Life Sketch Of Jyoti Basu

Jyoti Basu was born on 8th July, 1914 at Kolkata. His father Nishikanta Basu and mother Hemlata Devi lived in Kolkata though their ancestral home was in village Bardi in Dhaka. Nishikanta Basu was an eminent homeopath doctor. Jyoti Basu spent his childhood in Kolkata, mostly in their house in Hindusthan Park in South Kolkata, where he lived the most part of his life too.

Jyoti Basu passed his Senior Cambridge and Intermediate from St Xaviers’ school and later was admitted in Presidency College with Honours in English. Though not an active political family, Basu’s father was supportive of the national struggle. While in school, Basu was inspired by the Chittagong armed rebellion led by Surya Sen in 1930.

In 1935, Basu went to England to study law. In a volatile international situation, during his university days, his political thoughts were shaped in ideological debates against fascism. Basu became an active member of the India League, a body of Indian students, led by V.K Krishna Menon. Among others, Bhupesh Gupta and Snehangshukanta Acharya were his friends in student days. Jyoti Basu gradually came into contact with leaders of the Communist Party of Great Britain . He began to participate in Marxist Study Circles and joined in the activities of the Communist Groups in London, Oxford, and Cambridge. He came in close contact with Harry Pollit, Rajni Palme Dutt, Ben Bradley and other leaders of CPGB. They had a great influencing role in shaping the ideas and life of young Basu. Jyoti Basu became the first secretary of London Majlis, an association of Indians. They felicitated Jawharlal Nehru in London. Basu decided that he would join the Communist Party after returning to India.

Basu returned to India in 1940 and immediately contacted the Party leaders. Though he enrolled himself as a barrister in Calcutta High Court, he never practiced simply because he was determined to become a wholetimer of the Party.

Basu became the secretary of Friends of Soviet Union and Anti-Fascist Writers’ Association in Kolkata. As member of the Party, the initial task of Basu was to maintain liaison with underground Party leaders. He was entrusted responsibilities in the trade union front from 1944. In that year, Bengal Assam Railroad Workers’ Union was formed and Basu became its first secretary. Basu was elected to Bengal Provincial Assembly in 1946 from the Railway Workers constituency. Ratanlal Bramhan and Rupnarayan Roy were the other two Communists who were elected. From that day on, Basu became one of the most popular and influential legislators for decades to come. He showed how the Communists can use the legislative forums for strengthening struggles.

Basu played a very active role in stormy days of 1946-47 when Bengal witnessed the Tebhaga movement, workers strikes and even communal riots. Everywhere the struggling people got Basu by their side.

Jyoti Basu was the secretary of the West Bengal Provincial Committee of the Party from 1953 to January 1961. He was elected to Central Committee of the Party in 1951. He was a member of the Polit Bureau from 1964 onwards. He was elected as a special invitee to PB in 19th Congress of the Party in 2008.

After the country gained independence, he was elected to the assembly from Baranagar in 1952. He was elected to the West Bengal Legislative Assembly in 1952, 1957, 1962, 1967, 1969, 1971, 1977, 1982, 1987, 1991 and 1996. Though an elected member, Basu was arrested several times during the 1950s and 60s and for certain periods he went underground to evade arrest by the police.

In 1962, Jyoti Basu was one amongst the 32 members of the National Council who walked out of the meeting. When the CPI(M) was formed in 1964 as a result of the ideological struggle within the Communist movement, Basu became a member of the Polit Bureau. He was, in fact, the last surviving member of the “Navaratnas”, the nine members of the first Polit Bureau.

During the days of India-China border conflict, Basu, alongwith other leaders of the Party, were accused of being “agents of China” and faced attacks from the ruling class parties and the anti-Communist media.

1n 1967, Basu became the deputy Chief Minister in the first United Front Ministry and again in 1969. These two governments provided a great stimulus in unleashing mass and class struggle in West Bengal. Jyoti Basu played an important role in intertwining the struggle and running the government. In 1970, he narrowly escaped an assassination attempt at the Patna Railway Station by the Anandmargis. In 1971, Basu’s car and public meeting were attacked by Congress miscreants at least twice. Though CPI(M) became the single largest party in the assembly elections in 1971, the Party was refused the chance to form a ministry and Presidents’ Rule was imposed in West Bengal. The 1972 elections were rigged and Jyoti Basu was forced to boycott the elections. Basu famously declared the new assembly as “assembly of the frauds” and CPI(M) boycotted the assembly for the next five years. West Bengal faced severe repression and terror during the semi-fascist Congress regime in this period. The CPI(M) and the Left forces courageously fought the onslaught and Basu was one of the leading figures of that heroic resistance by the people.

