15th Lok Sabha Elections

March 30, 2009

Workers, peasants, women and youth of India!

Elections to the 15th Lok Sabha will take place during April-May 2009. It will take place in the context of the deepening economic crisis in India and on the world scale, which has once again exposed the fact that capitalism cannot provide prosperity and protection for all. It will take place in the context of growing terror and threat of war in the region.

Not long after the election dates were announced, the major coalitions of parties in the Lok Sabha have all started to fall apart. Various regional parties are deserting the Congress and BJP before the elections. The front that CPI(M) is seeking to build has met with lukewarm response. Conflicts are appearing within the left front.

Almost all parties represented in the 14th Lok Sabha are deciding to postpone decisions on alliances until after the votes are counted. This shows their opportunism and two timing nature. They want to sing one tune to the people now, and then ally with anyone they please after the vote and seat count is over. We are bound to witness intense bargaining and horse trading, before the 15th Lok Sabha and the new cabinet of ministers are sworn in.

Past experience and their current opportunist stance shows that the manifestos of these major parties cannot be believed. They all say what people want to hear, and once in power implement strictly what the capitalist class wants. Today these parties of the establishment are approaching the voters with all kinds of attractive slogans, each of them promising to deliver what the people want if only they vote for their party. At the same time, they are selecting candidates largely on the basis of caste and religious considerations.

The principal rivals in the contest to capture the Lok Sabha are organising televised dramas to create communal hysteria before the elections. The media is filling the air with the so-called fight between the communal BJP and the secular Congress, as well as rumours about possible terror attacks and alleged new plots by Pakistan. Security is on high alert. The process of electing the 15th Lok Sabha is to take place under unprecedented levels of troop deployment on the streets.

In opposition to the two-timing and self-serving parties, and challenging their domination, numerous candidates are emerging from the toiling majority. There are candidates who have been selected by working people and their local area committees, who are campaigning to change the system of democracy and orientation of the economy to fulfil basic needs of the toilers. There are candidates of textile workers, of plantation workers, of peasants in various regions, professionals, retired army men, representatives of residents’ associations, champions of human rights, opponents of state terrorism and army rule, national liberation fighters and others selected by various people’s organisations. They are all called ‘independent’ candidates according to the electoral laws and rules, which are biased in favour of candidates of the ‘recognised’ parties.

The popular movement challenging the present course of India is growing in scope and depth. People are refusing to accept that these two-timing parties should represent them and rule in their name. People want to become the rulers themselves. This is the demand of the times. This is the context in which the 15th Lok Sabha is being elected.

Comrades!

Even as the ‘big fight’ between the Congress Party, BJP and their respective former allies is being enacted on Television, the real affairs of the state are being dutifully carried out by the incumbent government headed by Manmohan Singh. Thousands of crores of rupees have been put in the hands of capitalist corporations and banks in the name of two stimulus packages. Now this government is issuing calls to further liberalise trade and further open up the economy to capital flows, both in and out of the country. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his able assistant, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, are preparing to champion the cause of “free trade” and oppose “protectionism” at the G20 meet in London next week. Home Minister Chidambaram is actively stepping up the troop deployment, along with jingoist propaganda against Pakistan.

The Congress Party has released a Manifesto claiming it is the best choice to implement a ‘middle path’. No matter what the Congress Party says in its Election Manifesto, its actions show that it is a party committed to serve the imperial aims of the Indian big bourgeoisie – the Tatas, Ambanis, Birlas and other monopoly houses. It is committed to continue with the program of globalisation, through liberalisation and privatisation, with whatever adjustments are required to tide over the present economic crisis, including temporary ‘nationalisation’ in the interests of big capitalists. They want state takeover of private firms that have been milked dry, like Satyam. They want to use people’s money to pay for the crimes committed by the capitalist plunderers. Enriching the capitalists while dishing out platitudes and crumbs for the toiling majority – this is the plan chalked out by the Congress party.

The Congress Party has a long track record of doing what the capitalists want while singing whatever tune the people want to hear. The Nehru government’s much trumpeted ‘non capitalist path to development’ served only to consolidate the domination of the industrial houses over the all-India market in the early decades after political independence from colonialism. The Congress Party presided over the creation of a system of plunder by big capitalist houses, while claiming it wanted to “wipe the tear from the eyes of every Indian”. It was a system of taxing the people and burdening them with public debt to build a state sector in the interest of enriching and expanding the empires of the Tatas, Birlas and other big capitalist houses. It was a state monopoly capitalist system, which the Congress Party presented to the people as a “socialistic pattern of society”.

