The Cat Is Out of the Bag

The nation may not officially know what had really transpired at Agra between Vajpayee and Musharraf. But we have been officially told that on July 31 an anguished Vajpayee had offered before his party MPs to resign from the prime minister's chair. Apparently he said that he was unable to manage the increasingly unruly, unwieldy coalition called NDA. Coming straight from the mouth of the much-acclaimed guru of coalition dharma, this confession is indeed quite revealing. He also said he was old and unwell and was finding it difficult to run the show. But Vajpayee is no Jayalalitha or Mamata. For all his old age and ill health, he is still eminently amenable. The next day he therefore informed the Lok Sabha: "Yes, I had offered to resign, but only before my own party MPs and they have refused to accept it. That's it and the matter ends there."

But now that the cat is finally out of the bag, it will surely not be easy to put it back in. The Shiv Sena refused to reprimand the MP who had alleged the PMO's involvement in the UTI-Cyberspace scam. And even as Thackeray condescended to grant Vajpayee another lease of life, he asked his party MPs to stay away from the NDA meeting, which reposed its faith in Vajpayee and even adopted a code of conduct for the alliance partners. But the code of conduct is likely to remain only on paper and if anything, it can only prove to be a prelude to and pretext for bigger discords within the NDA. After all, the BJP is trying to be too clever by indicting the NDA for its own internal problems. Most of the scams are originating directly from the PMO and the squabbles have their roots within the BJP and the Sangh Parivar. A wily Vajpayee is trying to kill two birds with the same stone by browbeating both NDA and his detractors within the BJP with the stick of resignation.

How long this browbeating and blackmailing will keep the Sangh Parivar and the NDA in order remains to be seen. But as far as the people of this country are concerned, they cannot be treated as mute spectators to the great family tamasha of the Sangh Parivar. Vajpayee may have his own calculations in staging the resignation drama, but the people too have their own pressing reasons for demanding the ouster of his government. The demand had been articulated spontaneously all over the country in the wake of the Tehelka revelations. That time round, the BJP found an easy scapegoat in Bangaru Laxman. By getting Jaya Jaitley and George Fernandes to resign and making minor changes in the PMO, the BJP crisis-managers managed to save the day. The failure, if not collusion, of the opposition played no mean role in this crisis management. Now the continuing economic recession and especially the UTI scam has landed the government in grave crisis. After all UTI is no ordinary neighbourhood chit fund, it is the biggest mutual fund of the country created by a special Act of the Indian Parliament. Once again the government is trying to save its own skin by sacking the UTI Chairman and resorting to this politics of blackmail.

For the people of India there could be no bigger vindication of their demand for the ouster of the Vajpayee government than Vajpayee's own offer, however insincere, to resign. This government has pushed the economy to the brink of a grave crisis. The godowns are collapsing under the staggering weight of 60 million tonnes of rotting foodgrains even as the rural poor continue to starve and die. The government's sinister politics of cease-fire has actually set large parts of the country afire. The new economic policies have turned the country into a graveyard for industry and agriculture while scamsters continue to make merry. The government's blatant support for the missile-crazy Bush administration and the shameless offer to host possible US military bases in the country have thoroughly tarnished the country's image, reducing the world's second biggest country with more than a billion people to the pitiable position of a vassal state of Washington. And at Agra, the government has just produced a diplomatic disaster that cannot be covered up by any mocking offer of a special package for Kashmir.

August is India's month of independence. The biggest independence that the whole of India is now craving for is salvation from the ongoing saffron disaster. Let the Sangh Parivar try and brush all their dirty saffron linen under the carpet, the people are getting ready to sweep the country clear of the saffron dirt.

In Memory of Com. Saroj Dutta

The Party, RYA, Gana Sanskriti Parishad and AIPWA in West Bengal held a meeting in memory of Com. Saroj Dutta at Surendra Nath Park, Kolkata before the statue of Saroj Dutta on 5th August, the day he was killed in 1971. Eminent intellectuals including Amitava Dasgupta, Tarun Sanyal, Paramesh Acharya, Ajijul Haq, Indranath Bandopadhya, Sadhan Chattopadhya, Ajit Pandey and CPI(ML) leaders Kartik Pal, Shankar Mitra and Santosh Rana paid tribute to the departed leader.

Remembering Com. Arvind N. Das

Last year on 7 August Com. Arvind met with a most premature end in Amsterdam. He was one of the most versatile and enterprising Marxist intellectuals of our times, as well as a passionate activist. Once a young student of St. Stephen's in Delhi, who went to Purnea to work among the landless poor, Com. AN Das retained his passion for Marxism and the revolutionary struggles of the rural poor all through his creative professional career. Transformation of the agrarian relations in Bihar remained his core concern in most of his subsequent researches. In the era of Soviet collapse, when quitting communist parties became almost an intellectual fashion with many, Arvind chose to renew his association with CPI(ML) and till his end he remained closely associated with many of the Party's ideological-political endeavors including the Indian Institute of Marxist Studies and Liberation.

