PARTY BARELY WINS MAJORITY IN INDIA |
By Kailas Chandra
Bombay
In the fourth general elections just concluded in India in the largest (bourgeois) "democracy" of the world, the 260-million strong electorate returned an overwhelming verdict against the Congress rule of the capitalist class. But the popular upsurge against the bourgeois. state: was largely to the advantage:-of extreme right-wing or regional capitalist parties like the Swatantra, Jan Sangh, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam [DMK] and Akali Dal, in the absence of a' positive revolutionary alternative provided by the tra~ ditional working-class: parties. The. anti-Congress: swing at the polls was so decisive on a national scale (nearly 70 percent of the voters exercised their franchise) that in the 52l1-member Lok Sabha [lower house of parliament] the Congress party managed to secure only 280.seats: (with 15 more to be filled). The Swatantra emerged as the largest opposition.party in the Lok Sabha with 4% seats, followed by the Jan Sangh which won 45-seats and the DMK, 25 seats. Among the various left parties: the SSP [Samyukta Socialist party] improved its. position from 5 to 23 seats, the "right" CPI [Communist party of India] raised its. strength to 21, the "left" CPI has 19, the PSP [Praja Socialist party] retained its strength at 10, the RSP (Revolutionary Socialist party] at 2, while the other parties and independents together have 47. : The outcome of the elections to various state legislative assemblies is very complex. While the two Communist. parties along with other left parties have achieved fairly good. results in two states, Kerala and West Bengal, a distinct rightward swing is evident in almost. all-the north Indian states, where the Jan Sangh, Swatantra and the dissident groups of Congress members have emerged-as the main challenge to the Congress party.
In Kerala, the left CPI-~led United Front, which includes such ideologically disparate groups as the Muslim League, secured an absolute majority in the 133-member legislative assembly, conceding only 9.seats to the Congress and 5 to the rebel Kerala Congress. The standing of the various constituents of the United Front is as follows: left CPI 52, right.CPI 19;.SSP 19, Muslim League 14, RSP 6, Kerala Socialist party 2, Karshaka Thozhilali party 2 and Independents 6.
In West Bengal, Congress failed to secure a majority in the 280-member legislative assembly. The Congress secured only 127 seats. The left CPI won 443 seats, the dissident Bangla Congress. 34, CPI 16, Forward.Bloc 13, SSP 7, PSP. 7, RSP 6, Socialist Unity party and other left groups 6. Among the rightist parties, the Swatantra and Jan Sangh managed to secure only 1 seat each, while 4 went to the Lok Seva Sangh and 2 to the Gorkha League. (two regional groups), and 13 to independents. The non-Congress parties fought the elections in West Bengal under the banner of the two rival united fronts -- one led by the left CPI and the other by the right CPI and the Bangla Congress. The two fronts fought each other.in many constituencies neutralising one another in favour of the Congress party. The rift was not due to political differences but inability to agree on the allocation of seats. Now that the Congress party has failed to secure a decisive majority in the assembly, a move has been sponsored by the opposition parties including the two CPIs and. the RSP to set up a non-Congress ministry under the leadership of Ajoy Mukherji, leader of the Bangla Congress.
A disconcerting situation has arisen for the ruling Congress party in the two major states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, considered to be its "traditional" strongholds. In Uttar Pradesh the Congress secured only 198 seats in the 425-member legislative assembly while Jan Sangh emerged as the largest single opposition party with 97 members, followed by the SSP which won 43 seats. The right CPI won 14 seats, the left CPI one, the PSP 11 and the Republican party 9. The Swatantra secured 12 seats while 37 went to the independents.
In the famine-affected state-of Bihar, where there were big food riots and an upsurge of students only last year, in the 418-member legislative assembly the Congress managed to secure only 128 seats, conceding 68 seats to the SSP which has emerged as the main opposition party in the state. The Jan Sangh became the second opposition group with 26 seats and the right CPI won 24 seats. Among the other parties in the state legislature, the left CPI secured 4 seats, PSP 18, Swatantra 3, Jana Kranti Dal (a group of dissident Congress members) 24, Republican party 1, and independents 22.
