17th Congress Call Unitedly Forward

Harkishan Singh Surjeet

THE Party Congress is the "supreme organ of the Party," and therefore constitutes a vital moment in the life of the Party. It elects the Central Committee, the "highest authority of the Party between two Congresses." This election of the Central Committee takes place after a thorough discussion has been held on the international and national situations, a review made of changes and the implementation of the Party policies since the last Congress, and the Party policies changed or modified to meet the challenges of the new situation.

The Congress is preceded by conferences at all levels of the organization, to 1) review the political-organizational work at their particular level, and 2), to enable discussion of the Draft Political Report, submitted by the CC, by all units of the Party, and their comments on the same. A testimony to the richness of our inner party democracy is the large number of amendments the Central Committee receives at every Congress, from comrades all over the country. This year some 4,780 amendments to, and 697 suggestions and comments on the Draft Political Resolution were received by the Central Committee; 98 of these pre-Congress amendments, suggested by more than 400 comrades, were accepted by the Central Committee.

The 17th Congress of the CPI(M) was held this year between March 19-24, in Hyderabad, the land of the glorious Telegana struggle.

The first three days of the Congress were mainly devoted to the presentation, discussion, and adoption of the political resolution. Scanning the international situation, the resolution noted the dramatic changes that have taken place since the last Congress particularly after the September 11 incident. Seizing on this catastrophe, President Bush declared the so-called "war against terrorism," characterising all those who would not stand with the US as being with the terrorists. Subsequently, he is using this incident to browbeat countries in the developing world into accepting US hegemony, and to launch wars of aggression not only in Afghanistan, but also other countries. Iraq seems to be his next target. He speaks about the "axis of evil" that runs through many country such as Iran, Iraq, North Korea, and Libya. Next, he has unilaterally abrogated the anti-ballistic missile "ABM Treaty", and followed it up with announcement of the US plans to further the threat of nuclear warfare by building the notorious "National Missile Defense (NMD). The crucial test in NMD was coincided with the eve of our Party Congress. Such acts constitute a threat to world peace, and is forging a strategic understanding between China and Russia. The aftermath of September 11 has been marked by a reactionary offensive all over the world. The worst instance of this is what is happening today in Palestine. In violation of all four United Nations Security Council resolutions, the US is openly backing the Sharon government’s aggression on Palestinian territories. Arafat has been blockaded in his own house and refused permission to leave his town. This has come in the background of a deepening of the world economic crisis of which we warned in our 16th Congress. The crisis been characterized by synchronization of the business cycle, severe financial crises, and a number of dramatic collapses of economies, the most the recent, but certainly not the last, being Argentina. In expected fashion imperialism is ruthlessly proceeding to transfer the burden to the backs of the developing world. The policies of the triumvirate the IMF, World Bank, and WTO, are directed to this goal, undermining the sovereignty of nations and subjugating them to the globalization process. But the new feature is that this imperialist offensive is meeting with a popular resistance that has begun to take on global dimensions. New forms of action and struggle against globalization are emerging not only in the developing world, but in the advanced capitalist countries as well. A regrouping of Communist and progressive forces is also taking place in this period. All these developments are noted in the resolution. At the national level, to remove BJP from the seat of power has become of paramount importance. -Back in 1988, the 13th Congress, seeing and warning of the dangers of the BJP ascendancy, even though it had not yet become the ruling party, gave the slogan of "Defeat The Congress and Isolate The BJP."

· By the 15th Congress in 1995, the BJP menace had become both real and alarming, and we gave the slogan of "Defeat Both The Congress and The BJP."

· When the 16th Congress met in Calcutta in 1998, the BJP had already assumed power. This brought about a basic change in the situation. The developments since then have fully borne out the assessment that we made in 1998.

The current Political Resolution summarizes the impact of four years of BJP government in the following five points:

· "A continuous assault on the secular principles of the state, the penetration of RSS into the state apparatus and vicious attacks on the minorities.

· An accelerated pursuit of the economic policies of liberalization and privatization, which has increased the exploitation of the people, and social inequalities.

· A foreign policy directed at making India a junior partner of the USA, by a government which is the most pro-imperialist government independent India has ever seen.

· A systematic plan for communalizing society through eroding the secular content of the educational system and assaults on our composite cultural values.

· Growing authoritarian threats to democracy and widespread corruption in governance."