In 1977, the Left Front Government was formed as a product of the democratic and mass struggles and Basu became the Chief Minister. He was 63 then. A new, vigorous era in his life began. The very first announcement by Basu after he was sworn in was that the government would not be run from Writers’ Building alone. The people would be very much part of it. Under Basu’s leadership, the LF government initiated far reaching measures in the interests of toiling people. The land reforms, decentralization through panchayats, guaranteeing trade union rights of the workers, giving widespread relief to different sections of the society, spread of education marked a radical departure in governance in our country. Under LF government, West Bengal witnessed excellent advancement in agriculture and later it was under his leadership that the state government took serious initiative in industrialization of the state. In office continuously for 24 years, Basu was the longest serving chief minister in the country.

One of the major contributions of Basu as Chief Minister was to raise the issue of Centre-State relations at the all India level. On the one hand, Basu led the struggle against discrimination against West Bengal and successfully built the Haldia Petro Chemicals, Bakreswar Thermal Power Station etc. On the other hand, he could mobilize other state governments and various political parties on the issue.

Jyoti Basu played a significant role in national politics and his intervention in important junctures proved to be crucial. Basu played a prominent role in mobilizing anti-Congress secular opposition forces during the regimes of Indira Gandhi ,Rajiv Gandhi and Narasimha Rao. He also played an important role in mobilizing secular forces against the communal BJP. In 1996, his name was proposed by the secular allies for Prime Ministership. But the CPI(M) Central Committee decided to support the government from outside.

Jyoti Basu was one of the main campaigners for the Party at the national level. He visited all the states and areas a number of times to address public meetings and rallies. He was particular about attending the open sessions of the CITU all India conferences.

Basu was all along associated with the trade union movement and was a champion of the cause of working class. He was a Vice President of CITU since its inception in 1970.

In November 2000, Basu voluntarily retired from Chief Ministership but he continued to lead the Party in West Bengal. Despite his ill health, Basu participated in Party meetings and in election campaign in 2006 also.

Basu’s wife Kamal Basu died some years ago. He is survived by his only son Chandan and three grandchildren.

Homage to Jyoti Basu

Condolence Resolution of the Polit Bureau

The Polit Bureau of the CPI (M) expresses its profound grief at the passing away of Comrade Jyoti Basu, senior most leader of the Party and one of the tallest leaders of the Communist movement in India who was the Chief Minister of the Left Front government of West Bengal from 1977 to 2000. He was 95 years old.

Jyoti Basu became a Communist while studying law in Britain. He came in contact with the British Communist party. He joined the Communist Party of India on his return in 1940. He began working in the railway trade union movement and became an important functionary of the B.A. Railroad Workers Union and the All India Railwaymen's Federation. In 1946,he was elected to the Bengal legislative assembly from a railway constituency.

He was the Secretary of the provincial committee of the CPI from 1953 to 1961. He became a member of the Central Committee of the CPI in 1951. When the CPI (M) was formed he became one of the founder Polit Bureau and Central Committee members, positions he continued in, till his death. He played a significant role in developing the CPI (M) in West Bengal along with Promode Dasgupta.

Jyoti Basu made his mark as the leader of the opposition in the assembly between 1957 and l967. He was twice Deputy Chief Minister in the United Front governments between 1967 and 1970. His role in the government in supporting the struggle for implementation of land reforms and in not allowing the police to be used against workers and peasants' struggles was notable.

Jyoti Basu belonged to the leadership of the CPI M) which steered the Party through the difficult days of semi-fascist terror in West Bengal in the early seventies. After the sweeping victory of the Left Front in 1977, Jyoti Basu became the Chief Minister of the Left Front government, a position he held continuously for more than 23 years, a record in the country. Under his leadership, the Left Front government embarked on land reforms on a scale unprecedented in the country; it instituted a panchayati raj system which was radical for its times, which gave the poor peasants and small farmers a say in running the panchayati institutions. West Bengal became an oasis of communal harmony and secular values under his leadership. One has to recall how as Chief Minister he dealt with the situation after the assassination of Indira Gandhi in 1984 when violence against Sikhs broke out in various parts of the country, but nothing was allowed to happen in West Bengal. Similarly he dealt firmly with efforts to instigate trouble after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992.

Jyoti Basu became a symbol for the Left, democratic and secular forces in the country. In West Bengal, the people adored him and respected him for his championing of their cause. He became the role model for all Communists and progressives on how to work in parliamentary institutions and serve the people. During this seven decades of work in the Communist party, he spent three and a half years in prison and two years underground.

