CPI helping 'communal forces' in Bihar, says CPI(M)

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, JAN.31. The CPI(M) has charged the CPI with helping the ``communal forces'' by not joining hands with Mr. Laloo Prasad Yadav's Rashtriya Janata Dal for the coming Assembly elections in Bihar. It has called the CPI's ``unilateral'' decision ``unfortunate'' and said that such a course would ``only help the division of the secular vote, thus helping the communal forces''.

The CPI(M) is the only Left party to have aligned with the RJD while with the CPI and the CPI(M-L) have formed a ``front'' with Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav's Samajwadi Party and a few other ``secular'' groups. They would be taking on the BJP and its allies, on the one hand, and the RJD and the Congress(I), on the other. In some constituencies, the CPI-led ``front'' is likely to end up opposing the CPI(M) as well.

The CPI(M) maintains that in Bihar the RJD alone is strong enough to challenge the BJP and its allies, and therefore, all ``secular'' parties should support it, setting aside their differences with Mr. Laloo Yadav on other issues. The CPI's stand, however, is that the BJP's rise in Bihar owes itself to the policies and style of the successive RJD Governments in the State. The ``sins'' of the RJD, it has alleged, have alienated the people from it and pushed them into the BJP-led camp.

In the latest issue of its official weekly, People's Democracy, the CPI(M) has published the correspondence between its general secretary, Mr. Harkishan Singh Surjeet, and the CPI chief, Mr. A.B.Bardhan, on the controversy with an introduction contending that the CPI's stand goes against its own stated position acknowledging the RJD's ``positive role'' in the fight against communalism.

The correspondence reveals the two parties' sharply conflicting perceptions of the RJD and its capacity to fight communalism in Bihar. Mr. Surjeet, in his two letters, repeatedly makes the point that even as his party does not approve of the RJD's policies and has openly campaigned against them, it remains the best bet against the ``communal'' forces. Bihar, he points out, is the only State where the BJP has not been able to capture power, and that is largely because of the RJD's presence.

Mr. Bardhan, on the other hand, points to the gap between what the RJD preaches and what it actually practices. He says that most of the promises made by Mr. Laloo Yadav in earlier election campaigns to promote social justice had turned to be mere rhetoric.

``Instead, repression was let loose on the activists of the CPI, the CPI(M) and CPI(M-L) when they organised struggles for land reforms and protested against landlords and the mafia'', he says.

The CPI, he points out, wanted to unite the Left parties and forces ``in the concrete situation of Bihar and on that basis to join with other non-Left democratic and secular parties.'' It had looked forward to the CPI(M)'s ``being an important part of this effort.''

Mr. Surjeet, however, remains unconvinced and urges the CPI even at this late stage to review its decision, and help prevent a split in the anti-BJP vote.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : National
Previous : BJP releases first list for Orissa polls
Next     : CPI, Cong. flay attack on film sets