Whither The Congress

Prakash Karat

WITH the announcement of assembly elections in Tripura, the slaughter has begun. Within a week of the notification of the elections, 10 people have been killed by the NLFT gangs; 7 of those killed were CPI(M) members and supporters. Among those murdered were two women, one of whom was blind. Particularly inhuman was the torture meted out to two workers of the Gana Mukti Parishad whose eyes were gouged out and their bodies mutilated before they were shot dead. The Congress is allied with the INPT that is backed by these killers. The NLFT is undertaking these massacres to help the INPT capture the 18 seats it is contesting in the elections, in alliance with the Congress party.

CYNICAL ALLIANCE

The cynical nature of the alliance, which the Congress has entered into with the INPT, once again highlights what is integral to the class outlook of the Congress party --- an unremitting hostility to the CPI(M) on the ground, whatever its professions at the national level.

As far as the Congress is concerned, while declaring the BJP to be its main foe, it has no compunctions in targeting the Left and allying with whichever forces can be ranged against the Left. In the 2001 assembly elections, the Congress allied with Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamul Congress to build an anti-Marxist front in West Bengal, even when it was evident that Mamata still had one foot in the NDA. In Kerala, the Congress forged a wide-ranging alliance of caste and communal forces in the form of the United Democratic Front and had no hesitation in arriving at informal understandings in certain seats with the BJP to defeat the Left Democratic Front. The CPI(M) had noted this feature in the political resolution of the 17th congress of the party in March 2002.

The CPI(M) does not determine its all-India political-tactical line solely on the basis of the antagonistic attitude of the Congress towards the Left in its strongholds. In the present political situation, the main danger stems from the BJP-RSS combine. After the Gujarat elections, and the renewed thrust to push forward with its Hindutva agenda, the BJP has to be combated politically and ideologically in a more comprehensive manner than before. But the Congress party is unable to do so --- not only because of its ideological infirmities and vacillations when faced with a concerted and determined assault by the communal forces, but also due to its economic policies and attitude to the imperialist driven globalisation which is pushing India on to a right-wing path.

DISMAL RECORD OF CONGRESS REGIMES

Mired as it is in stodgy bourgeois constitutionalism and its traditional reliance on patronage politics, the Congress leadership is unable to comprehend the enormity of the Hindutva challenge which is nothing but an effort to reorder the Indian political system to serve the needs of the long term goal of the RSS to establish a Hindu Rashtra. That this reactionary vision has an economic and class component is beyond the grasp of the Congress. The Congress party seeks to compete with and combat the BJP through electoral manoeuvres in order to cash in on the mass discontent engendered by the very economic policies being pushed through by the BJP of which it is a supporter.

If the record of the major states ruled by the Congress in recent years is analysed, one would find that it is still a vigorous advocate of neo-liberal policies. Whether it is Ajit Jogi in Chhattisgarh or S M Krishna in Karnataka or A K Antony in Kerala, there is hardly anything to distinguish their governments’ policies from those of their BJP counterparts in the states or at the centre. Ajit Jogi has the dubious distinction of having dismantled the state transport corporation inherited from the united Madhya Pradesh. Private bus owners have been handed over all the routes. He is privatising all the natural resources of Chhattisgarh. He can take the credit for being the first in the country to sell a stretch of river waters, of the Sheonath river, to a private company. A K Antony’s government had also proposed that private companies be contracted waters of the Periyar and Malampuzha rivers, but has been stopped in its tracks by widespread public protests. The Congress-led UDF government is set upon reversing the major achievements of the state in the sphere of public education and public distribution system.

While the Congress at the centre has now adopted a position that profitable public sector units should not be privatised, the Congress government of Punjab has put on the block profitable public sector undertakings like Punjab Tractors for outright sale. The Karnataka government is also doing so. The record of the Maharashtra government or that of Rajasthan in dealing with the problems of the peasantry, whether it be the precipitous fall in the prices of agricultural produce or tackling the drought conditions, has not been notable for any alternative policies. The dismal record of the Congress governments in the economic sphere has created the fertile grounds for discontent, which in many states will be to the benefit of the BJP and other reactionary forces like the Shiv Sena.