Remembering Com. Arvind on the first anniversary of his demise, we in the CPI(ML) will always cherish his intellectual activism.

US-64 Sent to Black Hole

Contrary to the expectations of a roaring debate on US-64, things turned out to be a damp squib in the Monsoon session of Parliament, thanks to the political match-fixing between BJP and Congress. Finance Minister and the tainted PMO men were saved and the scams were sent to the black hole of JPC. But the mother earth of all scams, the neo-liberal policies and their impact on the common man was not discussed in Parliament. After all, why do the high-pitch opposition parties like Congress and SP refrain from demanding a complete change in the policies and fight mock battles on inquiry commissions instead?

CPI(ML) in Bihar Preparing for State Conference

The State Party Conference in Bihar is scheduled to be held on 26-28 August. According to the Party Constitution, state conference are held every three years. They are the occasions for reviewing the whole practice over the intervening period. The process starts from below: from block level conference to district level conferences, and finally the state conference. At the block level, delegates come from activists groups and branches, the basic unit of the Party. However, it is at the district level mostly where work in city and countryside, among people from all walks of life, gets organically linked. District committee is the key link with regard to putting party line into practice. In these conferences, successes and failures in movements undertaken by the party on various issues as well as fronts are analysed, health of various lower level party units and formations, qualitative and quantitative aspects of the existing membership is assessed, and moreover, tactical decisions are reviewed. These conferences provide valuable inputs not only for state conferences but for Party congress as well.

In our previous issues we have carried reports of some district conferences including that of Bhojpur district. Here we are giving short reports of some other district conferences, mainly in Rohtas, Patna rural, Siwan and Muzaffarpur.

In Rohtas, the conference was held on 28-29 July at Union Hall, Nasiriganj. The draft report was placed by Com. Pawan Sharma. In this district, anarchist MCC group sometimes allies with class enemies against us. This group killed a popular Party leader Com. Brij Kishor Singh of Dinara block on 16 February, and even earlier the group had killed a local cadre. The report mentions our efforts during panchayat elections in making rural poor assert under party banner, when the rural poor are getting increasingly disillusioned from RJD. Hence, the Party must expose pro-kulak, feudal character of RJD, who divide the poor in order to turn them into vote bank in the name of caste. Similarly, the necessity of exposing the opportunist politics and pro-kulak, feudal character of BSP, and moreover, of establishing close relations with the poor and fighting on their burning issues till the last was also felt.

The report mentions the successes achieved in the course of "Strengthen the Party" campaign: Subscribers to Lokyudh increased from 97to 439. Now target is to recruit 500 subscribers. Study of Lokyudh has started in party branch meetings. As many as 103 classes and 20 workshops were organised, in which a total number of 2,388 comrades participated. Number of active party branches increased from 25 to 86, and 48 branches became partially active. Thus there are 134 active or partially active branches out of the total 154 branches in the district. Report holds that all block committee secretaries must be appointed secretary to some branch and sub-committees should be formed taking branch secretaries.

Report also mentions that bodies of Khet Mazdoor Sabha (agricultural labour organisation) have been formed at district and block level and 49,000 members recruited, which is three times the number of Kisan Sabha members. But it has also been pointed out that the district and block level coordinating bodies of Khet Mazdoor Sabha are to yet be activised. In order to organise agrarian labourers under independent banner of Khet Mazdoor Sabha, struggles must be launched on demands such as security of employment, minimum wages, 8-hour day, old age pension scheme, social security, free arms with license for self-defence and govt. recognition to agrarian labourers' self-defence groups, loan for self-employment, land or house for residential purpose, strict implementation of the act against repression of scheduled castes, etc.

Further, the report notes that the peasant movement that is being conducted against remnants of feudalism often takes the form of clashes against feudal private armies and criminal gangs and this resistance becomes imperative to take movement forward. If self-defence groups have not been organised in a village, people there get immobilised in face of attacks. A block level leading core should be formed taking developed members of these self-defence groups in the villages. Also, efforts should be taken to develop military skill of these groups and they must run under Party control.

It is also mentioned in the report that for implementing development-related tasks, one should rely on the organised might of the people and not on sycophancy or pleading. Party must set an example of honesty in developmental work and expose corruption. Wherever developmental work has been undertaken by a Party cadre, the account must be placed before the people in a meeting. Party are responisble to the people and not to the administration. And people's representatives must be regarded as Party leaders or cadres, and not as sahibs.

