Does Rahul ‘Corbyn’ Gandhi excite Marxists?

The CPM never formulates its policies and programmes based on the personalities of its adversaries, but on issues. Nonetheless, this time around they may have to weigh the impact of political evangelists like Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his new age opponent Rahul Gandhi on the electoral scene ahead of 2019 Parliament polls. Rahul Gandhi’s aggressive campaign in Gujarat where he espoused the cause of the subaltern and the alliances he stitched up with marginalised groups appear to have struck a chord with a section of the comrades that some of them believe he could be the Jeremy Corbyn of India while Prime Minister Narendra Modi is seen in Donald Trump mould.

The left-wing Corbyn, British Labour Party MP, who piped Prime Minister Theresa May in recent approval ratings, is a staunch believer in democracy and he halted the neoliberal drive of his predecessor Tony Blair with his brand of leftist socialism to reach out to the masses. Trying to shed the disproportionate pro-corporate image of the Congress, Rahul has been charting an inclusive, Left-of-Centre path to reach out to the tribals, dalits and the other marginalised sections with the motto “reforms with a human face” in sharp contrast to Modi’s pompous image and authoritarian streak.

While the powerful Kerala lobby led by former general secretary Prakash Karat, is stridently opposed to any truck with the Congress ahead, the Bengal group backing party chief Sitaram Yechury, is rooting for an alliance or understanding with the Grand Old Party to uproot the “modified” BJP, which they feel is dangerous to India’s pluralistic tradition and parliamentary democracy. The Bengal comrades regret that the Karat faction is not sufficiently alarmed at the rampant communal polarisation and the “vice like grip of RSS” on Modi government.

In two recent newspaper interviews, Karat has made it very clear that CPM cannot be part of a grand alliance against BJP. “For us, opposition to neoliberal economic policies is as important as fighting communal forces. We cannot be part of an alliance with the Congress which stands for such policies,” Karat told The Hindu. He, however, said some cooperation on specific issues in and outside Parliament is possible and can also “forge wider unity for a broader platform against communalism.”

In-house critics, however, question the efficacy of a mere “platform”, asking how it can stop the powerful RSS-Modi-Shah juggernaut without smart electoral alliances and tactics. If the BJP was humbled in Bihar two years ago, it was only because of the grand alliance of JDU-RJD-Congress (it is a different matter that it collapsed due to an individual’s hunger for power and the craftiness of BJP). Recent election eve understanding between Congress, Patidars and Dalit parties knotted the BJP in Gujarat. By linking “communalism” with “neo-liberal economic policies”, Karat, unwittingly perhaps, is weakening the fight against communal forces and undermining synchronised Opposition unity, they lament.

For years, the CPM has been struggling to find a way out to deal with “secular bourgeois” parties (read Congress and regional parties) without fundamentally altering its political-tactical line that rejects neo-liberal economic policies and communalism while emphasising equidistance between the Congress and the BJP.

Politics in India has undergone paradigm shift since 2014, and understandably, a section of worried Marxists is seeking a review of the antiquated political-tactical line. In the last three years, the issue was discussed several times in the politburo and central committee meetings, but a consensus eluded as the Karat lobby refused to budge from its rigid no-electoral truck with Congress stand while Bengal faction roots for an alliance or understanding with the Grand Old Party.

It is instructive to note that in 2004, then general secretary Harkishan Singh Surjeet tweaked the political-tactical line to join the Congress-led UPA. Surjeet, a pragmatist, foresaw BJP surge and the ugly face of communalism. Rest is history. Karat succeeded Surjeet a year later and in 2008, the CPM withdrew support to the UPA government protesting Indo-US nuclear deal, but it paid a heavy price for the ill-conceived decision; from 43 in 2004, its Lok Sabha seat tally plummeted to nine in 2014 while losing power in West Bengal to TMC.

Not only Congress, even the regional parties have also been pursuing the neo-liberal economic policy. How will an isolated CPM fight the BJP outside its Kerala, Bengal and Tripura bastions? The irony is that in Tamil Nadu, the CPM is trying to forge an alliance with DMK, an ally of the Congress. If the alliance fructifies, the CPM will be part of a state-level Front with Congress in Tamil Nadu. The Bengal unit is also pushing for an alliance with the Congress to fight Trinamool Congress. If the Congress is a pariah at national level, in the states it is a different, convoluted story.

Even within the CPM, many disagree with Karat’s postulation that right-wing “authoritarianism” is embodied in a leader. In the Indian context Modi draws his strength from the RSS machinery. While authoritarianism of Indira Gandhi was Emergency-specific, that of Modi is structural and systematic and hence more dangerous. What is being witnessed today is a deadly cocktail of neo-liberalism and Hindutva. Cultural policies are tweaked and expanded from limited anti-Muslim narrative to many other “un-Hindu” practices for maximum reach and effect. BJP’s election strategy has also since changed; it is now plotting to disaggregate the homogeneous social identities to create ground for subaltern deductive social identities that will undermine possible solidarity actions challenging its hegemony.

In the 80s, the Left was electorally stronger than BJP and, yet it could not dislodge the Congress as it did not have an alternative for reconstructing the nation. It is okay to criticise the Congress, but the CPM has also failed to project an alternative narrative. Party’s public discourse has not found pan-India resonance among the common man. A new narrative, not pedagogy, is needed to reach out to the public.

The author is an independent journalist.