Neither the Congress nor a combination of opposition parties in the two states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar are in a position to form a government. Nevertheless attempts are being made by the SSP, dissident Congress members and the Jan Sangh to form so-called "non-Congress" ministries in these states. The question is whether the disparate political groups can come together to run "stable" governments even within the present constitutional framework. In any case the prospect of presidential rule being imposed in the
two states appears high. The Congress party itself might seek coalitions with other right-wing parties like Jan Sangh, Swatantra and dissident Congress groups, once the initial attempts by the "opposition" parties to form "alternative" governments end up in stalemates.
In Orissa, another state where a mighty student upheaval was witnessed in recent years in the wake of an extremely difficult food situation, the Swatantra and the Jana Congress together won an absolute majority in the 133-member assembly (49 Swatantra, 24 Jana Congress) conceding only 29 seats to the Congress party. Efforts are already afoot to form a Swatantra-Jana Congress coalition with the PSP (which has secured 19 seats) supporting it. Among the other parties, the right CPI secured only 7 seats in the assembly, the left CPI one, the SSP 2 and independents 2.
In Rajasthan, the Congress party which secured only 89 seats in the 184-member assembly announced its decision to form a government with the support of some independents who have joined it. The Swatantra party emerged as the main opposition with 49 seats in the assembly, while the Jan Sangh won 22 seats. The SSP secured 8 seats while the CPI got only one seat, and 15 seats went to independents.
The most convincing defeat of the congress party occurred in the southern state of Madras where a regional bourgeois party, the DMK [Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam], which once campaigned for a separate Dravida nation, secured 138 seats in the 234-member legislative assembly conceding only 40 seats to the Congress. The DMK had an electoral alliance with the Swatantra (which secured 13 seats), the left CPI (which won 11 seats), the Muslim League (4% seats), and the SSP (2 seats). The right CPI, which did not join any electoral alliance in the state, secured only two seats in the assembly, while 4 seats went to the PSP. Annadurai, leader of the DMK, announced his party's decision to form a DMK ministry in. Madras with the support of his allies.
In. the newly created northwest frontier state of Punjab, the Congress also suf= fered a debacle, securing only 48 seats in the 104—-member legislative assembly. The Akali Dal led by Sant Fateh Singh, an.advocate of a separate state for Sikhs, emerged as the largest single opposition party with 22 members while the Jan Sangh secured 9 seats, the right CPI-5, left CPI 4, the Akali Dal (Tara Singh group) 2, the SSP 1, independents 9. In this state also, the opposition groups are trying to explore the possibilities of setting up a non-Congress ministry. The Jan Sangh emerged as the ruling party in the Delhi Metropolitan Council annexing 33 seats in the 6l-member house (including five nominated members), conceding only 19 seats to the Congress.. The Jan Sangh captured six out of seven Lok Sabha seats from the Delhi metropolitan area.
In the other states of Assam, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Mysore and Hariana (a part of old Punjab) and the centrally administered states, Himachal Pradesh and Manipur, the Congress managed to secure absolute majorities in the local legislatures.
In Andhra especially, the factional squabbles between the two CPIs and their refusal. to cooperate even on the basis of a common electoral front enabled the Congress to sweep the polls and secure 165 seats in the 287-member legislature. The Swatantra with 29 members replaced the.United CPI, which had 51 members in the outgoing assembly, as the main opposition party. The right CPI won only 10 seats in the new house and the left CPI 9 seats. The Jan Sangh made its first appearance in the legislature in this state, considered at one time as a CPI stronghold, winning 3 seats. The SSP won only one seat while as many as 68 seats went to independents, mostly rebels from the Congress party.
Thanks to the regional chauvinist politics of the two [PIs and other left parties in Maharashtra which fought the elections as constituents of the so-called Sampurna Maharashtra Samiti, the Congress secured an absolute majority of 202 seats in the 270member assembly. The Peasants and Workers party (a peasant formation) retained its status as the biggest single opposition group, securing 19 seats in the legislature. The right CPI improved its position from 6 to 10 seats. The left CPI won only 1 seat. Among the other parties, the PSP secured 8, SSP 4, and RPI [Republican Party of India] 5.
In Bombay city particularly where some prestige contests for parliament were fought, the SSP's George Fernandez defeated the Union Railway Minister S.K.Patil and the Chairman S.A.Dange of the right CPI was elected to the Lok Sabha, defeating Harish Mahendra, an industrialist sponsored by the Congress. The former Defence Minister V.K. Krishna Menon, who contested as a nonparty candidate supported by the left parties, lost to the Congress candidate, 8.G.Barve, though by a small margin of 12,000 votes. The Congress, however, managed to win 22 out of 28 assembly seats in Bombay city.
