“THIS is a Congress of Unity, Resolve and Determination”, said the newly elected general secretary of the CPI(M), Sitaram Yechury, in its 23rd Congress at Kannur. Yechury said this while concluding the deliberations of the five-day Party Congress in Kannur. The Congress was held from April 6-10, 2022.

 Yechury also narrated the historic role that this region(Kannur) played in the formation of the Communist Party in Kerala. He informed the heroic role of the martyrs of the Malabar region during the freedom movement.

PLACING THE RESOLUTION

The political resolution of the 23rd Congress was placed by Sitaram Yechury on April 6. Before placing the resolution, Yechury also informed about the democratic structure of the Party in which the political resolution is updated. The resolution was made public two months before the Party Congress and Party members were asked to send amendments to it. So, he said, it is the Party that with its membership decides the political tactical line and not just a top–bottom exercise. Informing about the amendments, he said nearly 4001 amendments were received during the course of time which were duly perused by the Central Committee. A report on the accepted amendments and the trend of these amendments was also placed in Congress.

Explaining the political situation in the country he said: “In the period since the 22nd Congress there have been multi-pronged attacks through the pursuit of rabid neo-liberal reforms strengthening communal-corporate nexus looting of national assets, promoting crony capitalism, legalising political corruption and imposing full-fledged authoritarianism.”

On the international situation, he said the dominant feature has been the Covid pandemic and its fallout on systemic issues of the social system we all are living in. The vulnerabilities of capitalism in handling the pandemic with rampant privatisation of health proved beyond doubt that a system based on profit maximisation cannot serve the interests of people even when they were so direly needed.

Yechury mentioned 12 important features of the international situation including deepening economic crisis; global hunger, poverty levels, unemployment and educational deprivations; US imperialism’s efforts to contain and isolate China; continuous global political rightward shift and also growing resistance; resistance in Latin America against US imperialism; Ukraine war and serious dangers posed by climate change.

Enumerating the tasks of the international situation Sitaram Yechury said that the Party will aggressively conduct campaigns against US imperialism’s goal globally, and particularly its interference in South Asia; support to the Palestinian people for their right to the homeland; solidarity with socialist countries; solidarity with anti-imperialist struggles in Latin America, particularly in Venezuela; solidarity with all forces combating neo-fascist forces, fundamentalism, religious fanaticism, ethnic sectarianism, obscurantism and reactionary forces; solidarity with all struggles against imperialism and in all its manifestations – neo liberalism, degradation of world’s environment and for universal climate justice; Party will contribute efforts to bring together various streams of people’s struggles to forge an all-embracing anti-imperialist movement across the world.

SitaramYechury  also explained the reason for rising stock markets on the one side and the falling levels of people’s living standards. He said the money is raised through government bonds which are then put in the stock markets thus artificially inflating them. This has nothing to depict growth in the economy. To sustain this order of massive loot across the globe, he said a political dispensation is required and international capital is instrumental in shaping this dispensation which is in tune with metropolitan capital.

DEFEAT AND ISOLATE HINDUTVA COMMUNALISM

On the national situation, he attacked the BJP government at the centre and said: “In the past, we have been raising issues of sale of India’s wealth right from the inception of neoliberal policies. But what we are experiencing with the current dispensation is far beyond that. It is not just the sale of India’s wealth, rather it is the destruction of economic foundations of independent India.”

Explaining the communal character of the BJP, Yechury quoted paragraphs from the Party programme and the 22nd Party Congress demonstrating the unambiguous clarity the Party has about the BJP and its mentor the RSS. The political resolution of the Party Congress stated: “The BJP succeeded in creating an overarching ‘Hindu identity’ cutting across social -ethnic divides to a significant extent, accompanied by crass micro-level caste-based mobilisations. Massive money power and control over the media and social media by the RSS-BJP influenced the results significantly. The BJP’s money power accumulated in multiple ways, including the instrument of electoral bonds, deprives a level playing field, an imperative for free and fair elections.”

Yechury explained in detail the challenges that the Indian polity faces with BJP in power. He said systematic efforts are on to change the character of the Indian Republic. The four fundamental pillars of the Indian Constitution -secular democracy, federalism, social justice and economic sovereignty are being assaulted.

He commented that under the current dispensation the State is acting as a patron of a particular religion whereas the State must act on the tenets of secularism. Speaking about the attack on the minorities he said nearly 72 per cent of the cases under UAPA have been registered after Modi’s ascendancy to power. There is a persistent attack on federalism with issues pertaining to the State list under the constitution being deliberately raked up by the centre. He mentioned how agriculture and education which are State subjects are being veneered over by the centre in the form of three farm laws and the national education policy. He also mentioned the GST and how it is an attack on the federal principles of the Indian State.

