For the first time, CPI-M plans party-level I- Day celebrations

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Thiruvananthapuram: After decades of dithering, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI-M) has decided to organize party-level Independence Day celebrations. 

In a clear break from the positions of the pre-split Communist Party of India (CPI) when the nation freed itself from the British rule on August 15, 1947, the Central Committee of the CPI (M) a few days back directed the party’s organizational tiers down to the local committees to assemble the cadres and hoist the national tricolor on the Independence Day. 

Though the party leadership is yet to give a detailed reasoning for this abrupt decision, it obviously signals the belated waking up to the reality that espousing national symbols is inevitable in the prevailing Indian politics, dominated by the ultra-nationalist Bharatiya Janata party (BJP). 

The party will use the occasion to tell the people that founding leaders of the Indian Communist movement were active participants in the national movement and freedom struggle, even as the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) had “betrayed” the national cause by serving the interests of the British.  

“The heroic role played by the Communists and the party in the freedom movement will be highlighted. The betrayal of the ideals of the freedom movement by the Congress and the BJP will be exposed, through speeches and webinars. The occasion will be used to mobilise public opinion against the undermining of the constitutionally-created secular republic by the BJP-led government”, says a party statement that was issued here. 

At the dawn of Independence, the Indian Communist leadership had refused to share the euphoria of the Congress, holding that the occasion marked a mere transition of power without bringing real freedom to disadvantaged millions. 

Ironically, many of the top Communist leaders of the time were active participants in the freedom struggle.  But after dissociating themselves from the Congress, under compulsions from the Communist International controlled by the erstwhile Soviet Union and the Western ideologues, they started swimming against the national current when the freedom movement scaled to its crescendo, coinciding with World War-II. The refusal to support the Quit India movement and subsequent alienation from the national mainstream had seriously hurt the Indian Communist movement. 

The controversial Calcutta Thesis of the party in 1948 sharpened the hostility towards the government of the newly independent India. B T Ranadive was the main proponent of the Calcutta Thesis, which was adopted by the second congress of the CPI, despite serious reservations from sections within it. The party called for direct action against the government, which it said served only the interests of the rich and the privileged. 

A couple of insurrections it planned in isolated pockets fizzled out. Soon, the party had to meekly surrender. Many party stalwarts of the time later dubbed this ill-thought-out and ill-timed move as an avoidable misadventure which had only retarded the Indian Communist movement. 

After the reversal of the flawed Calcutta Thesis, whose ghost haunted the party for long and even led to its split in 1964, the pre-split CPI adopted parliamentary path and started contesting elections in 1952. Still, the core program of the CPI(M) holds that elections are not the be-all and end-all for the party, which continues to be a vanguard of mass struggles.  

Critics of the Indian Communist movement say its failure to emerge as a powerful national force is largely due to its inability to live up to the national sentiments at crucial junctures before and after the independence. Instead, the then party top brass, drawn from the privileged class, tended to look at the Indian realities in purely dogmatic perspectives of the textbook Marxism-Leninism or through the blinkers offered by the Communist International. 

The two mainstream Indian Communist Party’s, however, have come a long way from the initial doctrinaire positions. They have reconciled to the reality of being part of a multi-party parliamentary system. Their programs, strategies and tactics are essentially shaped on the urgency of contesting elections. 

Having relegated to isolated pockets, and suffering grievous electoral reversals in more recent times, they now seem to have come to the conclusion that regaining the lost ground requires espousal of national symbols, and denying the ultra nationalist the monopoly over them. 

“There is no need to make much ado about the party decision. Wherever we are in power, our chief ministers and ministers participate in Independence Day and Republic Day celebrations. The same goes for those holding positions in local self government institutions. It is a malicious propaganda mounted by the RSS and its affiliates that Communists do not respect the national symbols,” said a party functionary. 

By organizing Independence Day celebrations, the party seeks to send the message that its members are no less patriotic and their trail-blazers had contributed significantly to the freedom movement.