“We are happy and proud to note that even the Washington Post has admitted the relevance and permanence of the communist dream and the creative interventions carried out by the communist-led government in Kerala. But its take on the perceived digressions from the path set in the Communist Manifesto stemmed from a lack of understanding of the communist philosophy or happened by design,” Mr. M.A. Baby, Polit Bureau member of the CPI(M), said on Monday on the liberal coverage received by Kerala communism in the daily recently.
Mr. Baby, who was set to leave for Russia on Monday night to represent the party at the centenary celebrations of the October Revolution, said the Communist Manifesto had laid emphasis on a dynamic and creative approach by the labour classes of individual nations.
“There wasn’t anything sacrosanct about the approach laid down by the manifesto, which gives broad guidelines to bring about social change. It has, to the contrary, iterated that the regional characteristics of a place be taken into consideration for realising the communist dream. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels were unambiguous that change was the only constant.
“The struggles undertaken by the communist-led government in Kerala are absolutely along the path laid down in the Manifesto and with a view to realising the communist dream. Within the limitations of the administrative power it enjoys and the resources at its disposal, whether it is possible to achieve the dream is what it explores. It is in the meantime, making creative interventions in the global struggles for social justice,” Mr. Baby said.
The Washington Post article, on one of the few places where a communist can still dream, has set off a debate of sorts in the State. Some saw it as a capitalist admission of the continued relevance of communism, while others thought it was a prejudiced, if now shallow, account of how the philosophy made a detour for survival in a place where the world’s first elected communist government came to power exactly 60 years ago.
Critical question
The article asks the critical question whether communism in Kerala can survive its own success. It presents disparate images and accounts, such as the anti-feudal strife that triggered the movement in Kerala, its unique social fabric that allows for faith and communism to coexist, heavy reliance on remittances from the Persian Gulf, the State’s impressive social and development indices amidst mounting debt and the party’s perceived shift in emphasis on ‘equal opportunities’.
No matter its objective, the write-up, as someone pointed out on a WhatsApp group, “is the capitalist centre’s acknowledgement of the communist dream which is still active”.