People's Democracy

Fight Against Imperialism and Communalism

Clarion Call of the DYFI 7th Conference

N S Arjun

THE 7th all India conference of the DYFI gave a clarion call to the youth to fight the twin dangers facing the nation – imperialism and communalism. The conference resolved to take up in a big way the struggles against unemployment, the most serious issue confronting the youth as fallout of the imperialist-dictated liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation policies of the Vajpayee government. The conference also updated the programme and constitution of the DYFI for the first time after its formation 23 years ago.

The conference took place on November 6-9 in the inspiring land of martyrs – Amritsar in Punjab, which witnessed the most inhuman massacre by the British imperialists on unarmed peaceful protestors at Jallianwala Bagh on April 13, 1919 killing nearly 2,000 people. Most befittingly, before the conference was formally inaugurated, the 804 delegates representing a membership of nearly 1.26 crore, led by the redoubtable freedom fighter, Captain Lakshmi Sahgal, gathered at Jallianwala Bagh to pay homage to the martyrs. (See box)  The conference venue had been renamed as Jallianwala Bagh Nagar and the dias was christened as Gurnam Sohan Manch, after the martyrs of youth movement of Punjab and India, Gurnam Singh Uppal and Sohan Singh Dhesi who fell to the extremist bullets.

INAUGURAL SESSION

Inaugurating the conference, Dr S P Singh, Vice-Chancellor of Guru Nanak Dev University, called upon the youth of our country to rise above all differences of religion, caste, creed to strongly fight against the imperialist-dictated globalisation. He warned that imperialist powers are out to capture our nation’s economy and thus enslave us once again and exhorted the youth to take up this challenge and fight for safeguarding our nation’s freedom. Dr. Singh also stressed that youth should take up the issue of making important life-saving drugs available to common people at affordable rates. He said that powerful MNC companies are making super profits by monopolizing these drugs, the disastrous effect of which is seen in the African continent in the form of AIDS drugs being out of reach for the people.

Dr. S P Singh expressed happiness that Amritsar, which has a special place in history due to its heroic role in the independence struggle, was hosting this important conference of the largest democratic youth force of our country.

Captain Lakshmi Sahgal, in an inspiring address to the delegates, gave a call to wage a renewed freedom struggle to achieve economic and social freedom for the toiling millions. She made it clear that even today India is not free in the real sense of the word freedom. That can be achieved only if there is economic and social freedom. And for this she called upon the youth to wage another freedom struggle. She stressed this struggle will be successful only with the sacrifices of the youth, a task which the DYFI was heroically fulfilling. Captain Sahgal stressed that the future of our nation is in the hands of the youth and she called upon them to fight vigorously against imperialism, communalism, casteism, gender injustices etc. She stressed that the issue of fight against dowry menace should be high on the agenda of the youth movement.

Former DYFI president, M A Baby, in his address greeting the conference wanted the delegates to reflect on the challenges facing the youth today. Recalling that the first ever youth organization in our country was formed from this land – Naujawan Bharat Sabha – by Shaheed Bhagat Singh, Baby noted that the DYFI is carrying forward that spirit and tradition of struggle.

AIDWA general secretary, Brinda Karat, in her message said that the youth and women’s movement have a close relationship bonded by sacrifices. Noting that without the youth movement the struggle against obscurantism would not have been effective, she congratulated the DYFI leadership for making a conscious effort to increase the representation of women in their organisation. She called upon the youth to fight against the conscious effort by the imperialist globalisation process to de-ideologise the youth.

Among others who greeted the conference were the AIAWU joint secretary Suneet Chopra, former DYFI general secretary Hannan Mollah, CITU secretary Tapan Sen, SFI general secretary Kallol Roy and AIYF general secretary Soni Thengam. The Reception Committee working president Vijay Kumar Misra welcomed the delegates on behalf of the committee.

Earlier, the DYFI president N N Krishnadas placed the resolution paying homage to the martyrs who have sacrificed their lives for the youth and democratic movement, in defence of national unity and secularism since the 6th conference. The long list of martyrs, particularly from Tripura, underscored the fact that the DYFI is the only youth organisation with a continuing record of standing up against forces of secession and fundamentalism of all sorts. The delegates paid homage by observing two minutes silence. The conference also paid homage to leaders of the Left and democratic movement and other towering personalities who passed away in the period since the 6th conference.

The DYFI vice president K N Balagopal introduced the foreign fraternal delegates from Vietnam, North Korea, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Burma and WFDY who were attending the conference. He also read out messages of greetings sent by the youth movements of Brazil, Sweden, Greece and China. The Vietnamese delegate was greeted with enthusiastic slogans of Mere Naam, Tere Naam - Vietnam by the delegates.

POL-ORG REPORT

The DYFI general secretary Tapas Sinha introduced the draft political-organisational report in the conference. The report takes stock of the national and international situation, the important campaigns and activities conducted, and the state of organisation in the period since the 6th conference was held on April 6-10, 2000, in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala.

Noting that there is growing resistance against imperialist globalisation with newer forms of struggles building up both in advanced capitalist countries and in developing countries, the report stressed the necessity of building up a powerful anti-imperialist movement in our country.

Taking stock of the national situation, the report detailed the all round attacks on common people, the communal threat, the challenges to national unity, the disastrous economic policies of the BJP-led government and its impact on people, the cultural offensive of the imperialist globalisation on the one hand and that of the BJP-RSS combine on the other. The report devoted a lengthy section on the burning issue of unemployment and called for the DYFI to play a “pro-active role to fight for new employment opportunities” while at the same time fighting against the regime exploiting the existing workforce. This section of the report ends by highlighting the need for winning over newer sections of youth through consistent struggles on people’s issues. This would make it easier for rallying the people behind a Left-People’s alternative.