Jyoti Basu as Chief Minister and as a Left leader played an important role in pushing for restructuring Centre-State relations and rallying other Chief Ministers and political leaders for the cause.

He played a prominent role in bringing together Left and secular parties against the Congress government in the nineteen eighties and later against the BJP in the nineties.

Jyoti Basu was a Marxist who never wavered in his convictions. After the fall of the Soviet Union and the setbacks to socialism, he provided the leadership along with his colleagues in the Polit Bureau to make a reappraisal of the experience of building socialism and to pinpoint the errors and to correct wrong notions and understandings while remaining true to Marxism-Leninism. He was a Marxist who was not dogmatic and continued to learn from his vast experience in charting out the course for the Party.

He emerged as the pre-eminent and most popular leader of the Party, but he always worked as a disciplined member of the Party, setting an example for all. In his long career in the Party, he undertook various responsibilities including being the first editor of People's Democracy. He had a lifelong association with the trade union movement and was the Vice-President of the Centre of Indian Trade Unions since its inception in 1970.

He stepped down from the Chief Ministership in 2000 due to ill health and advanced age. But he continued to work and discharge responsibilities till the end of his life. He became the source of inspiration and a fount of advice for the Party and the Left movement in the country. Irrespective of political affiliation, across the political spectrum, he was respected by all and accepted as a national leader.

The Left movement in the country was fortunate in having such an accomplished and dedicated leader at the helm of affairs in West Bengal and in the leadership of the CPI (M) for such a long time. His precious legacy is there for all of us to cherish and nurture.

The Polit Bureau salutes the memory of our beloved departed comrade. We pledge to carry forward his cause and work. We convey our heartfelt condolences to his son, Chandan Basu, granddaughters and other family members.

RED SALUTE COMRADE JYOTHI BASU

JYOTHI BASU (1914-2010)

Thunderbolt pays homage to Comrade Jyothi Basu. 

We pay floral tributes to the great mans memory.

Deshabhimani Malappuram Edition

Ninth edition of Deshabhimani, the malayalam mouthpiece of toiling masses will be inaugurated in the birth place of Com EMS Namboothiripad, Malappuram by Com. Pinarayi Vijayan, CPIM State Secretary. Inuagural function will be held at Perinthalmanna MSP Highschool Ground. As part of the inaugural ceremony various functions were organised in the different parts of the district. This is the first edition of Deshabhimani that is wholly dedicated to a single district.

REVERSE POLICIES TO CONTROL PRICE-RISE : CPIM

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has issued the following statement:

The Polit Bureau of the CPI (M) notes with grave concern that the WPI inflation rate climbed to 7.31% in December 2009 and inflation in food articles remained very high at 17.28% in the week ending 2^nd January 2010. The retail price of sugar has reached an unprecedented high of 50 rupees a kilo. Prices of cereals, pulses, vegetables and milk continue to rise. This reflects the utter failure of the Congress led Government in checking food prices and inflation.

The recent note issued by the Cabinet Committee on Prices shows that the Central Government wants to shirk its own responsibility by blaming the States. Without a proper assessment of the causes behind the relentless increase in food prices, effective measures cannot be undertaken. For example, one of the reasons for high sugar prices is the failure of the Central Government to build a sugar buffer stock. Instead the Government incentivised exports helping big traders and sugar mill owners. Sugar imports with a slew of concessions to importers since early last year have not resulted in lowering the retail price of sugar. Only the traders and big companies have profited, Some of the trading corporates have reported profits from 150 to 300 per cent. The Cabinet note does not address these issues but instead blames the States. In fact all the three Left led State Governments have removed VAT on sugar as have many others.

The Central Government’s faulty approach is evident in the decision to release buffer stocks of foodgrains in the open market rather than to provide it to State Governments at subsidized rates as a measure to restore the earlier cuts in allocations to APL sections. The issue price of so-called additional allocations of foodgrains being offered to State Governments is double the price of the earlier APL allocations. For example in Kerala the issue price of rice for APL allocations was Rs.8.90 per kilo. The monthly allocation of 1.13 lakh tonnes was slashed to just 17,000 tonnes. Now the additional foodgrains offered by the central Government is at Rs. 17 a kilo. Such is the hypocrisy of the Central Government on price rise!

Further, the threats being issued to State Governments that they will be bypassed and Central agencies like NAFED and NCCF will directly provide subsidized foodgrains, edible oil and pulses to consumers in the States is highly objectionable. This goes against the federal character of the Constitution. Besides it is common knowledge that these agencies have failed to deliver even on their present responsibilities given their limited outlets.

