People's Democracy

AKG BIRTH CENTENARY MEETING

‘Enrich The Party Politically, Ideologically’

B Prasant

THE CPI(M) leadership addressing the birth centenary meeting of the late Comrade A K Gopalan stressed upon the need to enrich the Party further politically and ideologically while remembering all the while the rich heritage the Party has inherited from the past struggles and movements.  Comrade A K Gopalan was verily the epitome of struggles and movements even as he worked for the political-ideological advancement of the Party.  A meeting was held on the occasion of the birth centenary of Comrade AKG at the Promode Dasgupta Bhavan on October 3 that was presided over by the Party’s central committee member, Benoy Konar.

Reminiscing about Comrade AKG, senior CPI(M) leader, Jyoti Basu said that Comrade AKG worked as a freedom fighter, and then among the workers and the rural poor as a member of the Communist Party.  Basu pointed out that Comrade AKG attached the greatest importance to work among the kisans and the khet mazdoors.  His name featured along those of Comrade EMS Namboodiripad and Comrade P Krishna Pillai as the trio under whose leadership and close guidance, the Communist Party could grow up in Kerala.

Recalling his long association with Comrade AKG, Jyoti Basu said that they had worked together for a very long time in the undivided Communist Party and later in the CPI(M).  Comrade AKG coordinated very well efforts inside and outside of the parliament; a good speaker, even those opposed to his ideology listened to his parliamentary oratory with rapt attention.  Comrade AKG’s speeches contained the liveliness of experience of taking part in struggles and movements.  AKG would rush to all corners of India in support of struggles, and there was a saying in Delhi that “struggles mean Gopalan and the other way round.”  Never was a truer word said.  Basu recalled Comrade AKG’s comprehensive attack against ‘Emergency’ while addressing the issue in parliament.  Basu also recalled his long association with Comrade Sushila Gopalan who was a women’s leader of proven dedication.  Both were extremely popular among the people, Basu said.

Jyoti Basu said that the immense sacrifices made by leaders like Comrade AKG and Comrade BTR, among others, contributed in no small measure to the building up of the Party.  The CPI(M) might be a small presence nationwide but it carried a high level of prestige and honour.  Even the bourgeois parties can ill afford to ignore it.  Basu said that there was a peculiar situation prevailing in the country where there was a need to conditionally support the Congress because of the necessity to prevent the BJP from making a comeback.  The same Congress that, said Basu, “we have opposed for four-and-a-half decades.”  Efforts should be made all the while to strengthen the mass base of the Party and to push forward its influence across the country, declared Basu who also called for the flourishing of the mass organisations.

State secretary of the CPI(M), Anil Biswas said that the Bengal unit of the Party would observe an ideological drive for the next three months, remembering all the while the contributions made by Comrade AKG and Comrade BTR.  The discussions that will follow shall strengthen the ideological basis of the Party.  The discussions shall also help the process of preparing the political-ideological document that will be placed at the forthcoming party Congress.

Comrade AKG, said Anil Biswas, was a skilled parliamentarian and he has left an example of how a Communist should use the parliamentary democracy and in what manner.  He would constantly draw attention of the house to the plight as well as the struggles of the poor.  He avoided all the ill effects of the parliamentary system.  The Party had but a few representatives in the parliament.  Today there are 60 Left MPs of whom 44 belong to the Party.  The responsibility of the CPI(M) in the arena of the parliament has increased manifold.  With Comrade AKG as an example, the Party must organise struggles within and without of the parliament for otherwise, a fatal attraction for parliamentarianism might well grow and take the form of a disease.

Comrade AKG, said Biswas, was the people’s warrior and he would mingle feely amidst the masses.  This was a source of strength for the Party.  It is regrettable but true that in some places, the people have to approach the Party leadership —this is not a symbol of strength of the Party.  The Party may not be able to solve all and every problem that burdens the people. But that does never mean that approaching the people and listening to them should be done away with. Any error and mistake in this direction must be rectified forthwith.

Biswas also dwelt on how Comrade AKG had correctly understood the Indian society and the contradictions that it contained.  In pre-independence India, said Biswas, the Communist movement flourished in a many-splendour fashion. The Communist movement grew around the armed struggles organised in Bengal, and the movements and struggles led by Bhagat Singh and the Gadar Party in the Punjab.  The Congress Socialist Party grew up in Kerala under the leadership of EMS-AKG-Krishna Pillai.  The base of the latter movement was to be found in the realm of social injustice and struggles against it.  Comrade AKG had gone in for satyagraha in support of the demand that people of the lower castes must be allowed entrance inside a temple.  The movement against the economic and social oppression of the low caste people gradually spread across the land and was not confined to that temple alone.  Later, the movement served to bolster the historical peasant rebellion of Malabar.

The Communists, said Biswas, never struck a compromise with the British rulers and they had to suffer long jail sentences. To keep up the struggle against imperialism, Comrade AKG and Comrade BTR should serve as the sources of inspiration for the Party, was how Biswas put it.  Biswas also noted that there were attempts being made to distort the history of India’s freedom movement.  He recalled the role of the workers, peasants, students, and youth as well as women in the struggle and said that history books even now did not reflect this reality.  Biswas said that a study of the lives of Comrade Muzaffar Ahmad, Comrade EMS, Comrade AKG, and Comrade BTR would depict the great role of the toiling masses in the freedom struggle. Biswas denigrated the attempts made by the communal BJP to distort history.

Benoy Konar said that ideological struggles were very important for a Communist Party and he noted that without that struggle it would not be possible for the Left Front government to remain in office in Bengal. The people must be made to realise that the Party was engaged in struggling towards socialism. An attempt cannot be made to build socialism in Bengal alone in the midst of the present social system.  If the masses are not made to understand this, they will blame not the society but the Party for the ills and evils that exist.  Konar also raised a resolution denoting a three-month-long ideological campaign statewide on the commencement of the birth centenary of Comrade AKG and the conclusion of the birth centenary of Comrade BTR.