In Gujarat the two CPIs forged an electoral front, the Mahagujarat Janata Pari-
shad, but failed to secure any representation in the assembly. Only two independents supporting the MJP were returned while Dinkar. Mehta, the left CPI mayor of Ahmedabad j, also lost in the contest for the assembly. The Swatantra party, which secured 64 seats, emerged as the main opposition. Indulal Yagnik, leader of the MJP, supported by the left, however, was elected to parliament from the state capital of Ahmedabad.
In the backward state of Madhya Pradesh, which witnessed big student demonstrations only last year, the Congress secured an absolute majority of 167 seats in the 296member assembly. The Jan Sangh with 78 seats emerged as the main opposition, reducing the electoral strength of the SSP, which won only 10 seats. The PSP won only 29 seats. - The CPI gained only one member in the assembly, while the Swentantra secured 9 seats and the independents most of whom are dissident Congressmen, won 24. seats.
In Mysore where the Congress came out relatively unscathed with 126 seats in the 216-member house, the PSP retained its position as the main opposition group with 20 seats, but the Swatantra improved its strength to 16 and the Jan Sangh made its first appearance in the state with 4 members in the assembly. The SSP secured 4 seats and the right CPI 2 while 40 seats went to independents, mostly dissident Congressmen.
An outstanding feature of the Congress debacle was the defeat of some of the unpopular central ministers like Railway Minister Patil in Bombay, Finance Minister Sachin Choudhuri in West Bengal, Food Minister Subramaniam in Madras and Commerce Minister Manubhai.Shah in Gujarat. The Congress party's President Kamaraj himself lost to a DMK rival, a student leader in Madras, in a contest for the state legislative assembly, while the treasurer of the Congress party, Atulya Ghosh, was defeated by the Forward Bloc leader Amiya Bose in West Bengal in a contest for the Lok Sabha.
Elections under a bourgeois parliamentary system no doubt impose financial and other burdens on the traditional left, especially on the working-class parties. The Congress leaders were so confident of winning in most states that it cannot be said that they resorted to unfair practices to rig the elections except perhaps in Jammu and Kashmir where 22 Congress party supporters were declared elected without contest. The factional squabbles between the two CPIs resulted in their losing at least 100 assembly seats and 15 to 20 Lok. Sabha seats. And. political gains accrued out of the conflict are in any case dubious since both the CPIs entered opportunist electoral coalitions with reactionary bourgeois parties wherever it suited them as in Kerala, Tamilnad and Maharashtra. They, however, failed to unite where they. should have forged a united front against the Congress as in West Bengal, Tripura and Andhra. The right CPI fielded 630 candidates for state assemblies and 105 for parliament and won about 118 and 21 seats respectively. The left CPI returned 128 out of 520 candidates it fielded for state assemblies and 19 out of 62 candidates. it put up for the Lok Sabha. In Andhra, the debacle of the CPI was spectacular. In the 1962 elections the United CPI had won 51 seats in the assembly. and returned 7 members to the Lok Sabha. This time the two CPIs together won only 19 assembly seats and a solitary seat for the Lok Sabha.
. E.M.S.Namboodiripad, the left CPI leader who is going to head the seven-party coalition ministry in Kerala, said that the result of the election was "not a vote for communism." He added: "The Communists did not ask for any vote for the Communist. Party but went to the voters with a minimum programme. It. was a:vote both against the Congress and anti-communism." (Free Press Journal, Bombay, February 25.) The RSP, one of the left coalition partners which had said that it would not join the coalition ministry, has also decided to enter the cabinet. .
Indeed the two CPIs did not fight the elections in Kerala, or, for that matter, in any other state on a working-class programme of "communism" but on a "minimum programme" (of "national" or “peoples democracy") on the basis of an alliance with the bourgeois parties. The leaders of both the CPIs suffer under the deadweight of deep-rooted illusions in bourgeois parliamentarism. They believe that the outcome of the general elections is a vindication of their class collaborationist policies!
