Despite an apparent “bourgeois trend’’ at the highest level of the party, the CPI(M) in a fresh document on the rectification campaign has blamed “association with bourgeois parties” for “corrosive effect” on its cadres. The document, “Organisational Tasks and Rectification”, went on to claim that the new entrants are “still to acquire the basic outlook of the party and they are yet to be grounded in the class and mass struggles”.
The document has come under ridicule by a section of party functionaries, who pointed fingers at certain top politburo members “holidaying abroad” and leading a “comfortable bourgeois lifestyle”. Incidentally, the document is prepared by Mr S.R. Pillai, known for his proximity to party general secretary Prakash Karat.
Despite the fact that the party leadership had been consistently pursuing the policy of striking electoral alliances with outfits like the Samajwadi party, Bahujan Samaj Party and the TDP, the document stated that “association with bourgeois parties at various levels, particularly through electoral understandings, have been continuing during the past 12 years since the 1996 rectification document. With the rise of the business-political nexus, there is a corresponding rise in use of money and other bourgeois practices. These have a corrosive effect on our cadres.”
The party has also held “lack of education in class and mass struggles” among its cadres responsible for losing its grip on the electorates. The document felt that the “majority of the new entrants are still to acquire the basic outlook of the party and they are yet to be grounded in the class and mass struggles”.
Of course, the document has no mention of its leadership’s poor electoral arithmetics, which saw the CPI(M) being routed in its bastion, West Bengal, during the last general elections. The party under Mr Karat had the worst ever performance during the last Lok Sabha polls and now stands threatened to lose the state to Trinamul Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee. Somehow unperturbed over the possible electoral debacle staring at its face in both Bengal and Kerala, the party tried to focus on “educating” its cadre on “ideological issues’’. The document stated: “Though we have expanded our party’s educational apparatus, still a large number of new entrants and due to lack of adequate education of the old membership, there is still a gap in the requisite political-ideological level.” It added: “Such a situation leads to all sorts of petty bourgeois trends emerging within the party.”
The document also pointed out the need for a rectification campaign, which was decided earlier.
The background offered by the party stated: “To launch a rectification campaign against all wrong trends...”
However, in Kerala, state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan is facing charges of financial irregularities.
The CBI has already filed a chargesheet against him but the party leadership, which has taken the high moral ground on the 2G scam, backed him to the hilt.
Trying to look within, the document stated: “An analysis of the class composition of the CPI(M) shows that 75 per cent of the membership comes from the working class, poor peasants and agricultural workers. But in the leading committees of the party only around 30 per cent belong to these classes, 70 per cent come from the middle class and other sections. This provides the basis for alien class influences.”