Even the homily to the State Governments to undertake dehoarding operations sound hollow when it is the Central Government which has liberalized inter-State movement of foodgrains and relaxed stockholding norms for private traders and corporates. At the same time speculative capital in the futures market continues to play havoc with commodity prices. Shockingly, in spite of continuing high prices in wheat, the earlier ban on future trading in wheat was lifted by the Central Government. Only Central Government can reissue the ban. Individual State Governments cannot make a dent on inflation through isolated actions in the neoliberal policy environment created by the Central Government. The Central Government follows policies which help hoarders and speculators and then blames State Governments for not taking action. Indeed it is the contradictory statements of different Central Ministers which are fuelling inflationary expectations.

The CPI (M) demands that the UPA Government take the following immediate steps in order to reign in food price inflation:

1. The Government must release cereal stocks through the PDS by increasing the rice and wheat quotas for the States. The Food Security legislation should be tabled without any further delay.

2. The Government must supply sugar, pulses and edible oils through PDS outlets at cheap rates.

3. Futures trading in all food articles must be immediately banned.

4. The Government, in coordination with the State Governments, must launch a countrywide crackdown against hoarding and black-marketing. All private traders of food articles must disclose their stocks and release surplus stocks.

5. Diesel and petrol prices must be brought down by cutting indirect taxes.

The Polit Bureau of the CPI (M) calls upon all its units to intensify the ongoing struggle against price rise till the Congress led Government initiates these steps in the coming days.

Rosa Luxemburg: an example of revolutionary struggle

Rosa Luxemburg (5 March 1871 – 15 January 1919)

Remembering a working-class hero

January 15 marks the anniversary of the 1919 assassination of communist leader Rosa Luxemburg. She, along with her comrade Karl Liebknecht, were leaders of the revolutionary Spartacus League in Germany. Both were murdered amid a revolutionary upsurge of German workers, which they had helped lead.

Throughout history, the ruling classes have attempted to eradicate the history of revolutionary figures or events. Women from the working-class movement in particular are written out of history. Their revolutionary ideals not only confront the capitalist class rule, but also the sexist and patriarchal framework that has characterized every form of class oppression.

But the memory of Rosa Luxemburg refuses to be buried. Every Jan. 15, tens of thousands of communists and socialists march to the Luxemburg and Liebknecht memorial with red carnations. The right-wing thugs who kidnapped and murdered Luxemburg and dumped her body in a Berlin canal wanted to stamp out any hope for the uprising of the working class in Germany. They failed.

Luxemburg was a noted leader of the German Social Democratic Party and the international socialist movement. She was at the center of many of the most pressing debates within the movement and was known for her eloquent oratorical skills.

To understand Luxemburg’s role and the impact she made on Germany and throughout the world, one must look at the series of events that shaped the life of "Red Rosa," as she was known.

Luxemburg was born in Poland on March 5, 1871, to a middle-class Jewish family of German origin. At the time, Poland was divided between German and Russian domination. It was the example throughout Europe of a poor and subjugated people exploited by the "great powers." Marx had described it in 1866: "The workers of Europe unanimously proclaim the restoration [independence] of Poland as a part and parcel of their political program."

Less than a decade before she was born, tens of thousands of Poles staged an armed uprising against the Russian czar beginning in January 1863. That uprising took over a year to put down, with thousands killed and thousands more deported by the czarist government.

Luxemburg attended the university in Warsaw, where she participated in the Polish revolutionary movement.

In 1889, she was forced to flee Poland to avoid imprisonment as a result of her political agitation. She moved to Zurich, Switzerland, where she continued both her education and her political work. While there, Luxemburg met several other political exiles, including members of the Russian Social Democratic Party Gregory Plekhanov and Pavel Axelrod.

In 1898, Luxemburg received her doctorate. Soon afterward, she moved to Germany, throwing herself into the work of the German Social Democratic Party.

The German Social Democratic Party (SPD) at that time was considered the most advanced socialist movement in the world. After being legalized in 1890, the SPD grew rapidly. Hundreds of thousands of workers joined the party, and it had a number of members in parliament. It published dozens of newspapers with a wide readership among the German working class.

But as the party experienced rapid growth and influence, a powerful non-revolutionary leadership began to emerge. Eduard Bernstein was the most prominent spokesperson of this trend, which argued that socialism could be achieved through incremental reforms of the capitalist system, and that the working class could achieve these reforms mainly through electoral means. Socialist revolution, Bernstein argued, was not necessary.

