People's Democracy
(Weekly Organ of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)
No. 30
July 28, 2013
|
Vol. XXXVII
No. 30 July 28, 2013 |
Samarda Will Always be Remembered
A K Padmanabhan OUR beloved
Samarda is no more. A
great revolutionary who gave us the rarest
of rare opportunities to observe his birth centenary in
his presence has passed
away after eight months of completing a century. He has left all
of us with many everlasting
memories about his selfless life and activities. It is of much
interest for the
present generation to know that he was expelled from
school and imprisoned for
the first time in 1929, for organising a campaign in his
school in support of the
Salt Satyagraha. This
prison term was for
only six days, but many more periods of imprisonment
followed that. He was involved
in organising workers
from his early days.
At the same time he
was also organising the peasants in his home district of
Howrah. From
1936 onwards he was leading the workers
and peasants in
Even when
Comrade Samarda was
involved in multifarious activities, he was active in
organising workers. ROLE
IN THE
CITU He was one of
the founders of the CITU
and was elected as working committee member in the
founding conference.
And from the Second Conference in 1973 until 2003,
he was leading the CITU in various capacities – as
treasurer, secretary,
general secretary and vice-president.
From 1983 to 1991, he was the CITU general
secretary, and from 1991 to
2003 he was vice-president of the CITU. He was in the
forefront of the
country’s trade union movement, constantly travelling to
different parts of the
country. He
led the movement with a
clear-cut vision, true to his steadfast belief in the
struggle for ending the
exploitative system and for the establishment of a new and
just society. In 1974, in the
historic railway men’s
strike, he played a leading role as a member of the
National Coordination
Committee for Railway Men’s Struggle (NCCRS).
He, along with Comrade Nrisingha Chakraborty,
secretary CITU,
represented the CITU in the committee. The brutal
oppression of the railway men
by the Congress government, even using the Army along with
various police
forces at their command, is a part of history now. Hundreds of
thousands of workers were victimised. Black
legislations like the Essential Services
Maintenance Ordinance and Maintenance of Internal Security
Act were used
freely. 50,000 workers were put in jail.
Nearly 8000 were summarily dismissed.
Many workers were killed by the police.
The strike started on May 8 and went on for more
than 10 days. On
May 15, a countrywide solidarity strike
was organised. Comrade
Samar Mukherjee,
along with others, guided this historic struggle. The
victimisation continued for years and
even after the change of government in 1977, leaders like
Comrade Samarda had to
make continuous efforts to get the workers reinstated. After the
railway strike, it was
during the Emergency that he, as deputy leader of the
CPI(M) in the Lok Sabha,
played a stellar role in exposing the authoritarian
regime. He
took up the cause of those who were being
imprisoned and also various issues of workers at that
time, though the
opportunities to settle them were very rare.
In his hard
hitting speech in parliament,
in November 1976, opposing the Bill to extend the life of
the parliament during
Emergency, he lashed out at the government’s authoritarian
move and also
answered critics of the Communist Party on the right to
fight for
democracy. It
was a speech quoting extensively
from Marxist literature.
He said “Democracy
means that the people should be the
real sovereign to decide the charter of the government
and the basic polices of
the government and basic policies of the country. But here, in
the name of sovereignty of parliament,
the party in majority, though representing the minority
voters, is trying to
stabilise their privileged position by taking advantage
of the Emergency”.
He had referred
in detail to the huge
concessions to monopolists and suppression of democratic
rights all over the
country and warned the rulers – Fortunately
for you, people are not alive to reality, but reality
will dawn. You
cannot expect that people will remain dumbfounded. It is a part of
history now, that people did
not remain dumbfounded and the authoritarian forces were
thrown out by the
people at the earliest opportunity available to them
through general elections
in March 1977. LEADING THE ACTIONS Comrade Samar
Mukherjee was elected
as general secretary of the CITU in 1983 and continued in
that position till
1991. This
was a period when there were
countrywide united actions including strike struggles from
joint platforms like
the National Campaign Committee. Other
than united general strikes, various sections of workers
went on sectoral
countrywide actions.
Comrade Samar took
up leading roles in all these struggles and visited
various centres of
struggles, travelling extensively all over the county. Comrade Samarda
had also taken up the
issues connected with various sections of employees and
workers, especially
those related to governmental sectors.
He guided them in their struggles and also took up
their issues
meticulously with the government and pursued these
regularly. As a member of
parliament for more
than 25 years, Samarda was in the forefront of raising
issues related to the working
people. As a
member of parliament, he
worked as a true representative of Indian workers, not
only of his constituency
or state. During his first
term itself, he was
deputy leader of the CPI(M) group in the Lok Sabha. Comrade A K
Gopalan was the leader at that
time. This
writer had direct experience
of the impact of the work done by Samarda. In the year
1975, comrades from
Tripura including Comrade Nripen Chakraborty were detained
in Vellore Jail and
they were not even allowed visitors.
With special permission from the home ministry,
Samarda came to Chennai
and proceeded to Only after
reaching Samarda could I
understand what had happened. As soon as
the TTE noted that the passenger is Samar Mukherjee MP, he
touched his feet and
was emotionally overwhelmed and tears started pouring out
of his eyes. He
later explained that he had faced some
victimisation but was not at fault. He
had written to leaders of many parties and Samarda was one
of them. Samarda had
taken up the issue with the authorities and settled it. The TTE said
that he had never imagined that
he could ever meet the leader who had helped him and when
he did meet him, he was
overcome with emotion. He went on thanking him for helping
an unknown worker. This would only
be one incident of an
umpteen number of cases of various sections he had taken
up as a representative
of the Indian working class. Comrade
Samarda’s life is an example
of serving the people
and of self
effacing sacrifice for the cause of the people. His
steadfastness and
commitment to the cause of the revolutionary movement will
forever be the
guiding spirit for the generations to come. Samarda will
always be remembered for
his great contributions!