LEARNING LITTLE FROM PAST MISTAKES

The flawed tactic in the Gujarat elections should have occasioned a critical reappraisal by the Congress not only of its repeated failure to confront and stand up to communal blackmail; it should also have simultaneously gone into the reason why the Congress fails to appear, or project itself, as an alternative to the BJP and all that it stands for. Being a partner in the oppressive project of pushing through policies dictated by the IMF and the World Bank, qualifies the Congress to be no better than an electoral clone of the BJP minus the communal genes.

If the BJP is unashamedly pursuing a pro-imperialist foreign policy and succumbing on all counts to American pressure, the Congress does not appear to be unduly concerned about this development. The Congress is receptive to the demands of international finance capital and institutions like the WTO. It should not be forgotten that it is the Congress which allowed opening up of the insurance sector and facilitated a retrograde change in the patent regime by its stand in parliament. The basis for the erosion of an independent foreign policy lies in the increasing influence of the United States and international finance capital within our economy and society. Here again, the Congress stand facilitates this penetration even while it formally adheres to a non-aligned foreign policy.

As the major opposition party, it was expected of the Congress that it would evolve such tactics as would help to isolate the BJP and neutralise its coalition arrangements. The recent blunder committed by the Congress in Uttar Pradesh shows that it has learnt very little from its past mistakes. The Mayawati government, based on the BSP-BJP alliance, began tottering a few months ago due to an internal revolt within the BJP. The question here was not about the character and antecedents of the dissidents who sought to bring down the government but the political opportunity which opened up for the fall of this opportunist combine and its government. The consolidation of such an alliance will be detrimental to the democratic and secular forces not only in Uttar Pradesh but also in the country.

But here the Congress refused to play the elementary role expected of a secular opposition party --- of joining hands with the rest of the opposition to establish that the Mayawati government is in a minority. Not only did its MLAs refuse to go to the governor to make this point but abstained in the crucial by-election in the legislative council which would have proved the untenability of the BJP’s claims and forced the governor to call the assembly session. Because of the abstention of its 23 MLAs, the ruling coalition’s candidate could win the seat even though they could not muster the votes of a majority of the MLAs in the assembly.

Given its mass base and its all-India strength, the Congress could play a major role in the fight against the reactionary communal forces. But there is no evidence as yet to show that the Congress leadership is aware of its responsibilities and is prepared to discharge them in a manner which would help facilitate the defence of democracy and secularism.

THE CPI(M) STAND

In contrast to the short-sighted attitude of the Congress, the CPI(M) is not for a tit-for-tat approach. While it will resolutely fight the Congress and its pernicious ally in Tripura, at the all-India plane the party maintains that the main threat emanates from the BJP. It does not stand for equidistance from the BJP and the Congress --- a position adopted by its Left allies like the RSP and the Forward Bloc. Both are not equal dangers. However, given the vacillating and often ineffectual stance of the Congress towards the blatant and intimidatory tactics of the Sangh combine, its full complicity in the anti-national and anti-people economic agenda and its perpetual style of corrupt governance, the CPI(M) must, and has to, maintain an independent stand. In states where the CPI(M) is not in a position to present a viable alternative, either by itself or along with other non-Congress forces, it will concentrate its political campaign against the BJP and devise suitable electoral tactics to help defeat the BJP. But there can be no alliance with the Congress. This is the line the party is adopting for the Himachal Pradesh elections.

On issues such as the efforts to communalise Indian society and politics or the creeping advance of authoritarianism, the CPI(M) and the Left are already working for joint endeavours with all secular parties, including the Congress, particularly inside parliament. The Congress, however, studiously refuses to mobilise its considerable mass base in movements to defend the common people from the onslaughts of liberalisation and imperialist driven globalisation. In such a situation, if the CPI(M) goes in for an alliance with the Congress, it would only weaken the Left and further strengthen the ruling class consensus around neo-liberal policies.

The Tripura elections and the tactics employed by the Congress may appear to be a minor episode, as far as all-India politics is concerned. But while gearing to fight the danger of the BJP and its reactionary cohorts effectively in the coming days, the CPI(M) and the Left will have to adopt correct tactics --- tactics which will enable the mobilisation of the widest range of forces to confront and isolate the main threat while in no way giving quarter to the selfish class approach of the Congress and its self-defeating opportunism.