THE Political-Organisational Report of the 23rd Congress was introduced by CPI(M) Polit Bureau member, Prakash Karat in the evening session on April 8, 2022. The Political-Organisational Report deals with the implementation of the political tactical line adopted in the last Party Congress and the review of the organisational tasks decided in the last Congress. The Report is in three parts: one part is on the implementation of the political tactical line and tasks set out in the 22nd Congress; the second one is on the organisational aspects; and the third is the report of the mass fronts.

The political tactical line and the Party organisation are closely interconnected. Prakash Karat said we must have an organisation which is suited, shaped towards implementing the tasks set out in the political tactical line. The last four years since the 22nd Party Congress have been, in one sense, an extraordinary period. The last two years have been badly affected by the covid. It also was a period in which within one year of the 22nd Congress, the Lok Sabha elections were held in 2019 with BJP returning to power with a bigger majority representing the consolidation of right-wing forces and indicating a further rightward shift. Post 2019 elections, Modi government saw a more aggressive pursuit of Hindutva agenda of the RSS, of pro-corporate policies, and the aggressive assault on Indian republic and constitution.

The four years following the last Party Congress were most challenging due to rightward consolidation and severe attacks on our Party in West Bengal and Tripura. But this period is also clearly marked by increasing resistance and fighting back in both these states and in conducting movements. There were two big mass movements – anti-CAA movement and the kisan struggle. Prakash Karat said, in the last political resolution adopted at the 22nd Party Congress, we had called for stepping up class and mass struggles to strengthen the independent base of the Party. We were able to implement this call. The kisan struggle, the various programmes organised by our trade union, kisan and agricultural fronts – jointly and independently – like the August 9, 2018 jail bharo, the 2018 September rally, the four General Strikes called by the Central Trade Unions, the formation of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha gave a momentum to the stepping up of class and mass struggles.

In the next two years since 2020, we had the Covid pandemic. The most notable work in this period was the relief work which was an important area of work for Party and class and mass organisations. Even in our weaker states, we had put in all our personnel and resources to provide relief to people through a wide ranging of activities. In West Bengal, the Red Volunteers were amongst people in time of need and distress.

The Party gave calls independently for protests against fuel price hike, for provision of goods, for MGNREGA work and wages, and also made attempts to forge united Left actions on these issues. In September 2019, Left parties convention was held and in October, united actions were organised. But, said Prakash Karat, we could not seriously take up issues like electoral reforms. There is a need for strengthening Left unity. While we were able to step up united Left actions, we could not strengthen Left unity. The RSP and Forward Block diverged and have gone into Congress led UDF in Kerala while in West Bengal they are with the Left Front. This created a political problem in terms of having a unified approach. The CPI (ML) in West Bengal had a different approach that confined to fighting and defeating only the BJP, without having anything to do with the TMC. We need to work on strengthening Left unity. We have always maintained that we will work for building Left unity which involves both unity and struggle on ideological, political issues within the framework of Left unity, noted Prakash Karat.

When we review our work on building the independent strength of the Party in the past four years, we cannot say we have made adequate political, ideological, and organisational efforts to develop the strength of our Party. The Political-Organisational Report of this Congress again reiterates the utmost importance of building the independent strength and influence of the Party. When we talk about class and mass struggles, we find that the influence and contacts we obtain from them is not politically consolidated, he said.

The Political-Organisational Report underlines the importance of developing local struggles on a sustained basis. The review of reports of Party state conferences shows that we have not developed consistent struggles on local issues. Prakash Karat emphasised that there are three reasons that can be attributed to this phenomenon. One, taking up local issues would invite the ire of the dominant classes and masses and taking on their interests requires a lot of determination and ability to face the repression. Two, parliamentarism that pervades the Party, does not encourage taking up local issues since this affliction encourages a compromising and a conciliatory approach towards the dominant forces in the village. Three, organisational weaknesses. We have to correct these weaknesses to see that conditions are created to help in having local struggles.

The organisational capacity to wage ideological and political battles is related to our political and ideological preparedness on taking on Hindutva. In the 22nd Congress and in Kolkata Plenum, we have identified five areas to intervene and work to expose Hindutva and the Hindutva consciousness that permeates the masses.

Prakash Karat maintained that there is still an understanding among us that with economic struggles, we can build our independent growth. We see working class, middle class joining economic struggles. But if the Party is not conducting sustained ideological struggle to consolidate, then they will go and vote for the BJP, he said. Uttar Pradesh elections show how despite economic hardships, farm struggles, anger against Yogi rule, the BJP had won and increased their votes. We have to recognise that economic struggle is the basis. But without class struggle in ideological arena, which is essentially a political struggle, we cannot move forward. Our efforts to counter the nationalist appeals of the BJP have to be analysed in this framework.