The second part of the report details the major campaigns and struggles undertaken after the 6th conference, prominent among them being the struggle in Kerala against the government repression on Adivasis, the campaign against communal forces, Tripura solidarity campaign etc. It calls for improvement in the organisation’s capability for effective and sustained campaigning in order to combat the intensive ideological offensive against it.

The third part of the report is devoted to matters relating to organisation. While noting that the membership growth rate was steady during the period since the last conference, the unevenness in the spread has been underlined. West Bengal and Kerala account for 1,07,08,544 out of the total 1,25,98,135 membership i.e. 85.01 per cent. Referring to this, the report says “The weakness in membership enrolment persists in the Hindi heartland areas. More attention must be given to weaker states so that this unevenness can be reduced.” The experience of Jammu and Kashmir state unit which, through proper planning and taking up of local issues, witnessed steady growth in membership, needs to be emulated by other states, noted the report.

The states which registered continuous growth in membership since the 6th conference were West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chattisgarh and Uttaranchal. Stressing the importance of membership, the report states “The experience of strong states has shown that wherever the concept of mass membership has been implemented, our organisation has moved forward and achieved success in expanding its base.”

There is a separate section dealing with the specific problems in weaker states. It suggests that proper planning must be made to target certain priority areas having potential and developing the movement in those areas and then spreading out to newer areas.

The report calls for increasing the strength for waging effective political-ideological struggle in the wake of increasing offensive of the reactionary forces. It concludes stating that today’s situation demands as urgent task of building a powerful anti-imperialist and anti-communal movement in the country. And for this there is a need to consolidate and expand the mass base through struggles and by further advancing the unity of the youth.

DISCUSSIONS

A total of 45 delegates from 25 states participated in the discussion on the political-organisational report. They contributed to the report through their suggestions, criticisms and experiences of their struggles and organisation. They were unanimous that the impact of globalisation is very high on youth, manifested in the form of high unemployment, inaccessible education, cultural degeneration, consumerism, drug-addiction etc. Some delegates stressed that resisting the cultural invasion should be an important part of DYFI’s activities. Almost everyone appreciated the initiative of the all India centre to conduct region wise study camps and to organise the first all India young women and tribal conventions. However, they pointed out the need for strengthening the centre functioning. There was a suggestion that for achieving a breakthrough in the Hindi-belt areas, and indeed through out the country, the DYFI should take up the issues of unemployment and social oppression in a big way. The experience of Tamilnadu was quoted in this regard. Many delegates called for the DYFI playing a more active role in the coming World Social Forum meetings in Mumbai.

CONCLUDING SESSION

The DYFI general secretary Tapas Sinha replying to the discussion on November 9, exhorted the cadres to go to the villages, slums, colonies, factories and wherever else the youth were and speak to them, educate them on their problems and organise them. He said the DYFI has to prepare for the challenges ahead and increase its strength accordingly. He announced that the DYFI central executive committee has accepted all the suggestions and proposals made by those participating in the discussion.

The conference then unanimously adopted the political-organisational report.

The former all India president of the SFI, Sitaram Yechury, addressing the conference on the last day made a passionate appeal to the DYFI to rise to the occasion of saving India from the joint clutches of the imperialist-communalist forces. He called upon the DYFI cadres to take up as a priority the task of combating all forms of communalism, which were aiming to disrupt the unity of youth. “The US imperialism and the RSS communalism were collaborating in a project to Saudi-Arabianise India i.e. to make it a rabidly communal, authoritarian and pro-imperialist State. This project has to be exposed by the DYFI and other democratic forces”, said Sitaram. Referring to the extremist problem in Punjab, J&K and the communal pogrom in Gujarat, he asked the DYFI cadres to reflect how the youth is falling into the trap of these disruptive forces. He said the vested political interests were diverting the youth into these movements by misutilising the religious sentiments. Emphasising that Congress party cannot counter these forces as it has often compromised with communalism, Sitaram declared that a real alternative could only be the Left and progressive sections. The core of that alternative can only be the Left, which intends to carry forward the freedom struggle to its logical conclusion by bringing in socialism. He said history would judge how best the principal progressive youth organisation DYFI has been able to contribute to this struggle.

Sitaram dwelt at length on the present international situation. He pointed out four important consequences of the US efforts to impose its hegemony on all parts of the world and in all sectors of society.

1)      it was resulting in the economic recolonisation of the third world

2)      there is a big military offensive to achieve this hegemony

3)      there is greater intervention in domestic politics of third world countries by the US, which is          evident in our country also

4)      world has become more unsafe place today as the US state terror, in the name of fighting           terrorism, was unleashing individual terror. Both feed on each other.

Sitaram wanted the youth to realise the gravity of the international situation and from that to make efforts to broaden the fight against imperialism. Referring to the positive aspect of the growing anti-war and anti-globalisation, he emphasised the need to merge these two streams into a powerful current against imperialism. At the same time he pointed out the dubious role of some o the NGO’s in the anti-globalisation struggle. He said these groups were deliberately taking this position in order to act as a pressure-cooker safety valve at the behest of the imperialists.

RESOLUTIONS

The conference adopted a total of 24 resolutions on various aspects. The issues ranged from unemployment, land reforms, education, right to strike, reservation in private sector, right to strike, tribal rights, caste discrimination, empowerment of women, terrorism, culture, national youth policy to the emphatic reiteration that “Socialism Is the Future” and against the US occupation of Iraq. A resolution was also adopted condemning the Jaylalitha government for suppressing freedom of expression by attacking the reputed daily The Hindu. Another resolution calling for unconditional talks with all shades of groups operating in J&K, including those outside the democratic process, was adopted by the conference.