As the ruins of its lost bastion in Tripura are inspected, CPI(M) mandarins prepare to decide on an alliance with the Congress
The CPI(M)-led Left Front바카라s steep fall in the recent Tripura Assembly election바카라ending its 25-year old rule and bringing a BJP-led coalition to power here for the first time바카라has brought back to boil the debate that has been roiling the party: whether an alliance with the Congress was the need of the hour.
Though the Congress is not being named, the resolution at the end of the five-day state conference of the CPI(M) in Calcutta (from March 5-9) may end with a call for uniting with all 바카라democratic and secular바카라 forces to deal with the bete noire number one바카라the BJP.
A similar proposal, contained in a resolution moved by CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury at the party바카라s central committee meeting in New Delhi in January, was resoundingly defeated in a 55-31 vote by the delegates. The main opposition to Yechury바카라s proposal comes from CPI(M) leaders from Kerala바카라the only state where the CPI(M) is in power and where its main rival is the Congress. This position was explicitly reiterated by Kerala party leader M.A. Baby recently. Leaders from Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh are also strongly behind the Kerala comrades on this.
Mohammad Selim, a central committee and politburo member of the CPI(M), says that this was a key issue to be discussed at the party congress in Hyderabad next month. 바카라It is not just about Congress, it s for joining with all secular democratic parties against communal forces. Of course, it will be reviewed in the context of Tripura poll results. A stronger endorsement could emerge for following such an electoral tactic but it can바카라t be stated with any certainty yet.바카라
Optimists in the party바카라s Bengal unit feel that even states which earlier shrank from the idea of joining forces with the Congress are now having a re-think. CPI(M) leaders from UP, Bihar and Maharashtra are likely to support the proposal, since they too face the immediate challenge of an ascendant BJP.
The mood swing among many delegates at the Calcutta conference, party insiders say, was interesting to watch. Many who were till recently sceptical of an alliance with the Congress, especially after the discouraging experience in the 2016 Assembly election in West Bengal, are now aghast at the looming BJP threat in Bengal. The way the Hindutva group was gobbling up political space to emerge as the main opposition to Mamata Banerjee바카라s rule has set alarm bells ringing among them.
Basudeb Majumdar, a four-time former CPI(M) MLA from Belonia, acknowledges that the idea of fighting the BJP along with the Congress had been discussed before the polls. 바카라It was not an option during the Tripura elections. Communists and the Congress have different ideologies and approaches to issues,바카라 he points out. He adds hurriedly, 바카라That바카라s not to say there will never be such an arrangement. It is the party바카라s decision.바카라
A dispassionate and objective analysis of the reasons behind the party바카라s debacle in Tripura might take a while. At present, reasons are sought by party sympathisers.
바카라The 25-year-old Communist regime in Tripura was nothing like the 34-year old Left rule in West Bengal,바카라 says Swapan Chandra Muhuri. The former resident of a remote village from Tripura, who is in the unique position of comparing the two Communist regimes, tells Outlook, 바카라The Left바카라s realities in the two neighbouring states are poles apart.바카라
An agricultural trader in Calcutta for the past two decades, he recalls what he calls the 바카라extremely efficient administration바카라 of the Manik Sarkar government when he was a student at Tripura바카라s Belonia College, where a statue of Lenin was razed to the ground recently. Muhuri has seen the video of the demolition, and it leaves him incredulous. 바카라This is not the Belonia, or the Tripura, of my childhood and youth,바카라 he rues.
Muhuri doesn바카라t think people in Tripura harbour so much bottled-up rage as to attack symbols of Communism. It바카라s not like in Bengal, he says, where people were fed up with the party as it infiltrated every institution바카라administrative, bureaucratic, educational, even police바카라denying jobs, government benefits and other opportunities to 바카라outsiders바카라 or non-party people for decades. 바카라Unlike in Bengal,바카라 he says, 바카라before elections, even in the backward villages like mine, we didn바카라t find CPI(M) cadres intimidating voters into staying away. Local administration, even in the remotest regions, functioned well; we had drinking water taps and electricity in most houses.바카라
Muhuri attributes the Left바카라s downfall to 바카라the failure to adapt to the times바카라. According to Muhuri, 바카라All three CPI(M) CMs of Tripura바카라Nripen Chakraborty, Dashrath Deo and Manik Sarkar바카라had clean images. They were impeccable Communists, each leading austere lives. During their rule, there was justice, but it was not enough. People got tired of the Left바카라s inability to go beyond Marxism and Leninism. They wanted progress, development and a share of the excitement that the mainland offers.바카라
바카라They just seemed to be stuck in the past. They were not doing anything to move forward,바카라 said an Agartala schoolteacher, who 바카라didn바카라t vote for the CPI(M)바카라 for the first time.
However, Tripura Communists feel it was their inability to nail the BJP바카라s lie that cost them the state. Majumdar, the former Belonia MLA, says, 바카라Our failure was that we were unable to call out the BJP바카라s lies and convince people that they were making false promises.바카라
He says that the BJP poll promise of jobs to members of every household in Tripura was an implausible claim a realistic CPI(M) never made. 바카라We tried our best, over the past two-and-a-half decades, to provide employment to the needy, the meritorious and the deserving, but our approach was grounded, honest and not beyond the realms of the possible.바카라 Clearly, the approach failed to impress large numbers of young voters.
The party, however, has not given up all hope in Tripura. It has perfect reason not to.
바카라You have to remember that almost every other administrative body in Tripura continues to be controlled by the Left Front,바카라 points out Pradip Muhuri, a 바카라mohokuma-level바카라 party leader. 바카라From municipal corporations down to gram panchayats, Communists still rule.바카라
Bringing up the comparisons with Bengal, Pradip says: 바카라Before the Left Front lost power there in the 2011 assembly elections, there were many signs. The CPI(M) lost almost half its seats in the Parliamentary polls of 2009. But in Tripura, just six months earlier, the Left swept the assembly bypolls, as it did in panchayat-level elections in north Tripura less than two months ago.바카라
The change in electoral fortune, therefore, is being attributed to money and muscle power that the BJP employed to win. A CPI(M) cadre claimed that 바카라goons forcefully entered booths and handed bundles of cash바카라not less than 10 to 20 thousand rupees to each family.바카라
But there is no clear answer yet whether joining hands with the Congress will be the best option for comrades in Tripura to regain their lost pride.
By Pranay Sharma and Dola Mitra