30-something dilemma

Thirty years is an age in politics. By surviving in power in Bengal for three whole decades, the Left Front has achieved what no other political party or formation in the country has managed to do in the history of post-Partition India. This period also saw a chief minister rule uninterruptedly for 23 years, which is also unprecedented. But any complacency that this rather extraordinary commemoration may evoke in Writer’s Building would have to be necessarily tempered by fact that today the Left Front faces unprecedented threats to its authority, image and resilience as a political entity.

Indeed, the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee government today finds itself in a make-or-break situation. Its ‘new’ industrial model ushered in during the last days of the Jyoti Basu government and taken forward by an energetic Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, which privileged urbanisation, industrialisation, the introduction of new technology and private investment, is now being tested as never before by the current tensions in Singur, Nandigram and Burnpur. Inept handling of these various crises have, in turn, undermined the administrative will of the government and introduced fissures within the Left Front itself, with the Forward Bloc, RSP and even CPI on occasion distancing themselves from the CPM’s handling of the issue.

There is also a serious contradiction that lies at the heart of Left Front politics in the state. Economic empowerment spread via private enterprise is, by its very nature, incompatible with a strong Stalinist state and dominating party machinery. In fact, economic development and the free flow of private capital have historically always worked to undermine political autocracy, whether that of individuals or parties. Given this, the biggest challenge facing Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and his party today is to usher in both economic and political reform. But it is difficult to be optimistic about such an outcome, given the history of Left Front politics in Bengal over these last 30 years.