PARTY conferences in West Bengal have focused on the emerging situation in the state and the necessity of translating the growing discontent among the people into concrete struggles. Nine district conferences have been completed till January 15, after the special meeting of the branches and local and zonal level conferences. The remaining districts will hold their conferences till last week of February and the state conference will begin with a public meeting at Brigade Parade Ground on March 8.

There is a perceptible change in the political-organisational reports and the mode of discussions in the conferences, reflecting the changing reality of the political situation in the state. On the one hand, the all-round failure of the TMC government and the  exposure of rampant corruption have generated discontent, even anger among the people. This, along with persistent work of the Party, has somewhat weakened the terror machinery of the ruling party in many areas. On the other hand, in the last few months, the Party and the mass organisations have been able to organise movements on peoples’ issues more frequently, galvanising the masses. The trade union activities, like united movement of the tea workers have encouraged the toiling people. Thousands of villages were touched by the peasant jatha. Continuous demonstrations and rallies took place demanding punishment for the culprits in the Saradha chit fund scam. The confidence of the Party workers at all levels has increased considerably and mass activities have been intensified.

However, as being warned by the leaders attending the conferences, the communal forces like the BJP are trying their level best to gain from the peoples’ discontent against Mamata Banerjee-raj. With the support from a section of the media, the BJP is portraying an aggressive posture. With this situation in mind, the importance of twin fight against both the TMC and the  BJP has been emphasised in every conference.

Conferences have been completed in Coochbehar, Alipurduar, Jalpaiguri, Darjeeling, North Dinajpur, South Dinajpur, Maldaha, Birbhum and Nadia. In most of them, massive public rallies were held. The rallies, themselves were vibrant and enthusiastic in nature, indicating peoples’ trust in the Red flag.

Polit Bureau member and state secretary Biman Basu attended most of the conferences, along with Polit Bureau member Suryakanta Misra. Other state secretariat members are attending the deliberations.

Biman Basu, in his observation, has emphasised the need to strengthen class unity which is being targeted by divisive forces. Without this unity, the class struggle cannot be unleashed. And, though the new opportunities for broadening the struggle have emerged, the Party and the mass organisations have to be subjectively prepared for translating those into real movements. This, he underlined in conferences, can be done only by strengthening the Party ideologically and organisationally. Wrong practices and wrong style of work have to be discarded so as to build the Party in the way the people want to see a Communist Party.

Suryakanta Misra, while addressing the public rallies and intervening in the deliberations in the conferences, called for the ouster of the TMC government from the state. He said in several rallies that this has become an urgent necessity so as to arrest the sharp decline of West Bengal and to thwart the communal forces. Without defeating the TMC, it will become difficult to resist communal forces like the BJP . Basu and Misra have called upon the Party to speed up offensive struggles as the state government has been forced to a defensive position right now.

Discussions in the conferences also identified the need to develop struggles centering local issues, strengthen mass organisations, bettering Party committee functioning, overcoming the problem of lack of initiative among sections of Party members, inducting younger sections into the Party etc.