National

Communist unity need of the time: Bardhan

By K.V. Prasad

NEW DELHI APRIL 7. Unfazed by the muted response of the CPI(M) to its suggestion on unity of the two Communist parties, the Communist Party of India feels that such a move was the `need of the time'.

"It is not a question of our pleading with or petitioning any party. The question is what we think is politically essential in the present critical circumstances. It requires that the Communists come together," the CPI General Secretary, A.B. Bardhan, told The Hindu today.

Mr. Bardhan, who was re-elected for the third time as the CPI general secretary at its Thiruvananthapuram Party Congress last week, said the party would patiently wait for the "realisation to dawn on others''. He said the CPI did not believe in using the unity talk as a `weapon'' — as suggested by the CPI(M) — and that the party had not diluted its Communist ideology. He said having studied the CPI(M) resolution and comparing it with the CPI resolution, there was `absolutely' nothing to show of one being closer to the Congress party.

The CPI(M) general secretary, Harkishan Singh Surjeet, had earlier cited that the CPI's move in the recent Punjab Assembly polls in which it preferred to go with the Congress instead of joining a secular democratic combine as suggested by the CPI(M), as one of the differences in the approach. Mr. Bardhan said for that matter during the 1999 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress had left a seat each for the CPI and the CPI(M) to contest.

However, Mr. Bardhan said it was not a question of how the leaders react but the masses, particularly the Communists, felt about it.

Referring to the tasks before the CPI, he said the party congress had given three clear directions, organising Left and secular forces against communal forces, ushering in people's movement against the policies of liberalisation, globalisation and privatisation, opposing `subordination' to the United States by the Vajpayee Government in the international sphere and building on a third political alternative to both the BJP and the Congress.

In fact, the CPI shared a view similar to that of the CPI(M) on the need for a third alternative in the country. Mr. Bardhan said the CPI felt that ousting the BJP Government could not be countered by restoring the Congress. Mr. Bardhan said in the struggle against communal forces, whose gruesome face appeared in Gujarat, the masses behind the Congress party had to be drawn into it.

The strategy, he said, was different from the approach and the attitude of the CPI towards the Congress on the question of the latter's bid for power. He said the challenge was to bring the silent majority of the people, especially the majority community who felt disturbed, but had not stirred, to come out and confront the communal forces which were spreading hatred. Only the Communist parties could fight the broad political and ideological struggle, he felt.

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