When the big capitalists had become big enough to seek global empires of their own, the very same Congress Party gave the call to dump the ‘socialistic pattern’ and embrace the mantra of modernisation in 1985, liberalisation and privatisation in 1991, to suit the needs of the bourgeoisie in the new period. When the resistance among workers and peasants to this so-called reform program had grown and spread all over the country, the bourgeoisie prepared and backed the emergence of the BJP to centre-stage.

The BJP claimed it was different from the Congress Party. But wherever and whenever it has been in power, BJP has served to push the same capitalist program. It was responsible for creating a special Ministry of Disinvestment to implement the program of selling public assets to private firms. It gleefully cheered the entry of many Indian corporate groups into the list of richest companies of the world. It claimed that India was shining because the capitalists had their pockets full and bursting at the seams.

 When workers and peasants were up in arms against the BJP led NDA rule and its consequences on their living conditions, the bourgeoisie backed the return of Congress Party to power in 2004, promising “reforms with a human face”.

The past five years of these “reforms with a human face” has resulted in several Indian big capitalists joining the list of the world’s richest billionaires. On the other hand, workers and peasants, women and youth, oppressed nationalities, tribal peoples and minorities have faced savage attacks on their livelihood and rights. Land of the peasantry and tribal peoples has been seized in the name of export promotion or special economic zones, and handed over to capitalists for their private profiteering ventures. Armed force has been unleashed by the state to crush the people’s resistance to this capitalist land grab.

Massive increase in prices has made life a living hell for the vast majority of working people. Their homes and shops have been demolished or sealed in the name of modernising cities. Millions of our youth face economic insecurity and pressure to take to crime or criminalised politics. Women are facing the brunt of the rising economic insecurity and terror in daily life.

 Different parties and fronts have come to power and run governments at the centre over the past 25 years, including not only Congress and BJP led coalitions but also other fronts in which the CPI has participated and the CPI(M) has extended support. People have been fed with various alluring slogans, like “modernisation”, “taking India into the 21st century”, “growth with social justice”, “India first”, “India shining”, “reforms with a human face”, and “inclusive growth”. What has remained constant is the trend of massive wealth accumulation in fewer and fewer hands, accompanied by the intensification of poverty and insecurity of livelihood of the toiling majority. What has continued unabated is the global expansion in the markets and spheres of influence of Indian capitalist corporations.

The past 25 years have witnessed growing resistance among workers and peasants, among women and youth, human rights activists, environmentalists and others, to the capitalist offensive against livelihood and rights. People have risen up against the sale of public assets to private profiteers. They have said no to the privatisation of education and health, and of water and electricity. They have opposed the unequal treaties and agreements entered into at the WTO, in the name of free trade. As the mass resistance mounted, the bourgeoisie resorted increasingly to violence and terror to divert, split and crush the masses.

We have been subjected to periodic state organised communal massacres in this period, in addition to the day to day police repression and army rule in Kashmir and the Northeast of the country. This period began with the mass killing of Sikhs in 1984, which was used to terrorise people and bring the Congress Party to power with the slogan Hindu, Hindi, Hindustan! The destruction of the Babri Masjid in 1992 was followed by communal violence unleashed by the principal rival parties in Parliament, the same time as the first generation of market oriented reforms were being implemented. The genocide of Muslims in 2002, following the Godhra incident, was used to paralyse the working people and enable BJP to return to power in Gujarat. These are the most monstrous crimes in this period, in addition to which there are the frequent bomb blasts and terror attacks in crowded public places, which are used to further step up repression and fascist measures in the name of fighting terrorism.

The bourgeoisie has set the agenda of orienting everything to assist maximum plunder, to enrich itself and enhance its global status. This agenda is carried out by the bureaucratic machine headed by the IAS officers, technical advisory and planning bodies, regulatory commissions, international negotiating teams and other mechanisms of the state. The armed forces, the lathis and bullets, courts and jails, carry out the suppression of resistance among the people to this agenda. The ballot serves to give legitimacy to this anti-worker, anti-peasant, anti-national and anti-social agenda of a tiny minority of exploiters.

Elections are used to make workers and peasants give up their united resistance to the capitalist offensive and get divided along the lines of inter-capitalist, inter-religious, inter-caste and inter-party rivalry. Election campaigns are used to lower the level of political consciousness among the people. Those who have been fighting against capitalism and the attacks of the bourgeoisie are suddenly made to debate whether a government headed by Manmohan Singh or Advani would be better for India in 2009.