The 21st Congress of the Party and the Kolkata Plenum emphasized on restoring the primacy of building the Left and Democratic Front. This is not a front of political parties. It is a front of various classes which will mobilise eventually for a People’s Democratic Revolution. What are the issues which can be fought for, for building a Left and Democratic Front? We could not do much in this area. The Polit Bureau did not show any initiative to take up this matter. And hence it could not push the states also to do it, he pointed out.

Talking about the electoral tactics, Prakash Karat said, we underlined that they should be based on our political tactical line. The Central Committee reviewing the West Bengal Assembly elections in 2021, made critical observations regarding the tactics pursued by the Bengal state committee. The political tactical line adopted at the 22nd Congress says that there should be no political alliance with the Congress party, but during elections, we should work out ways to maximise anti-BJP votes. In West Bengal, we had to fight not just the BJP but also the TMC. The Central Committee had permitted seat sharing adjustments with the Congress party and other secular parties. But the West Bengal committee went beyond this, and formed a morcha and called for the formation of a government. The political point is that in these elections, there was a tendency in the state Party to equate both the BJP and the TMC as equal enemies. But in our political resolution, we clearly spelt out that the BJP is the main threat. The West Bengal state committee of the Party had undermined this resolution.

The Polit Bureau also made an intervention in Telangana with regard to the formation of the BLF (Bahujan Left Front) taking mainly the oppressed castes as a political alternative.

Broadly when we review our political organisational work in the last four years, we find that there was progress. We were able to step up struggles and tried to take the movement forward. In Kerala, there was an expansion in our influence and the work and performance of the LDF government headed by us helped in achieving this expansion. There were inadequacies and failures in implementing the important tasks of the last Congress in developing the independent strength of the Party, and in building a Left and Democratic Front. The inability of the Polit Bureau to carry out these tasks was mainly due to the focus on day-to-day developments and a preoccupation with the electoral work. This is a reformist approach and this trend reflects parliamentarism afflicting the Party. This happens when we divorce the electoral work from the basic political and organisational work of the Party. The Kolkata Plenum identified four reasons for our weaknesses: parliamentarism, reformism, subjectivism and liberalism.

In October 2019, after the Lok Sabha elections review, the Party had decided that we must conduct a review of the implementation of Kolkata Plenum tasks and a review document was adopted, and based on that, ten tasks were set up which were time bound, to check up how much work was done in this regard. But in the next three-four months, Covid pandemic struck. Keeping these limitations in note, we tried to review how much was this implemented, said Prakash Karat.

When we examined the task of orienting the Party to mass line, we noted that the Covid relief activities organised by the Party, and class and mass organisations helped in going to people in their hour of need. In Kerala, mass activities were held in a big way even going house to house etc. Improving the quality of membership should begin with recruitment and renewal of membership based on the five criterion enlisted by the Kolkata Plenum. Youth and women's composition of membership should be improved. Currently women's membership comprises 25 per cent and youth membership is about 20 per cent of the Party membership. The West Bengal example is striking. Youth participation in struggles has increased, but youth membership has gone down from the last conference.  Women’s membership from Kerala has improved, and in Karnataka it is about 32 per cent, which demonstrates that if there is a will, there is a way and we can bring about a change in the composition with planned efforts. In Kerala, there is at least one woman member in every district secretariat of the Party. The age limit for the Central Committee earlier was 80 years; now we have brought it down to 75 years. Every time the age limit will be reviewed and fixed accordingly by the Central Committee. The Party Centre and the Polit Bureau’s work should be reoriented to overcome the weaknesses identified. Polit Bureau could not review the work of the mass fronts. It could not review the work of the members of the Polit Bureau working from the centre. It could not form a coordination committee of Hindi speaking states to help in taking forward the Party work in these states, he said.

Summing up the placing of the report, Prakash Karat said that the enemy has gained and consolidated. There is a severe attack on us in West Bengal and Tripura, and there is a general decline all over except in Kerala. From this position, we have to fight back and increase the independent strength of the Party. This requires tremendous efforts to implement the political tactical line and the organisational tasks.

48 delegates participated in the discussion, making critical points and enriching the draft with their experiences. They pointed out that there should be timely intervention on the issues. They also underscored the need for the leadership to lead from the front and inspire the rank and file. Organisational weaknesses and reformist tendencies should be rectified in time. After the reply on the discussions by Prakash Karat, the Political-Organisational Report was unanimously adopted by the Congress.