The chairman of the right CPI, S.A.Dange, said in Trivandrum on February 28 that the election outcome was a "success for the democratic leftist forces" in the country. In West Bengal, the two CPIs readily agreed to join a coalition headed by Ajoy Mukherji, a dissident Congress leader who is a bourgeois liberal at best! The question is whether the hotch-potch coalition ministries being cooked up with the support of left parties in some of the states where the Congress has failed to secure a majority will work at all because of their obvious inner contradictions. Even if such coalition ministries are actually put together, the question remains -- how long will they last?
What is the reaction of the bourgeois leadership of the Congress, Swatantra and the Jan Sangh to the outcome of the elections? The Bombay Congress boss S.K.Patil soon after his defeat in Bombay claimed that the election showed "an increased popularity of
rightist ideology" (Bharat Jyoti, Bombay, February 26.) Swantantra leader C. Rajagopalachari has been counseling his partymen to seek a coalition with the Congress in the interest of creating stable governments at the centre and in the states where the Congress has suffered defeats. Rajagopalachari has also mooted the idea of a "national government" comprising "talents drawn from all sections of the people." At least a section of the farsighted bourgeois leadership knows the gravity of the present erisis facing’ the Indian ruling class, both politically and economically. Its strategy is to enlist the cooperation of the various political parties including the CPIs in averting the crisis facing the bourgeois rulers.
The problems confronting the masses are so complex today that they cannot be resolved within the framework of the bourgeois society. The reformist socialist parties like the SSP would readily fall a prey to the idea of a "national coalition." In fact, in a state like Bihar where the SSP has emerged as the largest single opposition party, it is initiating a move to form a coalition ministry with Jan Sangh, etc. There are indications that both the right and left CPIs might also follow the line in the name of coalescing with the so-called progressive sections of the bourgeoisie. The Stalinist leaders of both parties appear to have lost faith in the possibility of a revolutionary intervention of the working class in the.present situation.
In reality, however, new massive struggles of workers and peasants are bound to erupt throughout the country. The debacle of the Congress at the polls has aroused the hopes of the masses. The new governments that are going to be set up both at the centre and in the states, however, despite their diverse political colours, will not be ina position to solve any of their basic problems within the present crisis-ridden capitalist framework.
The bourgeois leadership of the Congress is also playing a very shrewd game at the present juncture. There is indeed a fight for leadership within the Congress parliamentary party. But the Congress leadership is agreed on the strategy of giving plenty of rope to the various opposition parties in the states to exhaust themselves in their attempts to form coalition ministries. These are bound to fall sooner or later. That would open up the way for the Congress to seek coalitions with the reactionary bourgeois parties like Swatantra and Jan Sangh on a national scale. Unless the Congress leaders succeed in forging a united front of the bourgeois parties, they correctly fear that their grip on the political life of the country will be lost forever. |
An alternative for the bourgeoisie would be to resort to a military dictatorship. This is not a mere theoretical possibility today. With the American imperialists actively interested in installing a stable bourgeois regime in New Delhi which occupies a pivotal position in its political and military strategy in South Asia, the possibility of an_ imperialist intervention in the present crisis in a big way is also not ruled out.
The only answer that the working-class parties might give to the challenge posed by the bourgeois reaction to it is to mobilise the united irtervention of the working class supported by the rural poor and the lower middle-class wage earners in the country, for a revolutionary settlement with the capitalist system and the establishment of a workers. and peasants government in India. The bourgeois rulers and their imperialist advisers in India might have been temporarily thrown into disarray by the unexpected results of the general elections: but they are bound to recover from the initial shock and take steps to consolidate themselves. The question is whether the revolutionary © socialist movement in the country will assert itself in time.
. me March 1, 1967
MOSCOW DUBS MAO A "TROTSKYIST"
The latest issue of Kommunist, the theoretical magazine of the Central Committee of the Communist party of the Soviet Union, carries an article attacking Mao with the most fearsome epithet in the entire lexicon of Stalinism -- "Trotskyist." As reported by the February 25 issue of Le Monde, the article attacks the "cultural revolution" as counterrevolutionary and aimed against the socialist conquests of the Chinese people. Mao's petty-bourgeois concepts, declares Kommunist, "coincide in all details with the slogans of Trotsky and his emulators."
Kommunist's sally on this front appears to be on a par with the arrest in Peking last December of the student Tan Li-fu on charges of being a "