THE General Elections for the 16th Lok Sabha is going to be held in the background of a crisis in the economy and the society as a fallout of the vigorous pursuit of neo-liberal policies by the successive governments at the centre, particularly those led by both the Congress and the BJP. In the run up to the electioneering, both the Congress-led UPA and the BJP-led NDA who appear to be the main contenders of power at the centre, have been asserting their commitment to the same neo-liberal policies of deregulation, privatisation and globalisation, despite their pernicious impact on the life and livelihood of the mass of the people. The corporate run media is also batting for the same model of neo-liberalism with the dubious intent of influencing the peoples’ choice to be restricted to these two options. Among other political forces, beyond these two formations, the Left parties remain the only consistent and firm opponents of the anti-people and anti-self-reliant neo-liberal policies from the very beginning. And the Left parties opposed with vehemence those policies, not merely in parliament and legislatures, but in actions as well, through numerous countrywide agitations and strikes involving several crores of people. Even the state governments run by Left parties, despite all limitations under the present Constitutional framework, undertook several important pro-people steps on relief and rights for the common people which demarcate from and militate against the neo-liberal policies. The trade union movement in the country, irrespective of political affiliations, came together on to the streets in holding militant agitations and strikes both at the national level and sectoral level/factory-gates/workplaces against these neo-liberal policies that were ruining their lives and livelihood. The Left forces took leading initiative in organising this united trade union movement. FOREWARNED BY THE LEFT From the day one, the Left parties worked diligently among the people to expose the anti-people and anti-self-reliant character of the neo-liberal policy regime, authored, piloted and sought to be imposed on the developing countries, including India, by the imperialist-backed international financial agencies. It did forecast that these policies would neither benefit the mass of the toiling people nor the country in the least, rather would make her dependent on the international finance capital, impinging and intruding upon her sovereignty, not merely on economic matters but also on political and foreign policy issues. Through the last three decades’ pursuit of the same neo-liberal policy regime, every aspect of the Left’s forecast on the impact of neo-liberalism on the people and on country’s economy stands totally vindicated. The poverty got widened and deepened among the mass of the people, and wealth amassed by handful of the rich and big-business class multiplied many times, giving rise to the most obscene inequality on the one hand and bringing about severe squeeze on the purchasing power of the people on the other. As a consequence, contraction of the domestic market and the resultant gloom and decline in employment generating investment and growth rate is making the situation further worse for the people. People from all walks of life were made to suffer severely owing to the neo-liberal policy-induced drive of drastic cut in public investment/expenditure in health, education, social welfare etc and subsidies on food, fuel and fertilisers. On the other hand, huge pilferage by the big-business and corporates from the national exchequer was being allowed through huge tax concession every year as well as non-payment of tax, through privatization of national assets at depressed prices, and through various instruments of contracts and corruptions. And in this process, resources and wealth created by working people are being transferred to a handful of big-business/corporate entities, both foreign and domestic while the mass of the populace find themselves worse off every passing day. Neo-liberal policies acted as instruments of looting the people and national resources for private gains and also for the gains of those in governance who facilitated this process of loot. The votaries of neo-liberalism with the support of corporate-run media have been trying to manufacture consensus among the political forces on this neo-liberal direction of the economic policies. But, the consistent struggles by the Left and the working class movement against the same policies through numerous agitations and strikes etc involving several crores of people have been able to develop a different kind of consensus of opposition among the mass of the common people. They are united in opposition against various facets of neo-liberal policies like privatisation, on land-related matters, PPP in public services, suppression of wages and trade union rights, contractorisation, FDI in retail trade etc. And this got reflected in vacillation among other non-Left political forces also who are otherwise not vocally opposed to neo-liberal policies. In the debate in parliament, almost all the political parties, including many allies of UPA, spoke against FDI in retail trade, PFRDA Bill and on many other issues. This consensus being developed among the working people for fighting against the anti-people neo-liberal regime of loot and plunder on people and the country through consistent struggles has to be carried forward. This struggle has to be heightened for reversal of this anti-people regime and to put in place the alternative people-centric