WB: CPI(M) documentation redefining ideological role

Kolkata, Feb 25: In a bid to redifine its identity in the era of globalisation, the CPI(M) is set to prepare the party's ideological document, for the first time since inception, striking a balance between Marxism and capitalism.

With the fall of the Soviet Union raising many a question and the iron curtain in China opening up to unbriddled capital from the West, it was time for the party to chart out its way in the Indian context assimilating new lessons and discarding practice of classical Marxism.

"The Central Committee will work on an ideological document in the Indian context, which we do not have till now. The document will be our guiding force to negotiate the present complex situation with a new handle, yet upholding our Marxist identity," top sources in the party said.

The draft for the proposed document would be sent for debate in the party at different levels before being finally endorsed.

The party, which came into being following a split with the CPI in 1964, had so far been run on the basis of the joint declaration of the Communist parties of 12 Socialist countries, which was issued after a meeting in Moscow in 1957.

Approving the line of the 20th party Congress of the Communist Party of Soviet Union(CPSU), held in the previous year, the declaration emphasised on international solidarity of the 'growing' communist movement and opening up a new stage in the worlwide movement along the Marxist-Leninist lines.

In keeping with the spirit, the CPI(M), from the very beginning, has also described itself as a revolutionary vanguard of workers with an objective of ushering in socialism through 'Proletariat Dictatorship'.

However, things went wrong after Communism was banished from its own land--the USSR-- and the iconic Kremlin came crashing leading to the serial disaster in the East European Socialist countries and East Germany.

Groping for an answer, required for the party to go forward and maintain its relevance, the CPI(M) leadership concluded after brainstorming parleys that Marxism was not at fault, but what went wrong in those countries was the inability to keep pace with the changing time.

However, the party took heart from China, pushed on a fast track growth-- first by Deng Tshiao Ping and then by Hu-Zin-Tao-based on a socialist infrastructure, though differing from its pluralistic political system as against the Indian multi-party democracy. "The realisation became more pronounced in the party that no country can be our absolute model and our success will depend only on application according to the situation in the country," the sources said.

Even though the Chennai Party Congress in 1992 and a special session in Tiruvantapuram in 2000 tried to curve out a way amid the inevitability of globalisation and the need for capital, the CPI(M) could not make much headway before 2005 when the Delhi party Congress advocated for shedding inhibition to foreign capital accepting what Deng Tshiao Ping once said, "it does not matter whether the cat is white or black as long as it catches rats." Accepting the need of the hour, Mr Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, the reformist Chief Minister of West Bengal, has recently admitted that what his Government was practicing was capitalism and not Marxism.

Meanwhile, the widening fault lines of neo liberalisation and the emerging socialist powers in Latin America, including Venezuela, Bolivia and Chile have rekindled new hopes among the party bosses prompting it to go for assimilating various lessons and experiences.

"In the changing situation, we have to accept many things. But there are fine lines between what and what not should be accepted which we will have to take care. The ideological document will enlighten us on this aspect, among many other things," the sources said.

UNI