July 1-15, 2007
The Presidential Elections and the role of CPI (M)
Who should be the next President of India has become a bone of contention between different groupings of political parties representing the bourgeoisie. Two main groupings — one led by the Congress and the other led by the BJP — are locked in contention.
Leading the race is the Congress Party candidate, Pratibha Patil, whose family belongs to the wealthy and influential sugar lobby of Masharashtra.
Vice President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat is standing as an Independent, with the backing of the BJP led NDA.
There is also a Third Front - consisting of parties like the TDP, SP, AGP, AIADMK, MDMK and others – which is attempting to use the Presidential polls to create a viable grouping that could prove an alternative to the Congress and the BJP at the centre.
The largely ceremonial role of the President of India assumes special significance when votes are divided and there is what is called a "hung Parliament". Under such circumstances, the President has been vested with discretionary powers to invite the party that has to form the government. Thus, for instance, if no party or pre-poll combination gets a clear majority in the next Lok Sabha the President can decide whether to give the first chance to the Congress, the BJP, or anyone else to form the government. This is the main reason that each of the three fronts is keen to have a person who is partisan to their group as the next President.
Pratibha Patil is expected to win, thanks to the support of Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) led Left Front. The BSP leader has several cases pending against her, which the centre can close through its intervention. She also wants the Center’s support for her government in UP. What is the reason for the CPI(M)’s working overtime to ensure the victory of the Congress candidate in these elections?
The past two years have seen sharpening political battles amongst the ruling class parties wherein the role of the President as well as the role of institutions like the Election Commision and State Governors has been crucial. Bihar had two Assembly polls in quick succession after a hung assembly and the dissolution of the first Assembly amidst controversy. Jharkhand has had open horse trading as well government changes. The same has happened in Goa. In the Uttar Pradesh Elections, accusations have been leveled at the Central Government for using the Election Commission to manufacture a majority. Before the 2006 West Bengal Assembly elections, CPI(M) itself raised a hue and cry that the Election Commission was playing a partisan role to defeat it.
Elections to a number of critical states — Gujarat, Rajasthan, Delhi, MP, Chattisgarh — and the 2009 General Elections lie ahead. The role of the President is obviously looked at with great anxiety by all the parliamentary parties as the possibility of a hung parliament is real. The CPI(M), in supporting the Congress candidate, is clearly stating that it wants the continuation of the Congress Party rule and the strengthening of the present arrangement at the centre. As part of this arrangement, the Central government has favoured the governments of West Bengal, Kerala, and Tripura and refrained from destabilizing them
The leaders of the CPI(M) have been repeating the so-called principle that the next President must be 'political'. They do not specify whether they are talking about the politics of the bourgeoisie or the politics of the working class. What they actually mean by saying the candidate must be political is that it must not be a 'consensus candidate' like Kalam, who received support from both the Congress Party and the BJP in 2002. By 'political' what they mean is that it must be a partisan figure, somebody who is clearly aligned with the Congress and against the BJP. In 2002, the CPI(M) got shut out and was forced to put up a losing candidate, Captain Lakshmi Sehgal, against Kalam. CPI(M) does not want a repetition of this in this election. They want to make sure that they have a say in who is the person who becomes the President. CPI(M) has also declared that the candidate must be “secular”, in other words, a person who will not rely on the support of the BJP.
The Congress Party and the BJP stand for the same class interest, the interest of the big bourgeoisie and its aim of making India an imperialist superpower through globalisation, liberalisation and privatization, through fascism and imperialist war. The duty of communists is to forge a fighting front of the working class, peasantry and all those who are opposed to the offensive of the bourgeoisie. The duty of communists is to forge a political front against the bourgeoisie and without any bourgeois party in command. The CPI (M) is acting in the opposite direction. By championing the cause of the Congress Party, it is causing great harm to the workers and peasants and the struggle against globalization, privatization and liberalization, fascism, imperialism and imperialist war.
The CPI (M) is spreading the extremely harmful idea that the main enemy of the workers and peasants is not the capitalist class, but only one party of the bourgeoisie, the BJP. It is spreading the harmful illusion that the people's salvation lies in stabilizing Congress Party rule in order to keep the BJP out. Leaders of CPI (M) have even declared that only a candidate who is aligned clearly with the Congress Party would serve the "national interest" – thereby identifying national interest with the interest of the Congress Party.
A communist party is duty bound to utilize every possibility to educate the working masses about the real nature of the political system and process in place and to agitate for a new system and process that will ensure that the working class comes to power. It must bring out the political theory that underlies the present system, a theory that ensures the rule of the bourgeoisie over the people. And it must put forward the alternate political process that will pave the way for the victory of the working class. In other words, the strategic approach of a communist party to the Presidential Elections would be to explain the role of the President, the aim of each and every bourgeois party in choosing the President, and how communists should approach it. Communists cannot merge with the existing process and become indistinguishable in strategy and tactics from other bourgeois parties.
The fact that CPI(M) did not even carry out a discussion amongst the masses of workers and peasants regarding its tactics in the Presidential Elections shows that it does not believe people should have a say beyond what is permitted in the present political process. Since the President is elected by MPs and MLA’s, why discuss this issue amongst the people -- so seems to be CPI(M)’s thinking. They are falling at the feet of a system that denies the working class and people the right to govern themselves.
CPI(M)’s stand in the present Presidential Elections clearly reveals its complete merger with the existing process. A strategic understanding seems to have been reached between the Congress Party and the leaders of CPI(M), in the service of stabilizing the rule of the bourgeoisie and carrying forward its anti-social program. Communists need to beware of this development.
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