Thus, the State – the bureaucratic and armed apparatus, courts and jails, and the process of representative democracy dominated by parties funded by capitalists – this entire arrangement preserves and facilitates the capitalist system of plunder and the imperialist drive of the bourgeoisie. This is the reason that no matter which party gets to form the government after each election, the course of Indian society does not change. Governments change but the State remains in tact, and the bourgeoisie remains in power. The orientation remains that of maximum plunder in favour of a small minority.

Comrades!

The Communist Ghadar Party of India has been an active participant in the mass resistance to the bourgeois offensive, in the forefront of the struggle against state terrorism, and the struggle against privatisation and liberalisation. In the midst of these struggles, CGPI has consistently pointed out that the Indian state and the rule of the bourgeois class must be the main target of all the fighting forces. It has pointed out that this state is communal and our people are not communal. This state is the fountainhead of violence and terror. The foundations of this State was laid by the British colonialists, to enslave our people and plunder our land and natural resources. The Indian bourgeoisie has preserved the colonial foundations and further developed the State to impose its agenda on the people, through the ballot and the bullet.

The Communist Ghadar Party of India has repeatedly pointed out that the capitalist system of plunder is the root cause of the economic problems facing the toiling masses. It is the ruling bourgeois class and its drive for maximum profits that is responsible for widespread poverty and insecurity, and the perennial cycle of booms and busts. It is their rule that is responsible for organising terror through underground groups and then using it as the pretext for stepping up state terror and repression, in the name of fighting terrorism.

The Communist Ghadar Party of India alerted the working class and people to the danger of state terrorism as early as in 1984, when the Congress Party in power organised the assault on the Golden Temple and stepped up troop deployment within the country and especially in Punjab, in the name of fighting terrorism and defending the “unity and integrity of India”.

The Communist Ghadar Party of India has consistently defended the rights of all, fought for ending army rule and withdrawing troops to their barracks in Kashmir and Northeast India. We fight for immediate repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act and all other fascist laws that deprive people of their most basic rights, including the right to live.

The Communist Ghadar Party of India has consistently held the position that capitalism cannot provide for all, nor can it be given a ‘human face’. It is impossible for the right to livelihood to be guaranteed for all toilers, and for capitalist greed to be fulfilled at the same time. There is no such thing as a middle road between capitalism and socialism. If a party in the communist movement conciliates with the slogans of ‘human face’ and ‘middle road’, it will end up as no different from any bourgeois party, as seen in West Bengal.

To end capitalism and begin to construct socialism, it is essential for the working class and majority of toiling people to become the rulers, and establish a new state power that would protect and maintain their rule. Only then can they eliminate, step by step, capitalist private property from all spheres and bring the means of social production – the mines and factories, the land and other natural resources – completely under their control. This is the essential condition for ensuring extended reproduction of society without any crisis. It will ensure prosperity and protection for every member of society.

Based on these conclusions, the Communist Ghadar Party of India has begun the work of building the foundations of a new state of workers and peasants. It has begun this work in collaboration with other political forces, in the form of building people’s samitis in the mohallas, bastis and villages, to resist the attacks of the bourgeoisie, assert the rights of the people, and prepare to become the basic organs of a new political power. Such people’s committees have started to select their own candidates to contest elections.

Comrades!

The Communist Ghadar Party of India places before you a concrete plan and program for changing the course of India in line with your best aspirations. It is a program for all of us – workers, peasants, women and youth – to become the masters of India. It is a program to replace the existing colonial and imperialist Indian state with a new state that would defend our rule. It is a program to lift Indian society out of crisis and open the path to replace capitalism by modern socialism, sweeping away everything oppressive and backward in our society.

The first step is to build and bring to power a united front of all those resisting the bourgeois offensive, with the worker-peasant alliance as its backbone. A revolutionary government formed by such a front would take immediate steps to halt the capitalist offensive, renew the system of democracy and reorient the economy to provide for all.

A revolutionary worker-peasant government will immediately convict and severely punish those responsible for monstrous social crimes, including the organisers of communal violence in 1984, 1992-93 and 2002. It will immediately end army rule in Kashmir and Northeast India, repeal the Armed Forces Special Powers Act and other colonial and fascist laws.

Such a government would take immediate steps to convene an elected Constituent Assembly, to draft a new Constitution to replace the existing 1950 Constitution. The new Constitution will guarantee the rights of every human being, including the right to livelihood, education and health care, and provide for enabling laws and enforcing mechanisms to make sure that these rights are not violated under any pretext. It will defend the Right to Conscience of every member of society – that is, every individual’s right to hold on to one’s beliefs and convictions. Nobody can be persecuted for holding any religious belief or ideological conviction, by branding it as ‘fundamentalist’ or ‘extremist’. It will lay the basis for the human identity to flourish, and for caste identities to fade out over time.

