national vision) and romanticisation of nationality movements as in your uncritical analysis of and attitude to the question of castes which led many of your ideologues and activists in Andhra to fall for the BSP and the spurious theory of dalit democratic revolution.
In our Varanasi Congress we had taken note of the PWG’s attempt to form mass democratic formations and indicated our positive approach towards having issue-based joint action with such fora. But such forums never really took up issues beyond WTO and POTA and despite describing itself as a resistance forum its activities hardly cross the limits of formal conventions and conferences and declaratory statements. Because of this limited format and the inherent sectarianism of the PWG it becomes very difficult to have joint mass actions with PWG-led organisations.
This is in fact symptomatic of a larger and more fundamental problem concerning the PWG’s political future. A good section of the PWG cadre did emerge from the mass-based radical students’ union of Andhra Pradesh. In Maharashtra too the PWG attracted student activists of the Vidyarthi Pragati Sanghatana. Both in Andhra and Maharashtra, many prominent and promising litterateurs, singers and cultural activists, civil libertarians and trade union leaders have been associated with the PWG during different phases. But over the years many of them have got disillusioned and moved away when they realised that the PWG’s concept of mass organisation and mass work is limited merely to the defence of the military activities of its squads. And within this formal decorative framework, there is no scope for mass initiatives to be unleashed and developed in any big way. PWG-led mass initiatives in Karnataka are an exception ‘permitted’ by the rule that the state still remains dormant in the PWG’s military map.
To take an example of the PWG’s pattern of ‘mass politics’, recently on 25 August, the PWG and MCC (how close are they to their much-trumpeted merger?) had called a ‘bandh’ in Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal. Beyond certain pockets of Jharkhand the bandh had no impact. More importantly, there was no political propaganda before the bandh, and hardly anybody knew anything about the demands and slogans of the bandh. And on August 25, nowhere were the masses to be seen in action, while the bandh was sought to be ‘enforced’ through sheer terror and with the help of sensational media coverage. By contrast, just four days ago the CPI(ML) had called a bandh in Bihar against state repression and the reigning criminal-police-government nexus. The same day, the SUCI and the West Bengal unit of our Party had also called a bandh demanding roll back of hikes in electricity tariffs, education fees, hospital charges and sundry taxes. In both the states the bandh was hugely successful – the action was preceded by sustained, systematic and intensive mass campaigning and then there was large-scale mobilisation of the masses in every district on the day of the bandh.
Friends in PWG who are desirous of unity of revolutionary forces should address the real issues that constitute the crux of the problem: Ask your military command to stop killing innocent people and CPI(ML) activists and lend some real teeth to your mass work and mass politics.