In Patna Rural, the conference took place on 1-2 August at Chitkohra Cooperative Hall, where 165 delegates discussed the draft report presented by Com. Nand Kishor Prasad. The report notes that when following the assembly elections held in 2000 the district organisation was in the grip of pessimism, the 6-point "strengthen the party" campaign helped in overcoming liberal trends. In this phase 73 new branches were formed and 55% of the members were organised in them. However, no significant success could be gained in mass struggles, Party was more entangled in dealing with PWG. Activities like Shahbazpur march, however, could secure a larger participation. Gains in "strengthen the party" campaign concretely manifested in panchayat election results, in which Party bagged 4 district council seats, 20 mukhiya and 28 panchayat samiti seats. Party could win 1 block pramukh seat and 3 deputy-pramukh seats. The report makes a proposal that Party should form "Panchayat council", taking elected mukhiyas, panchayat samiti members, district council members, deputy pramukhs and pramukhs, under the inchargeship of a district committee member. It will function under Party block committee. Report also mentions do's and dont's for newly elected panchayat members. The membership of Khet Mazdoor Sabha is around 30,000.

In Siwan, the conference was held on 28-29 July at Mairwa. It was inaugurated by Com. Dipankar Bhattacharya. The report here analysed in detail the course and impact of desertion by renegade Ramesh Kushwaha, and pointed out the fact that it is Raghunathpur where the setback was most perceptible during the last assembly elections. However, in Panchayat elections the work could be expanded in Gorayyakothi, from where the Party won a district council seat apart from the one from Darauli. But results in Mairwa are unquestionably poor. Party membership has declined from what it was 2 years back and the number of block committees has also reduced from 6 to 4. Report says that "strengthen the party" campaign did not have a qualitative impact on party organisation.

In Muzaffarpur, the conference was held on 28-29 July. Participated in by more than 100 delegates, the conference was inaugurated by Com. Ramji Rai. The report put forth by the outgoing secretary Com. Meena Tiwary observed that after the last conference work has expanded in Bochaha precisely by championing the cause of the downtrodden against touts and kulaks belonging to RJD on the one hand and police-administration on the other. In Sakra too, party expansion has taken place in last two years.

Reports from Nalanda (21-23 July), Jahanabad, (28-29 July), Kaimur (28-29 July) and Buxar (1-2 July), East Champaran and West Champaran have also reached Party office. In Kaimur, the emphasis of the discussion was on finding out effective ways to check the rising influence of BSP and to maintain the continuity of peasant movement. In Buxar, the main topic of discussion was centred around finding out the reasons behind unsatisfactory performance in the elections and developing proper means to deal with Ranvir Sena.

Six People Killed in Police Firing in Muzaffarpur

Orissa has not yet recovered from the devastating floods, and in the meantime several parts of Bihar and Assam have become flood-affected. Here too, as elsewhere, people have been just left in the lurch because of centre's apathy and state government's callousness in arriving at any long-term solution of the problem or providing immediate relief to the victims. An extreme manifestation of this very approach was betrayed by Bihar police, which, true to its anti-people character, opened fire on a large crowd at Aurai in Muzaffarpur of North Bihar on 6 August and reportedly killed 6 people who were agitating against loot and corruption by officials and police in supply of relief materials to the flood-victims in the area.

CPI(ML) expressed deep sorrow and anguish over the incident and observed statewide protest on 7 August. A Party team led by Legislature group leader Com. Ram Naresh Ram went to the place of firing. The Party also gave a call of "Muzaffarpur Bandh" on 8 August which received spontaneous response from all sections of the society.

Demonstration in Protest to Police Attack in W.B.

On 23th July, police lathicharged on party comrades talking to officials of Mertala Panchayat, Purbasthali, Burdwan in West Bengal, against the corruption of panchayet pradhan. Com. Bapan Baxi and Sibu Santra were brutally beaten when they protested, and taken to police camp. Within a short time more than 150 people including women blocked the road at Chandipur in demand of release of Com. Baxi. The police again conducted lathi-charge there, injuring severals including four women. On 27 July, party organised a militant demonostration attended by around 600 people before Purbasthali PS demanding action against guilty police officers. In face of the mass pressure, the Circle Inspector was forced to admit the police mistake.

Joint TU Rally in ECL

A joint front of trade unions in coal sector in which Coal Mines Workers Union (AICCTU) is a constituent, held a rally at Eastern Coalfields Ltd. headquarters at Sanctoria in West Bengal, opposing anti-worker industrial policies of the government, particularly privatisation move in the coal sector. It was attended by over 5000 coal workers.

Anti-Globalisation Conference in Begusarai

Anti-globalisation conference was held at Nagar Bhawan Hall in Begusarai on 31 July. Inaugurating the conference Com. Dipankar Bhattacharya said that globalisation is an anti-production and anti-peasant principle, having sole emphasis on amassing profit. During the last 10 years, all the barriers were removed for foreign capital but it is not entering into productive sector. More so in Bihar. Attack of capital has further intensified throughout the world in the wake of globalisation, and whatever control was there has slackened. He said that globalisation is being opposed even in western countries, and in India, forces like us are girding our loin against it. Com. Saroj Chaube and Rajaram Singh also addressed the conference. An 11-member committee of People's Campaign Against Globalisation was formed.