Rosa Luxemburg’s first struggles within the SPD were against this reformist current. In 1900, Luxemburg wrote "Reform or Revolution," arguing that it is only after the overthrow of the capitalist state and when the workers have power in their hands that socialism can begin to be achieved.

Luxemburg remained in the minority, but became an important factor in the party’s revolutionary left wing. Bernstein himself admitted that "Reform or Revolution" was the strongest and most well-developed argument against his position.

As a critic of reformism, Luxemburg was aligned with Russian revolutionary leader V.I. Lenin, whose Bolshevik party was steeled in the same struggle against reformist elements within the working-class movement.

Luxemburg and national liberation

This alignment was not complete, however. Luxemburg repeatedly clashed with Lenin on another vital issue in the socialist movement at the time: the orientation of the working class toward the struggle of the oppressed nations. The Bolsheviks argued for the right of nations to self-determination and for socialists’ duty to uphol

d this right regardless of the character of the leadership of the national movements.

The sites where the corpses were thrown into the river.

Luxemburg argued that the nationalism of the oppressed hindered the possibility of unifying the workers’ struggle. She counterposed the communist perspective of working-class internationalism to the right of nations to self-det

ermination. She viewed the multi-class national movements in Poland, for example, as an obstacle to class consciousness, and opposed the Polish struggle for political independence as a state. The way Luxemburg saw it, all bourgeoisies were the same, whether it was the Russian czarist regime, or the Polish bourgeois forces that were allied with the Polish workers and peasants for independence from the Russian empire.

Instead, Luxemburg proposed that all the workers and oppressed peoples of the Russian empire should unite and fight for socialism.

These views were undoubtedly influenced by the loom

ing national tensions prior to the outbreak of World War I. She viewed the nationalist struggles in the countries oppressed by czarist reaction as feeding into the hyper-nationalism and ethnic conflicts that divided workers.

This disagreement was a sharp one. Lenin’s view was that it was impossible to build class solidarity without being the most consistent champions of self-determination. He argued that conceding this point amounted to siding with the imperialist oppressor powers—and would discredit the socialist parties in the eyes of millions of oppressed people.

Lenin answered Luxemburg in a book in 1914, called "The Right o

f Nations to Self-Determination." He argued that it was necessary to analyze each national struggle based on the concrete conditions in any given situation. With regard to Poland, he said that the national movement was still in the early stage of trying to achieve political independence as a state, involving all classes—bourgeois, worker and peasant. Lenin made a strong distinction between the bourgeoisie of an oppressed nation and that of an oppressor, especially an imperialist country like Russia.

Ultimately, based on the Bolshevik arguments and experience after the 1917 Russian Revolution, the revolutionary working-class movement embraced Lenin’s position and rejected Luxemburg’s attacks against the national movements. Despite the fact that Lenin’s nationality was of the oppressor Great Russian nationality, his uncompromising stance as the champion of the right of nations to self-determination, and the Bolsheviks’ success in uniting the many oppressed nationalities for socialist revolution in Russia, proved the correctness of Lenin’s theory and attitude on the national question.

Despite these sharp disagreements, Luxemburg found herself again and again advancing revolutionary struggle alongside her Bolshevik counterparts in Russia.

Against imperialist war

In August 1914, World War I broke out. The issue became a litmus test for socialist parties across Europe. The

German SPD, like most of the parties of the Second International, turned its back on all the militant anti-war proclamations it had issued and ended up supporting the German government in the war. The reformism that Luxemburg had criticized so vociferously had rotted the core of the party.

In the face of this historic betrayal, Luxemburg joined with Karl Liebknecht and other members of the SPD’s left wing—Leo Jogiches, Paul Levi, Ernest Meyer, Franz Mehring and Clara Zetkin, among others—to form the Spartacus League. Like the Bolsheviks, the Spartacus League held that the enemy was not abroad but was the bourgeois class in their own country. They called for the workers to not participate in the imperialist war but to create a civil war against their own ruling class.

On May 1, 1916, the Spartacus League organized a mass demonstration against the war. Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Liebknecht and other leaders were arrested and held in prison for two years.

When they were released in 1918, the climate had changed dramatically. Soldiers were mutinying against the war, finally bringing it to an end. Workers’ and soldiers’ councils were being set up across Germany, inspired by the recent victory of the Bolshevik-led revolution.

In this revolutionary upsurge, Luxemburg and Liebknecht founded the German Communist Party in solidarity with the Soviet revolution. They immediately made plans to push the revolutionary struggle ahead.

The leadership of the new Communist Party was as yet untested. On Jan. 1, 1919, the party launched an uprising in Berlin to attempt to oust the new SPD-led capitalist government. Their former comrades unleashed the full fury of the armed forces against the insurgency.