 The new Constitution will provide for a voluntary union of nations and peoples to replace the present Indian Union, which is a colonial legacy that imposes its “unity and integrity” on all its constituents with guns. It will be the Constitution of a Union of Workers’ and Peasants’ Republics of India, where each constituent people will have the right to rule themselves, and to secede from the union if and when they so desire.

Such a Constitution will vest supreme decision making power with the people, by bringing all elected legislative bodies under their control. It will redefine electoral laws and rules so that workers, peasants, women and youth can select candidates from among their peers, hold elected representatives to account, and recall them at any time. It will empower people’s committees in the constituencies with the authority to make sure that every citizen can exercise these rights, and also make proposals for consideration by the legislative bodies. It will redefine the role of political parties as instruments to provide consciousness and a vision for society, and to enable the people to rule themselves, without any intermediary. It will end the exclusion of people from decision making by parties that act as middlemen and power brokers, to rule in the people’s name. It will lay the basis for a system where people do not put parties in power, but parties have the duty of working to keep people in power.

The worker-peasant regime will immediately renounce Indian imperialist empire building aims and dismantle all mechanisms of state terrorism, interference and provocations in other countries, including through covert sponsoring of individual terrorism. It will commit sincerely to build unity of South Asian states against imperialism, for lasting peace and security in the region.

The worker-peasant power will call an immediate halt to privatisation and liberalisation. It will take immediate steps to create a modern universal Public Distribution System, which will provide food, clothing and all essential mass consumption goods to all the toiling people at affordable prices. To ensure adequate supply, it will invest in public enterprises to expand the production of consumption goods needed by the toiling masses. It will enforce strict rules on private firms that produce consumer goods, and take over the assets of those who break the rules, without compensation.

The revolutionary regime will immediately repeal the colonial Land Acquisition Act and the new SEZ Act, to block any attempts of capitalist corporations to grab peasants’ land. It will take steps to provide inputs for agriculture at stable prices and ensure guaranteed procurement of peasants’ produce at remunerative prices. To ensure price stability, it will bring domestic wholesale trade and foreign trade under social control, eliminating the role of private middlemen and speculators. It will place the PDS under people’s control.

The new state power will solve the age old agrarian crisis by defending the rights of the tillers, and by encouraging them to voluntarily pool their land to create rural cooperatives. It will provide free technical assistance to enable such cooperatives to achieve higher levels of productivity on the basis of large-scale production and modern technology, to benefit the rural masses and rapidly raise their standard of living.

A revolutionary worker-peasant government will immediately ban futures trading and nationalise and socialise banking and insurance – so that the financial resources of the country are under the people’s control and can be deployed in the general interest of society.

In short, the program of the Communist Ghadar Party of India is aimed at resolving the glaring contradiction between highly socialised production and highly concentrated private ownership of the means of production. It is aimed at placing decision making power in the hands of the majority, from being the exclusive preserve of a privileged elite. It is aimed at establishing an economy focused on people’s needs, rather than on private profits and unlimited greed of a super rich minority.

Workers, peasants, women and youth!

Come, let us use the occasion of the election campaign to strengthen the united front of working people against capitalism, imperialism, state terrorism and war hysteria. Let us use it to raise the level of political discussion among the masses of people on the alternative to capitalism and the Westminster model of democracy.

Let us reject the illusion of a middle path, of capitalism with a ‘human face’, and of any ‘secular’ bourgeois front that would allegedly be kind to the workers and peasants. Let us resolve to oppose and defeat those within the working class movement who are spreading such harmful illusions.

Let us promote politicians of the working class and peasantry who will fight uncompromisingly against the bourgeois offensive and work steadfastly for the program of worker-peasant rule. Let us utilise the election campaign to develop able spokespersons of the workers, peasants, women and youth.

Let us use the election campaign to further strengthen that force capable of changing the course of India. Let us build political unity around the program of worker-peasant democracy, of the voluntary Indian Union, and of socialist reorientation of the economy.

Come, let us prepare to become the masters of India! India belongs to us, not to the criminal and parasitic capitalist class and its imperialist allies!

Fight to halt the capitalist program of globalisation and profiteering in the name of stimulus!

Unite to end state terrorism, army rule in border regions and repeal all fascist laws!

Reorient the economy to provide prosperity and protection for all!

Replace the democracy of an exploiting minority with a system of rule by the toiling majority!

Only worker-peasant rule can provide for all, end terrorism and ensure peace in South Asia!

Inquilab Zindabad!