Peasant Agitations in Punjab

Against burden of debt forcing the peasants to commit suicide, the movement launched by BKU(Ekta) took a militant turn on 16 July, when 2,000 peasants blocked the highway demanding arrest of the bank manager and commision agent in Maur Mandi under 306 Cr. PC for forcing a poor peasant Mithu Singh to commit suicide. On 24 July, Police from three districts of Bathinda, Mansa and Faridkot brutally attacked the peasants to remove the blockade. The police entered the adjoining village Maisarkhana and beat up the pesants including women, children and old indiscriminately, and even fired several rounds of tear gas inside the historic Gurudwara in the village where people had taken shelter to ecape from police brutality. In total, 104 leaders and activists were arrested, brutally beaten up and even the injured were refused medical aid.

A state-wide solidarity movement was organised. As a part of it, a militant rally was taken out in Mansa on 30 July. People blocked the road and burnt Chief Minister's effigy. The rally was adressed by Com. Rajvinder Rana, Ruldu Singh and Swapan Mukherjee. To foil the resistance rally to be held at Maur on 1 August, police arrested CPI(ML) leader, Com. Rajvinder Rana on 31 July. However, inspite of the police terror Maur Mandi witnessed a massive rally on 1 August, defying 144. The administration wasforced to release Com. Rana on 2 August. It is to be noted that All-India Peasant Conference is going to be held in this centre of struggle, Mansa, on 10-11 September.

Actions by Working Class in Chattisgarh

In protest to an irrational wage agreement, Centre of Steel Workers (CSW) held a meeting at Boria Gate of Bhilai Steel Plant in Chhattisgarh on 24 July. It was addressed by Com. Rajaram, CC member, Party Distt. Secy. Shambhu Singh, AICCTU leaders Narottam Sharma, Ashok Miri, Shyamlal Chauhan and Khomadas Sahu.

Janwadi Mazdoor Ekta Kendra (AICCTU) held a demonstration before General Manager's office on 23 July, demanding arrear wages to the workers who have taken voluntary retirement. The GM agreed to give 3-month wages. On 24 July, dharnas were held in Raipur against anti-worker policies of the union govt. A coordination committee of central trade unions, including AICCTU, has been formed to carry on this movement.

Has Home Ministry Double Standards?

In Jharkhand, when CPI(ML)'s Garhwa district conference was about to commence at Garhwa town on 4 August, 2001 at around 4 p.m., a large contingent of police from 3 police stations, viz. Meral, Nagar Utari and Garhwa, launched a crackdown on the gathering of the conference. When comrades tried to argue, police conducted brutal lathicharge and arrested six Party leaders of the district, including well-known mass leaders like Com. Kishore Kumar, Laxman Singh, and sent them to jail. This was done at the behest of Ram Chandra Keshri, Samata Minister in the Babulal Marandi govt. Since 6 August, CPI(ML) has started protest programmes including dharna and marches throughout Jharkhand, particularly in Ranchi and Garhwa.

In Karnataka, following PF office's refusal to issue PF settlement forms, spontaneous violence broke out in Peenya industrial area of Bangalore, because along with the refusal there was the rumour that they would be barred from getting their PF dues up to 45 years. CPI(ML) and AICCTU in Bangalore demanded immediate release of all the innocent workers, compensation to the victims of police high-handedness etc. However, even before they could organise any programme in solidarity to the workers in Peenya, police attacked Party office and picked up Com. Sankar and Govindarajan.

However, despite our demand, the Union Home Ministry found no reason to act against these lawless attacks on civil rights of a state-recognised party. On the other hand, it is busy teaching AIADMK govt. in Tamil Nadu a lesson for picking up Karunanidhi and two central ministers. Are these persons "special citizens" having superior civil rights, whereas CPI(ML) cadres have no civil rights? Does the Home Ministry work under a constitution stipulating two types of citizens in India having different fundamental rights?

Joint T.U. Programmes in Neyveli

In Neyveli, 12 central and state trade unions including AICCTU held a convention on 17 July against Vajpayee govt.'s economic policies. It was presided over by Com. M Selvraj of AICCTU. The unions gave strike notice to the Neyveli Lignite Corpn. (NLC) management on 13 July against the wage settlement arrived at by the management with a minority union LPF. Joint street corner meetings were also conducted on 18-19 July in NLC area. Fasting dharnas were also held at six places in NLC complex. On 24 July, a a joint district-level rally of all trade unions was held at Cuddalore to protest the economic policies of Vajpayee govt. It was presided over by Com. Selvaraj.