On Jan. 15, two weeks after the insurrection was launched and just three months after being freed from prison, Luxemburg and Liebknecht were attacked in the streets by members of the right-wing Freikorps militias.

Rosa Luxemburg’s legacy

While "Red Rosa’s" name may not be as well-known today as the names of Lenin or other male leaders, her example of revolutionary struggle is still relevant today.

The struggles against reformism and against imperialist war are very much alive today. Her words would be welcome today as some forces try to corral the anti-war movement into the safe confines of electoral politics and out of revolutionary politics.

Her contributions were far more numerous. She dealt extensively with the relationship between the spontaneous mass struggle and revolutionary leadership in writings like "The Mass Strike." She analyzed the effects of war spending on the capitalist economy in her groundbreaking book, "The Accumulation of Capital."

There are those who try to use the differences that Rosa Luxemburg had with Lenin and the Bolsheviks as a point of division, separating themselves from the communist movement. Those attempts would have been wholeheartedly rejected by Luxemburg herself.

Few today would hold onto her more extreme views on the national question—especially given the rich historical experiences of communists in the national liberation struggles in Korea, China, Vietnam, Cuba and much of the rest of the oppressed world. Many of the socialist revolutions of the 20th century involved the close interconnection of the international working-class struggle and the national liberation struggles.

Some might grasp onto her tactical disagreements with Lenin after the Russian revolution over this or that Soviet policy. She herself had little time to familiarize herself with the real situation facing the Bolshevik government before she was murdered.

She was always on the side of revolution. That was her hallmark and what separates her from any effort to put her in opposition to the most militant revolutionaries.

In fact, the greatest tribute she gave to the young Soviet Republic was that she gave her life in the struggle to replicate its successes in Germany.

(Ana María Ramírez ; Courtesy : Party for Socialism and Democracy)

TAMILNADU:DYFI Organises Vigorous Protest Actions Against Untouchability

Com S G Ramesh Babu (DYFI TN State President) Leading the movement at
Kokkarayanpettai in Namakkal District

DECEMBER 25 is a historic date in the history of class struggle in Tamilnadu as it is associated with the Venmani martyrs. It was on this day 42 years ago, on 1968, when the oppressed and suppressed agricultural workers of East Thanjavur region in Tamilnadu faced a cruel attack from the landlords while fighting under the red flag for a rise in their wages. At the peak of this very movement, goons hired by the landlords burnt to death 44 agricultural workers, including women and children, in Keezha Venmani village.

Every year since then, tens of thousands of working people from all parts of the state attend the Red Salute programme at Venmani, organised by the Communist Party of India (Marxist).

Commemorating the day on December 25 this year and linking the elements of class struggle with the struggle against untouchability, the Tamilnadu state committee of the Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) organised direct actions against the various forms of untouchability. Thousands of youth joined these protest actions, and this struggle for the rights of dalit people scored remarkable victories in five places.

Of these places, Kokkarayanpettai in Namakkal district is the seat of nearly 1800 years old temple of Brammhaligeshwara. This temple is under the Hindu Religious Endowment Ministry of the Tamilnadu government. However, for a long while, the dalit people were denied the right to enter the temple by the caste Hindus of the village. To break the shackles of this cruel untouchability, the DYFI announced a temple entry struggle here. Under the pressure of the DYFI protest, then, the government officials arranged a tripartite talk and the caste Hindus agreed to allow the entry of dalit people into the temple. On December 25, dalit people of the village successfully entered this temple, accompanied by the DYFI state president S G Ramesh Babu and others.

Dalits offering prayer at temple in Kokkarayanpettai, Namakkal District

At Mathur village in Nagapattinam district, the dalit people, who were not able to exercise their right to enter the Mariamman Temple, organised under the DYFI banner and successfully entered the temple. After the DYFI’s announcement of a temple entry programme here, the concerned officials did hold talks with a group of DYFI leaders and a group of villagers, but it failed to soften the adamant stance of the caste Hindus. The officials then announced that dalit people would enter the temple under the protection of a police force. Some caste Hindu elements did challenge this decision, closed the doors of the temple and virtually sealed it. However, under the leadership of the DYFI, hundreds of dalit people including women gathered in front of the temple when a slew of government officials with police force broke open the doors of the temple and asked the dalit mass to enter the temple.

Nagapattinam

At Kottaiyur village in Trichy district, the dalit people had had no right to walk with their footwear on and were not allowed to enter the local temple. The DYFI and the All India Agricultural Workers Union (AIAWU) announced a protest programme against these customs. Here also, the government authorities intervened and held talks. Caste Hindus relented under the pressure of these officials and dalit people successfully entered the temple.

