Will India's communist parties heed Kavita Krishnan?

Communist parties of India have maintained silence on China's treatment of Uighur Muslims and Russia's attack on Ukraine

It was sheer coincidence that just when we learnt about the passing away of Mikhail Gorbachev, the last chief of the Communist Party that ruled the Soviet Union, the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) leader Kavita Krishnan made public the information about her decision to leave all party posts. The reason for this was not personal. Nor was there any objection to the party's style of functioning cited in her announcement.

As reported by Scroll, "Krishnan Krishnan said that she requested the party as she needed to pursue 'certain troubling political questions', which would not have been possible if she continued to be a CPI(M-L) leader. There was a need to recognise the importance of defending liberal democracies with all their flaws against rising forms of authoritarian and majoritarian populisms."

The activist said it was not enough to discuss the regimes of the former Soviet Union, its premier Joseph Stalin and that of China as "failed socialisms". Instead, Krishnan said, they were some of the "world's worst authoritarianisms".

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"For our fight for democracy against fascism and growing totalitarianism in India to be consistent, we must acknowledge the entitlement to the same democratic rights and civil liberties for all people across the world, including subjects of socialist totalitarian regimes past and present," she said.

The reason was that Krishnan needed sufficient free space to deal with these ideological questions. The most surprising but welcome thing in this context was the respectful attitude of the party to her decision. However, the party thought it necessary to take away from Kavita Krishnan the primary membership of the party, which she wanted to retain. But the party accepted her right to decide. After this, the CPIML also condemned the humiliating attack on Krishnan and some people who belong to the left, especially the members of the Communist Party of India (Marxist). The party made it clear that it could not be a mute spectator to this humiliation of its former leader.

In the bitter and toxic political culture that we are accustomed to in India today, it all sounds like news from some other world. Usually, those who break away from the party attack the party, blaming the party leadership to justify their decision. In response, the party does the same. It is unlikely that both of them, at the moment of separation, respect the decision and also express this respect. If you don't show even this slightest courtesy to someone who has spent and invested 20 years of her life in you is a sign of an utter lack of civility.

This is what democratic culture should be. This acrimony is more visible in leftist politics. Adjectives such as revisionist or traitor are immediately used for people who leave the party. That it has not happened in the case of Krishnan proves that civility is possible in politics.

The reason given by Krishnan for her decision to leave the party is not only for communist parties but for all the parties to think about. But of course, for communist parties, it is all the more important to think about what she says. She has said that, be it the Soviet Union or the former communist countries, the demise of the communist regime of their communist parties should not be rued as the failure of the Soviet model of socialism or explained away as a failure of one type of experiment of socialism. Rather it should be acknowledged that those regimes were anti-democratic and dictatorial. To not say this and regret their downfall is to promote a lie. Their end brought democratic relief to the people of those countries. One must ask why did they rejoice at the end of something the communists in this country or elsewhere desperately wanted to continue.

While talking about the collapse of communist powers in the Soviet Union and other Eastern European countries, a lament is heard that their collapse was like a great dream shattered. But what we call a dream was, for the people of those countries, a nightmare that they wanted to end. Krishnan was not wrong when she said that despite the shortcomings of capitalist democracy, one should admit that communist dictatorships were far more oppressive and anti-people. The prefix communist does not wash away their sins.

Various arguments have been given in the last hundred years to defend the communist dictatorship. One is that the class struggle has many stages, the most essential being that of the dictatorship of the proletariat. Even after the defeat of capitalism, its remnants need to be cleaned up. Class enemies survive by hiding. Their elimination is necessary. You cannot expect nascent communism to adopt parliamentary democracy immediately because it cannot compete with the parties supported by capitalism. Therefore, the dictatorship of the proletariat is necessary to take care of all this. The dictatorship of the proletariat effectively means the dictatorship of the communist party. Can everyone join the vanguard squad of the revolution? Thus, the dictatorship of the party is established in the name of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The party is the keeper of social conscience. Only the party has the right to express it. It is all knowing. No one knows better than the party what is best for the people.

The party operates on the principle of democratic centralism. So, within the party, the central leadership of the party will be paramount. Thus, for the establishment of communism or the annihilation of the class, the dictatorship of the proletariat has to be established, which means the rule of the party, which in turn means the rule of the party leadership.

In this regime, there is no place for any objection or criticism to the opinion of the party, which is actually the opinion of the leader. Apart from what the party calls Marxism, any other interpretation of Marxism is revisionism. Neglecting it is dangerous. Only its complete removal can protect the interests of the proletariat. So the revolution never ends. You have to be constantly alert against class enemies, revisionists, etc. Mao coined the term permanent revolution. Its implication is clear. Permanent revolution means permanent dictatorship.

Stalin is often blamed for it, but Lenin was the pioneer of this theory. The revolution of 1917, known as the Bolshevik Revolution, involved many parties other than the Bolsheviks. Under the leadership of Lenin, the Bolsheviks captured that revolution and marginalised other parties and people involved in it. This is never discussed in communist circles because Lenin is beyond criticism. Lenin initiated the mass show trials that Stalin continued to finish his opponents or critics. He conducted many mass show trials against the leaders of the Communist party who differed from him. These were sham trials. In such cases, the punishment was already known. In India, Maoists enact similar mass show trials in the name of the Jantana governments.

It was because of Lenin's repression that the peasants refused to cooperate with him. The consequences for them were severe. But due to this, Russia also had to face a terrible famine which is infamously known as Lenin's famine. Scientists, philosophers, and writers were exiled from the country. Lenin himself forced his friend Maxim Gorky, who wrote very critically about his repressive measures, to leave the country.

Stalin captured the party after Lenin's early death. Then the Soviet Union had to endure a period of more than three decades of his repressive regime. The communist powers that were established in Eastern Europe also followed the same path. In between, if there was a democratic flurry in countries like Hungary or Czechoslovakia, Soviet tanks were sent to extinguish that.

China has made this repression so permanent that no one talks about it anymore. Cuba's dictatorship has also been supported in the name of keeping the symbol of communism alive.

Since communist countries are surrounded by capitalist countries, there will always be a danger of capitalism coming back. Therefore, there can be no relaxation in the dictatorship of the proletariat. What was supposed to be a transitional system will become permanent.

Ironically, communism is called the supreme form of democracy. But the communist parties, wherever they were in power, destroyed democracy. Rather, democracy was ridiculed by calling it bourgeois democracy. It is also clear that those who considered the annihilation of the class enemy as the responsibility of the revolution could not believe in the principle of human rights.

In the name of class, individual liberty was defamed. Individualism was the worst crime. Individuals didn't exist. Only classes did. Declassification was hailed, but your class origin could be invoked at any time to punish you.

It was not surprising that the communist parties of India, which fight for democracy and human rights in their country, consider them unnecessary for the people of communist countries. The communist parties of India have also maintained silence on China's cultural revolution and its treatment of Uighur Muslims today. What about the rights of minorities?

There is no longer even a communist regime in Russia. Yet its attack on Ukraine has not been unconditionally condemned by any Communist party except the CPIML.

These questions should disturb the sleep of any leftist. Krishnan wants freedom for herself to think about them. But to do this, she has to break away from the party. Should not the party also start discussing these questions? The matter of mutual etiquette is different, but why these questions cannot be considered while remaining in the party, is also a matter for the communist parties to think about.

(The writer teaches at Delhi University)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.