Comrades and the Congress

The Communists were once a force in Bihar and Telengana, in Kanpur and Coimbatore. Once they could win in Faizabad, notable for the fact that it includes Ayodhya. Today, they win seats outside their three strongholds only if another party is willing to be charitable.

I also likened the Left8217;s conduct to a 8220;tacky show8221;. And that too is well merited. American quiz-shows in the early years of television degenerated into a fraudulent farce, which just about sums up the Left Front today.

While the Communists claim to be bitter foes of the Congress, that enmity8217; is restricted exclusively to West Bengal, Kerala, and Tripura. Elsewhere, the Left and the Congress have no qualms about sleeping together 8212; as in Tamil Nadu. Both Marxists and Congressmen are content to play second-fiddle to Jayalalitha in Chennai.

All pretence of hostility is given up when the Communists trek to Delhi. Because the sole candidate being put up for Prime Minister by the Left Front is, believe it or not, Sonia Gandhi. On at least two occasions in the past three years, the aged Jyoti Basu was a heartbeat away from becoming the prime minister. Today, nobody is even thinking about such a prospect.

Strictly speaking, this farce 8212; perhaps fraud8217; is a better word 8212; is more a problem for the voters of Kerala and Tripura than it is for those of West Bengal. For all the sound and fury during elections, it doesn8217;t matter if the citizens of the first two vote for Congressmen or Communists; once in Delhi they sit on the same side. In Bengal, however, there is a real option in the Trinamul Congress-BJP alliance.

I am sure some of the Leftist persuasion shall disagree with my description of their relationship with Sonia Gandhi Inc. as a 8220;fraud8221;. May I remind them of certain events in the history of the Communist movement?

The CPI was an electoral ally of the Congress as far back as the General Election of 1971. If memory serves me right, the Communists even won Baghpat, Charan Singh8217;s home-turf, thanks to the Indira wave. In fact, this alliance was on the verge of turning into something even more intimate; when the Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev visited Delhi, he advised the CPI leaders to 8220;strengthen progressive forces8221; by merging with the Congress. At least S.A. Dange and Mohit Sen took this advice quite seriously.

The CPI went to the extent of enthusiastically supporting the Emergency, a fact bitterly resented by other Comrades. When it sought reentry into the Left Front fold after 1977, a vengeful CPIM demanded a public apology, which was duly delivered at Bhatinda. Someone in the Congress possesses a sense of humour; when the CPI asked the Congress for an electoral arrangement in Punjab in 1998, it was allotted Bhatinda.

Why is the CPIM now regurgitating the same arguments that it rejected so violently twenty years ago? I don8217;t know if the Left still uses words like progressive8217; any longer, but substitute secular8217; 8212; an equally meaningless catch-word in today8217;s context 8212; and there is no difference between the Brezhnev of yesterday and the Surjeet of today.

It might be argued that much water has flowed down the Yamuna in the twenty or more years since Brezhnev8217;s visit. Yes, but what about things that happened as recently as three years ago?

The United Front, whose 8220;Chanakya8221; was Comrade Harkishen Singh Surjeet, repeatedly refused to consider supporting any ministry in which the Congress participated. Forget about backing a government actually led by the Congress! It refused to do so after the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls of 1996. It refused after the fall of Deve Gowda in 1997. It refused after the Congress slid the carpet from under Gujral8217;s feet.

But there was a sudden volte-face in April of this year. After the Vajpayee ministry lost the vote of confidence, the CPIM suddenly began drumming up support for Sonia Gandhi. So much so that Comrade Surjeet angrily questioned Mulayam Singh Yadav8217;s secular8217; credentials when the Samajwadi Party boss wouldn8217;t lick La Gandhi8217;s Guccis.

In other words, the Left Front was amazingly consistent for the past three years about rejecting any explicit partnership with the Congress. What has changed in the brief months since April to force such a u-turn in its policy?Of course, the Congress is not the only new friend being wooed by the Left.

I have already mentioned the alliance with Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu; this means Karunanidhi has been given the boot. The Left has also snapped links with Mulayam Singh Yadav 8212; in the hope of snapping up the crumbs from Laloo Prasad Yadav8217;s table. And in Punjab, its bosom buddy is the Akali Dal splinter led by G. S. Tohra 8212; that same Akali Dal denounced as a hotbed of communalism.

I have no idea how long these new arrangements shall last. In fact, the Congress president already seems keen to keep the octogenarian dinosaurs of the Left at bay. Could it be an inherited trait?

Congressmen are strong believers in genetics. Indira Gandhi inherited her talents from Panditji and Priyanka Vadra from Rajiv Gandhi according to the Congress gospel. By that logic, we should look very closely at the late Signor Maino, specifically what he thought of Communists.

Maino was a Fascist. The Left uses that word loosely, but the Congress boss8217;s father was the genuine article 8212; one of Mussolini8217;s men. Maino named his dog Stalin8217; to demonstrate his contempt for Communism. His daughter goes one better 8212; she doesn8217;t hesitate to kick the Marxists, secure in the knowledge that the poodles will creep straight back into the kennels of 10, Janpath.

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