In Tiruppur district, it was a different experience. At Koduvai village in this district, a saloon shop owner had constantly refused to employ the dalit Arundhadhiya people, because it was a shop meant only for caste Hindus. Recently, when some flag carrying DYFI cadres assembled in front of this saloon shop, the shop owner closed the doors and personally mobilised caste Hindus of the village against the DYFI cadres. Then the concerned officials intervened.

In Virudhnagar district, the struggle ended victoriously after dawn to dusk stuggle

Struggle against Saloon in Thiruppur

Another form of untouchability has been destroyed broken at Palaya Pattinam in Cuddalore district. Though there is a statue of Dr B R Ambedkar in the village, dalit people could not use the common streets of the village to approach the statue for garlanding it. The DYFI decided to lead the dalit people of the village in a programme to use the common village roads for reaching Dr Ambedkar’s statue and garlanding IT. Here, government officials sided with the caste Hindus and sent a police posse to the village in opposition to the DYFI programme.

Cadres holding Road Roko protest against police highhandedness in Cudalloore

Nearly 300 policemen, carrying long lathis, then occupied the entire area around the statue. All the streets were sealed. However, hundreds of DYFI cadres and dalit people mobilised and held a road roko action. The protest action lasted for nearly two hours. Then the police arrested all of them.

In all the above villages, some tension did prevail and the DYFI state committee urged the state government to take necessary steps to maintain peace and protect the rights of dalit people. But the chief minister of Tamilnadu, M Karunanidhi, criticised the DYFI that the latter was out to disturb the law and order in the state. State DYFI leaders S Kannan and S G Ramesh Babu rejected the claim of the chief minister and vowed to continue the struggle against untouchability.

Apart from organising such direct actions, DYFI cadres participated in a large number of demonstrations and other actions against untouchability in as many as 12 districts.

P Sampath, leader of the Tamilnadu Untouchability Eradication Front (TNUEF), and DYFI leaders including R Velmurugan, L Shanmuga Sundaram, S Muthu Kannan, S Bala, T V Meenakshi, S Lenin and others participated in these protests.

(S P Rajendran : Peoples Democracy)
(Photo Source : Com. S G Ramesh Babu)

Deshabhimani Reaches New Heights in its Growth

Deshabhimani, the peoples daily in Malayalam, has added yet another jewel to its crown by becoming the largest circulated newspaper in Thrissur district, Kerala state with One lakh subscribers. The decleration of this great feat was made by CPIM state secretary com. Pinarayi Vijayan at a public function in Thrissur district. With one lakh circulation Deshabhimani has reached way ahead of all other newspapers in the district. It is a great moment in this era of corporate journalism which is trying its best to tarnish left parties especially CPIM. Pinarayi Vijayan congratulated all party members and sympathisers who have worked day and night to make this historic growth. Deshabhimani is making good strides in its growth these months. A campaign is going on through the state for the last two months. Deshabhimani had added a new edition from Bangalore and a new edition from Malappuram District, Kerala will be inaugurated later this month.

Revolutionary greetings to all who have worked to make this happen..Thunderbolt Team

Andhra Pradesh : Left calls for rollback of RTC fares

Movement of buses came to a standstill across the State for quite some time on Monday as activists of the CPI (M) and the CPI picketed bus depots demanding immediate rollback in the recent hike of bus fares. Hundreds of Left party activists who gathered at the bus depots staged demonstrations in protest against the “steep hike” in bus fares announced by the AP State Road Transport Corporation. The agitated activists shouted slogans against the government and the RTC management, while tension prevailed in some areas when the police and the activists jostled with each other. Many of them were arrested.

All-party meet sought

CPI State secretary K. Narayana and CPI (M) MP P. Madhu led the protests by staging a demonstration in front of the Bus Bhavan, the RTC’s headquarters here. Addressing the gathering, Mr Narayana demanded that the government convene an all-party meeting to discuss measures to bring the ailing corporation out of the red. Expressing concern over the first of its kind 51 per cent hike in fares, he said the government could take steps to bring the corporation out of losses by checking the “illegal operations” by private operators that was causing a deep dent in RTC’s revenues.

Activists arrested

Mahabubnagar: Demanding the roll back of RTC bus fares activists of CPI and CPI (M) staged a dharna in front of bus station here on Monday.

Leaders of left parties including CPI district secretary E. Narasima and CPI (M) district secretary Kille Gopal addressing the gathering demanded the government to roll back the bus fares immediately. They also asked the government to take steps to reduce the prices of essential commodities.