policies which would ensure growth with distributive equity and that alone can make the growth sustainable. And this alternative inevitably coincides with the Left’s vision on development. Only the Left forces can provide for such alternative since it is the Left which consistently fought against every aspects of neoliberalism from the very beginning. The working class movement, therefore must carry the message to the working people at grassroots level to defeat both the Congress and BJP led combines decisively and support the Left parties wherever they are in the fray and in other places those candidates who commit to fight against the policies of deregulation, privatisation and globalisation and also against communalism. We have to make people at the grassroots level vocal and assertive against the policies and politics of neo-liberalism and that is the biggest task before the working class in the forthcoming electoral battle. ATTACKS ON THE LEFT At the same time, the severe and heinous all round attacks being faced by the Left parties from the right wing forces in their stronger areas have to be understood and combated resolutely by involving mass of the people in a big way. A peoples’ resistance against the assault on Left has to be developed. Because the assault on the Left is in real sense the attack on peoples’ right to live with dignity. During the last couple of years, Left forces have come under constant attack through various ways not only in West Bengal but also in Kerala, Tripura and in many other states in the country. The form of attacks varies from place to place depending on the local situation. In West Bengal it is in the form of brutal physical attacks after the regime change in 2011; in Kerala it is mainly in the form of unprecedented malicious campaign against the Left forces in collaboration with corporate run media to confuse and also create disruption. Even in Tripura, despite there being no regime change, the atmosphere of West Bengal was and is being sought to be recreated which is being successfully resisted by the people. Malicious and misinformation campaigns are unleashed against the Left all over the country. In this context, such multi-pronged and multi-dimensional attacks are bound to intensify further as the date of poll comes nearer. The attacks on the trade union and democratic rights assumed a new dimension in West Bengal. Immediately after the last assembly elections and the formation of the TMC government, violent physical attacks were unleashed on the trade unions, particularly on CITU and other mass organisations of peasants, students, youth and women by the armed TMC hoodlums. Left supporters are being forced to desert their houses in villages and towns in many parts of the state. The police remained silent spectators in most of the cases. Trade union offices are being set on fire and ransacked, Left supporters are being physically attacked, women, including the anganwadi employees, are molested and tortured, houses set on fire and many of CPI(M) activists have been killed. In many areas, contract workers owing allegiance to CITU unions were thrown out of employment and new set of workers are being engaged at reduced wages in connivance with the contractors. An atmosphere of terror is sought to be created to maim the Left opposition and democratic movement. Such a situation bears ominous portent for democracy and indicates the fascistic design to suppress the class and mass organisations in this strong Left bastion. It is aimed at weakening and marginalising any opposition to the anti-people neo-liberal measures being unleashed by the TMC led government in the state. The alarming rise of crime, indiscriminate rape in broad-day light and killing of the victim, violence against women, attack on educational and cultural institutions has made the state occupy the top slot in those respects among all the states in the country. Such an anarchic situation reveals the lumpensation of politics and governance in the midst of crisis ridden economy and the society. And in such a situation, in the face of fast disillusionment and isolation from peace-loving people, the ruling clique led by TMC is banking upon securing support forcibly through violence and rigging the elections. Violence has been resorted to by TMC bandwagons to capture most of the school committees’ or college governing body’s elections or large cooperative societies etc in the state. The most recent incidents are that out of 222 colleges, only in 36 colleges the students’ organisations other that the TMC sponsored one could file their nomination for union elections, that too partially. More than 30 activists and supporters of the Left parties were murdered in the run up to the recently held panchayat elections in the state and in most of the places a large section of electorate could not cast their vote. And after all these, Left candidates elected in the panchayat elections are being threatened and tortured either to tender resignation or to join TMC. And now in the run up to the election campaign for Lok Sabha, in many places in the state, violent attacks on the offices of the Left parties and their village level campaigns have already started becoming as almost an every-day incident. OFFENSIVE AGAINST PEOPLE It would be wrong to consider or comprehend such violence and brutalities against the Left as mere sporadic acts of revenge by the party in power. In many districts, tenant peasants are forced to leave their land and land reforms implemented during the Left regime are sought to be reversed. The former