Thirty eight delegates participated in the discussion on the Political Resolution. The discussion highlighted the growing communalization and its threat to national unity and a peaceful life. Minorities have been systematically targeted in many parts of the county, and the recent anti-Muslim pogrom in Gujarat is a pointer to the future. The way RSS-controlled outfits behaved in recent days on the question of Ayodhya makes it clear that they would not hesitate in taking recourse to lies, deceit, and conspiratorial methods. The communal menace was the theme of a number of separate resolutions such as "On the Ayodhya Issue," "Against Communalization of Education," and "On The Communal Carnage in Gujarat." AGRARIAN SITUATION Yet another important focus of the discussion was the deepening agrarian crisis in the country. The crisis has affected all sections of the peasantry, forcing even rich peasants into agitation. The agricultural laborers and poor peasants have been the worst sufferers as exemplified by the starvation deaths reported from various parts of the country, despite the 62 million tonnes of stock of food grains. The Congress adopted a separate resolution "On the Grim Agrarian Situation," which called upon the peasants and agricultural workers to rally round an 8-point charter of demands which included: restrictions on imports, remunerative prices, strengthening of the public distribution system, and food-for-work program. The resolution also emphasized the basic needs of agricultural workers and the need for a omprehensive social security legislation for them. Another issue emphasized by the delegates focused on the threat to the federal system and the need to restructure Center-State relations. A separate resolution on this theme was also adopted, which amongst other things, highlighted the conditionalities being linked to Central assistance, in clear violation of the spirit of the Constitution. This issue gives scope for greater interaction with regional parties and also the need for coordination among the state governments. GROWING DISCONTENT Our Party has been in the forefront of the struggle against the anti-people, anti-national, and anti-secular policies of the BJP government. The discontent among the people is growing day by day. During the last four years the BJP and its allies have suffered defeat in as many as 19 of the 23 Assembly elections. But a democratic alternative to the BJP-led NDA did not emerge in many of these states. In many states, in the absence of a democratic alternative, the Congress Party gained. Where a viable alternative force was seen to exist in a state, the people voted for it in place of the Congress. This is what happened in UP where the Samajvadi Party has emerged as the leading force. As BJP attempts to implement its hidden agenda, discontent among the NDA allies has also been growing. Though the NDA is a fragile combination, it remains intact from the the sole desire of remaining in power. The Political Resolution reiterated the importance of a third force at the national level, as an alternative to the BJP and Congress. A step towards this was the formation of the People’s Front, consisting of the Left parties and some of the secular opposition parties. POLITICAL-ORGANISATIONAL REPORT The Political Organizational Report undertook the review of the United Front experience both at the national and at the state level. A self-critical review of the United Front tactics revealed that for various reasons the Party’s independent strength has not grown. Further, the United Front tactics have been mainly confined to the electoral sphere. In order to provide a basis for developing, organizing, and expanding the Party’s multifaceted activities, and rallying the Left and democratic forces, a nine-point program of Left and Democratic Forces has been put forward. These slogans concern: Defense of national unity and secularism Federalism Democratic structure Economic policy Rights of the working people For people’s welfare For development For social justice Foreign policy. The Resolution emphasized the importance of the development of the independent strength and role of the Party. greater emphasis has to be layed on our independent political campaigns and mass movements. United Front tactics must be used to advance our influence. Party membership had shown a 10.9 percent growth between the two Congresses, to a total membership of 7,96,073. The total membership of the mass organizations has also exhibited an 8.7 percent growth to reach 40 million members. Even though this is a creditable achievement, certain disconcerting trends were noted in the Political Organizational Report. First was the persistent uneveness of development — thus while most of the increase has come from West Bengal, Kerala, and Tripura, there has been a decline in the Party membership and membership of some of the key mass organizations in the Hindi-speaking states. The Review Report also noted that the quality of membership was also not satisfactory in terms of ideological firmness and involvement in political work. The representation of women, minorities, and dalits was also low. A number of rectification measures have been proposed to reactivate the various organs of the Party and to improve the quality and spread of the membership. Most important among them are ideological work, particularly Party education, and launching of mass actions and struggles. The following have been identified as immediate organizational tasks: i)strengthening the Party centre, ii) rapid expansion of the Party, especially in the weaker states; iii) strengthening the ideological work; iv) improvement of quality of membership recruitment, functioning of auxiliary groups and branches; v) rectification campaign to strengthen democratic centralism, weaken parliamentarianism, and for adherence to Communist norms. Twenty-two fraternal parties sent delegations to the Party Congress. Some of the Communist Parties, including the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, which for internal reasons, could not participate in the Congress, sent messages. The delegates from the fraternal parties attended both the presentation as well as deliberations on the Reports. NEW CC A 79-member Central Committee was constituted (two seats were not filled at the Congress), of whom eight are women. The Congress concluded with a mass rally on the 24th of March. The resounding turnout of people at the rally reflected the rapid advance the Party and mass movements have been making in Andhra Pradesh in the recent period. Our Party has been in the forefront of militant agitations against the globalization policies of the Chandra Babu Naidu government, such as the electricity workers’ and road transport workers’ strikes. The Party has also been taking up the issues of the rural poor and questions of social justice. The strong revolutionary legacy of Andhra Pradesh is undergoing a renaissance.