Adilabad : The CPI and CPI(M) jointly staged a dharna in front of the RTC bus depot on Monday demanding roll back of the bus fare hike affected a few days back. About 200 activists raised slogans against the hike. They were taken into custody by the Two-Town police and were released later.

Nalgonda : Activists of CPI and CPI(M) district units picketed the RTC bus depot here on Monday. The protesters disrupted the movement of the buses from the depot to various destinations for sometime demanding immediate withdrawal of hike on bus charges. Speaking on the occasion, CPI district secretary Mallepalli Adi Reddy alleged that the government imposed a backbreaking burden on the common man by increasing the bus charges steeply, while the State was reeling under turmoil.

“It is ridiculous on the part of Chief Minister K. Rosaiah and Transport Minister S. Vijayarama Raju to feign ignorance about the move,” he deplored and demanded the government to roll back the hike in the bus charges forthwith.

CPI (M) district secretary Nandyala Narasimha Reddy, Munugode MLA U Yadagiri Rao of the CPI, and others spoke. CPI leader Ghulam Rasool and CPI(M) leader Syed Hasham besides, a host of senior leaders of left parties participated in the demonstration. Artistes of Praja Natya Mandali also staged a demonstration at the bus station in the town denouncing the bus fare hike and skyrocketing prices of essential commodities.

Sangareddy : Demanding to scale down the increased fare in RTC, workers of the CPI(M) held dharnas at the depots in Medak district on Monday. Addressing the party workers, CPI(M) district committee member K. Rajaiah said that the agitation would be continued till the charges were brought down. District committee members G. Jayaraj, M. Adivaiah, A Mainkyam and others participated in the agitation.

Vijayawada: Activists of the Left parties picketed the Pandit Nehru Bus Station to register their protest against the hike in RTC fares as part of a State-wide agitation programme, here on Monday. CPI and CPI(M) workers and leaders raised slogans demanding complete rollback. CPI city secretary and former MLA K. Subba Raju said there could be nothing worse than the RTC hiking the fares without consultations. CPI(M) district secretary V. Umamaheswara Rao, former MLA Sk. Nasar Vali, CPI corporators P. Durgabhavani, D.V. Ramana Babu, I. Appala Naidu, CPI(M) corporators Ch. Babu Rao, B. Sathi Babu, D. Kasinath, K. Ramu, K. Sridevi participated.

Vizhianagaram: CPI (M) district secretary M. Krishna Murty and CPI secretary P. Kameswara Rao, who led the protesters, said that the government instead of resolving the dispute over Statehood issue and soaring prices of essential commodities hiked the bus fares and burdened the poor and middle classes who depend most on RTC services. Following the rasta roko, vehicular traffic at the complex was paralysed for some time. Party leaders Reddy Sankara Rao, B. Suribabu and others participated.

(Courtesy : The Hindu)

Condemn Killings in West Bengal

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has issued the following statement:

The Polit Bureau of the CPI(M) strongly condemns the killing of four CPI(M) activists in Narayanpur under the Canning Police Station of South 24 Parganas district of West Bengal.

In a dastardly incident anti-social and criminal elements of the Trinamul Congress launched a murderous assault on a peaceful and unarmed group of CPI(M) supporters who were returning after filing nomination papers for the elections to the managing committee of a local madrasa. CPI(M) activists Dinesh Haldar, Khairul Jamadar, Biswanath Gayen and Salim Jamadar were killed on the spot. The gruesome nature of the killings is revealed by the fact that two of them were killed after being fired with the revolver placed inside their mouths. Seven other CPI(M) activists were grievously injured in the attack and are in critical condition and are fighting for their lives.

This incident shows the extent of violence that is being unleashed against the CPI(M) and the Left in West Bengal while the Trinamul Congress and its leader Mamata Banerjee campaigns that there is no law and order in the state of West Bengal. The CPI(M) along with other Left parties had earlier presented a memorandum to the Prime Minister listing out the more than 150 CPI(M) leaders and activists who had been killed by the opposition since the Lok Sabha election results. Hardly a day passes in Junglemahal area especially in West Midnapur district when CPI(M) activists are not killed by Maoist marauders. In the rest of the state it is the Trinamul which carries on the campaign of violence.

Yesterday's incident is a major development in this continued spree of violence. The Polit Bureau of the CPI(M) calls upon all peace loving people in West Bengal and elsewhere in the country to join in condemnation of these murders. The PB calls upon all its Party units to redouble their efforts in expressing solidarity with the struggle for defence of peace and democracy that the CPI(M) and the Left is conducting in such trying circumstances in West Bengal.