landlords and jotedars are trying to gain control on lands by evicting the tenant peasants with the help of TMC led administration. Peasants are being deprived of even the minimum support price and remunerative prices for their produce as the state government is seeking to procure rice through the rice mill owners or other private agencies who are usurping government funds by compelling the farmers to make distress sales. While trade unions are being attacked and terrorised, the employers’ class, in the private sector in particular, have become more aggressive in suppressing the rights of the trade unions and workers. The head of the state government did not mince words while expressing her total intolerance to right to strike. She in fact called upon employees to “finish” the oldest and largest organisation of the state government employees, the State Coordination Committee. The pro-people democratic changes in the economy and in various social, educational, cultural and cooperative institutions brought about by Left Front government, which led to economic, political and social empowerment of the common people at the grassroots level in the process of land reforms, operation barga, panchayati raj with the financial and administrative empowerment of elected panchayats, expansion of trade union rights etc, are under attack in West Bengal today. These benefits and rights to the people are sought to be reversed in favour of the handful of rich landlords and employers’ class by the TMC led right wing regime. The physical attacks on the Left forces, trade unions, kisan sabha and other class and mass organisations are designed for eliminating resistance against such right wing reversals. In the background of the deepening crisis of the neo-liberal order, it is but natural that Left politics will be the prime target of the right wing pro-imperialist forces, the protagonists of neo-liberalism. The Left politics not only offer a viable alternative to the destructive neo-liberal order but also possess the potential to build up resistance and fight it back to decisive defeat. That is precisely the reason for such an all round attack and conspiracies being engineered by the pro-imperialist forces and their cohorts against the Left, particularly in their stronger bastions. The corporate media and all the agencies of the neo-liberal camp are being utilised for this malicious misinformation campaign to discredit and eliminate the Left, while at the same time pampering the divisive and extremist forces, sometimes using ultra Left slogans. Therefore at this present juncture, when the country is going for general elections, in the background of severe resentment among the mass of the people from all walks of lives, the neo-liberal policies must be put on the dock and the people should be made to question the very purpose and efficacy of these anti-people policies while deciding on their verdict. This can only be done effectively by the Left because of its principled and irrefutable position on this policy regime. And that is the reason why the Left is under all round attack by the enemies of the people But in real sense, it is not merely an attack on the Left, it is on the entire people and the nation as such. Continuance of this neo-liberal order without any hurdles will mean faster pace of pauperisation of mass of the people, change of control over our natural and national resources hence of the economy in favour of foreign corporate interests with domestic players as junior partner. This is bound to result in crisis once again and economic slow-down with the increasing burden to be borne by the mass of the populace. This will weaken and kill our self reliance and intrude upon our sovereignty. DEFEND THE RIGHTS, DEFEND DEMOCRACY To combat such attack, people must be made to understand that it is not just the Left that is under attack; the attack is being engineered on the entire people, on every individual through the ongoing violent machination for manufacturing consent and manipulating support destroying the democratic process and institutions. It is the right of every individual citizen of the state, men and women alike to live and opine freely with dignity, which is under attack. It is the right of every woman to remain protected from beastly attacks and also the right to lodge complaint on such attack with dignity and receptivity from the concerned authority, the right to get justice with compassion, which is under barbarous assault. It is the right of every contract worker not to get evicted from employment, it is right of every farmer and tenant-farmer to work on his land without being extorted heavily by the local political goons, it is also their right to get the right price for their produce without paying gratification which is under onslaught. It is the right to respectability and autonomy for every educational, cultural and social institutions which is being outraged every day and so on. And the task of the trade union movement and the working class in general is to carry that message and realisation to people through an organised widespread person to person, house-to-house approach in every habitat, every factory gate, in every workplace and relate to their own experience. That will definitely generate confidence among all to defend their democratic rights to express and opine and also to defend the democratic process from the machinations of the ongoing lumpen-raj backed by vested interests. Let us pledge to undertake the task with all seriousness in the forthcoming political battle. We will overcome.