The brazenness of the attacks on the minorities post- 2019 when Modi came back to power was also explained by him.  The government dissolved the state of Jammu and Kashmir, enacted the Citizenship Amendment Act(CAA) and announced the sequence of the National Population Register to be followed up by the National Register of Citizens. He said all of these interventions are blatant violations of the Constitution, but still the BJP went ahead to further strengthen the narrative of polarising the Indian people on communal lines.

He explained in detail the economic mess through which the country is passing. There is an economic recession; expenditure contraction aggravated GDP slowdown; private final consumption expenditure declined; government expenditure fell; agricultural distress continues; more burdens on people continue; alarming unemployment and growing poverty unabatedly; inequalities widen sharply. Given this background, he said the corporates, however, enjoy the favours of tax concession by the government. Net direct tax collections declined by 8 per cent from 2018-2019-20 from Rs 11.36 crore to Rs 10.49 lakh crore.

Yechury also explained the complete mishandling of the Covid situation and termed it ‘criminal’.

The political resolution also gave an in-depth narration of attacks on different groups of people-women, dalits, adivasis, OBCs, and others.

Yechury mentioned that these attacks either on peoples’ livelihoods or on the basis on their gender, social and ethnic background have not gone uncontested. Particularly he mentioned about the resistance built against the CAA in different parts of the country and the farmers struggle that went on for more than a year. He also gave narration of the struggle of trade unions in the country.

The youth were in the forefront of the anti-CAA struggle resisting the offensive of Hindutva brigade, he said. These protests spread all across the country rapidly with the involvement of people’s movements, a large cross section of women, intellectuals, academicians and NGOs participated in them, he pointed out. On the kisan struggle he said from November 26, 2020, tens of thousands of farmers sat on dharna at five different points of highways on the borders of Delhi. They braved police repression in reaching the borders but did not relent till the farm laws were taken back. Yechury said the successful historic struggle inspires all other sections of the people in their struggles against the anti-people policies of the government and for a better life.

Yechury also gave a narration of the massive working class struggles in the country. Three country wide general strikes were held under the banner of joint trade union platform comprising 10 central trade unions and other sectoral federations.

SitaramYechury explained that despite India falling in most of the indices of human development, globally, BJP which is in power and should have gotten a drubbing, is still winning elections as was seen in the recent state elections held in March 2022 in five states. The BJP could win four out of five, barring Punjab where AAP won. What is the reason he asked? Even if people’s livelihood is worsening, there is also a movement on such issues as the kisan struggle, still, people have voted for BJP!

He said the BJP has been able to ensure a considerable shift in the polity. Merely raising economic issues will not be able to confront them. They have a package- a package of Hindutva. He said Hindutva has to be fought by combating Hindutva by arming ourselves and people with proper weapons- weapons of the social, political and cultural web woven around and intensifying and sharpening the struggle on these issues.

Sitaram Yechury also spoke about the Left and Democratic Front and explained that this is a class front and should not be confused with fronts formed during elections. There is a programme for this front and efforts must be there to knit it properly. There should be an identification of forces in each state that can be part of the LDF. On this basis, then unity and struggle must be strengthened to project the Left democratic programme as the only real alternative to the ruling class policies.

Explaining the political line of the Party, Yechury said the main task is to isolate and defeat the BJP. But for that, “This requires the growth of the independent strength of the CPI(M) and the Left forces to mobilise the people in the class and mass struggles in a powerful militant manner,” he asserted. He further stated that the “broadest possible mobilisation of people and rallying of secular opposition forces against corporate communal regime must be done.”

Altogether 48 delegates participated in the discussion and consumed 570 minutes in it. There were also 390 amendments and 12 suggestions proposed by the delegates in Congress. The discussion continued on April 7 and 8. The discussion was mainly on strengthening the draft resolution. There were also queries and pointed remarks over the political line drawn in the previous Congress.

Sitaram Yechury in his reply addressed all those issues and said what is imperative is that the forces of Hindutva are defeated. He also explained the project of Hindutva. He said it has nothing to do with Hindu religion. It is a political project. V D Savarkar, the proponent of this theory clearly remarked that Hindutva has nothing to do with Hindu religion.

Sitaram Yechury said we should not lose focus of our goal of achieving our programmatic task of attaining peoples’ democracy but for that, it is important that our basic classes the working class and the peasanty have a solid unity. Sections of our basic classes get swayed by Hindutva communalism. Hence to march ahead towards our programmatic goal it is important that we defeat Hindutva communalism. This has to be taken as a foremost task. Rallying the broadest possible unity along with mounting resistance through social, cultural and political issues is the way forward, he explained.

In the end, he remarked: “This Congress is a Congress of unity, determination and resolve. Resolve to ensure that the basic fabric of our Republic is protected; Determination to meet the challenge of Hindutva communalism with all our vigour and Unity of the Party and the working class and other sections ensuring our advancement and defeat of the sinister fascistic designs of RSS led BJP government.”

The political resolution was finally adopted in the Congress.