How the mighty karat has fallen

 

 

When trouble comes, it rarely comes alone. Back in the days of UPA’s first term, 2004-2009, the CPM head office at Gopalan Bhawan in central Delhi was the most favoured destination of politicians, industrialists and the media. The most vivid TV bytes of that part of recent history included images of CPM General Secretary, Prakash Karat, holding forth on a variety of issues, mostly highly uncomplimentary, for ally Congress. It appeared that the world began and ended at the party high command.

But that was then. Today after Left’s pummeling in the elections, the mandatory Delhi Police vehicle stationed permanently outside the party office for five years, has disappeared. Worse, the exclusive party parking lot has been converted into a public one. If the situation of the parent party was not bad enough, the plight of its supreme leader demonstrates how different 2009 is from 2004. Amidst hostility from the powerful West Bengal section of the CPM and the party’s own disastrous General Election results, Prakash Karat has just been able to hold on — only just.

Consider this: two years ago, his word inside the party was law, even though Communists are quick to say that their decisions are collective. Today, he has few takers for his views. Karat wanted Kerala chief minister VS Achyutanandan out both from the government and the all powerful CPM Politbureau because the charges against him were grave. But the Kerala leader was removed from the Politbureau and retained as chief minister.

Like the proverbial chickens coming to roost, Karat’s words are now being questioned by other constituents of the Left and no issue is big or old enough to beat the party General Secretary with. Among them, the decision to keep former West Bengal chief minister, Jyoti Basu, out of the prime ministerial sweepstakes in 2003 tops the list. Left constituent RSP leader Abani Roy, told TSI: “The decision to keep Basu from becoming PM when consensus had been reached within the Left and outside it, was a historical blunder. It would have changed history in this country.’’

In the tradition of Left parties, great debates in the last few weeks have hinged around what the party could have done with the Indo-US nuclear accord and its dealings with veteran party leader and then Speaker Somnath Chatterjee. That Karat had sounded belligerent to the point of being absurd on both the issues is no longer beyond doubt. Today more and more Left leaders are questioning the wisdom of that decision.

CPI’s D Raja told TSI: “In the Left coordination meetings, we held the view that the Left should withdraw support from the UPA much before the deal was signed. But the CPM sat on the issue for eight months. Our situation would not have been as precarious as it is today: The CPM has been reduced to 16 seats from an all time high of 43.’’ In the Politbureau and Central Committee of the party, the main decision making bodies in the CPM, voting had been held to determine whether the Left should have withdrawn support to the UPA government when it did, and more importantly was the timing of that withdrawal appropriate, both of which had been dictated by Karat and his ‘line’.

Thought to be equally disreputable is the treatment meted out to Somnath Chatterjee at party forums and inside the Lok Sabha itself, where he was specially targeted by Left MPs with Karat looking and sounding very aggressive against his former leader in public meetings and media interviews. Surprisingly in a party where ‘errant’ leaders in the past have been banished from public life, Karat has got away relatively lightly. In party forums, great care has been taken to protect the top boss. The official line being taken is that while election tactics were right, their implementation was doubtful and patchy. “Instead of picking up inflation as the main issue, we chose to put all our eggs in the nuclear deal basket. As if our life depended upon it. That was uncalled for,’’ confesses a CPM MP.

Just how strong is the resentment against Karat? While there is no question of any outward bickering, party leader Sitaram Yechury told TSI: “Wins and defeats are part of any election. It would be incorrect to blame any individual. All decisions in the party are collective. Today our position on the nuclear deal has been vindicated. The US is imposing all kinds of conditions on the deal now.’’

The CPM, a party not given to excessive media bytes, has remained impassive but there could be trouble lurking in the shadows. Though the personal equations between Karat and Yechury — both firebrands as students of Jawaharlal Nehru University in the early 1970s — appear firm, they are nothing like in the past.

Observers point to Karat’s visits to Bengal in the aftermath of the Nandigram and Singur massacres, where he took to task the state unit of the party for failing to implement land reforms and educate people about their rights and struggles. The leader in charge of the West Bengal unit: one Sitaram Yechury!

In the two powerful state units, West Bengal and Kerala, uncomfortable questions are being raised more regularly than they have been so far. In Bengal, peasant leaders like Abdur Rezzak Mollah, now a land reforms minister in the Bengal Cabinet, says the ‘land grab’ policy put paid to their electoral plans. Others say that Yechury has the support of the ‘Burdwan lobby’ in the state and owes his Rajya Sabha nomination to them.

Karat, facing increasing opposition from within it, has shown signs of being under pressure. He has warned that no dissidence would be tolerated in the party. Supporters are pained. Laments Justice VR Krishna Iyer: “The picture of the pachyderm-like politbureau meeting where the chief minister has been kept out but kept in power is grotesque. The penalty for this bizarre fratricidal catastrophe persists and it will cause the Left to vanish from Kerala.’’ Applied to West Bengal, they certainly look the prophetic last words. “You cannot blame any one leader”

CPI leader Atul Anjan tells TSI that decisions in Left parties are collective, and not dictated by individuals

After the results of the last Lok Sabha, has Prakash Karat’s stature declined?

It would not be right to blame Prakash Karat for the Left debacle. The decision to withdraw support to the UPA was a collective one. The tactics were right, but their implementation was wrong.

But surely Karat has to take some blame?

I repeat that all decisions were collective. There are differences of opinion in the Left but no personal feelings. The differences are based on issues, not personalities.

The way Achutanandan was fixed suggests there were personal differences in the party?

Left parties are cadre based. Individuals are not stronger than the institution. It is not like the Congress where Arjun Singh was elected member, Congress Working Committee, forced to resign and then re-nominated to the same position. It can only happen in the Congress that Sonia Gandhi is the supreme and unquestioned leader of the party. In the Left parties it is the Central Committee, the national conference and Politbureau which take these decisions.