The 100th anniversary of the October Revolution in Russia, which marked the beginning of a project for creating New Man in a classless society, may not be an occasion for celebration for the people of that country or the erstwhile Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).
However, the centenary of the Bolshevik Revolution, which took place this day a century ago, is certain to strike a chord with a large number of people in the State who still view the socialist project with great hope.
The negatives of the Soviet revolutionary project, marked by the tales of State tyranny and Gulags, have not dampened the spirit of thousands, who still swear by the idealogy of Marxism-Leninism that saw the working class take over power in Russia, to present to the world an alternative to the capitalist socio-economic and political order.
Setbacks there have been, particularly post-1991, but ideas of egalitarianism, social control of public goods and services and much else, that were at the heart of the revolution, continue to fire the imagination of many in the State even today.
Political force
The Communist party in the State emerged nearly two decades after the Russian Revolution, initially wooing young activists from the national movement.
After the Congress Socialist camp morphed into the Communist movement, it has been a major political force to reckon with in the State in all spheres of life, including political and cultural.
Ideas of class struggle, hegemony of the working class and peasant revolt still hold sway in the minds of thousands in the land which elected the first Communist government through ballot in the country.
“Right from the beginning of the 20th century, radical politics found a fertile ground both in Malabar and Travancore in the aftermath of the October Revolution,” says T. Sasidharan, Head of Department of Politics, Sree Narayana College here, and author of the book Radical Politics of Kannur (2017).
Inspirational input
The Russian Revolution’s inspirational input played a major role in the predominantly agrarian uprisings in Malabar which, on a larger plane, was also anti-colonial movement.
By the 1930s, the rise of political awareness in Malabar, especially in North Malabar, had got translated into peasant struggles that carried all the trappings of an organised class struggle.
This would not have been possible but for the socialist ideas gaining acceptance in the early 20th Century since Swadeshabhimani Ramakrishna Paillai published a short biography of Karl Marx in Malayalam in 1912.
Aaron Mill strike
In North Malabar, the majority of workers then had been confined to beedi and textile industries. By mid-1930s, they were organised. The Aaron Mill strike in 1939 was the first working class strike organised by the Communist Party unit in the State, Dr. Sasidharan said.
The peasant movements in 1940-41, like the Morazha and Kayyur revolts, also had the international developments of the time as their backdrop. The slogans raised by peasants in the Kayyur revolt not only spoke of bringing an end to the exploitative land tenure system of the colonial rulers but also about their dream to build socialist world.
Revolutionary ideas
The Karivellur and Kavumbayi struggles in Malabar and the Punnapra-Vayalar uprising in the then princely State of Travancore, were also triggered as much by revolutionary ideas as anger and angst of the downtrodden.
“The idea of October Revolution is still relevant in the contemporary world,” says N. Sukanya, an All India Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA) leader, echoeing the many who still believe that a more equal world is possible.