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Electoral Imperatives in the Indian Communist Party Split

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

T. R. Sharma
T. R. Sharma
Affiliation:
Himachal Pradesh University, Simla, India
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Extract

At the moment, India, with two Congress Parties, two Jana Sanghs, two Socialist Parties, two D.M.K.s, two Akali Dals and two Communist Parties (the third Communist Party—the C.P.M.L.—has been declared illegal after the present emergency), presents a picture with ‘splitism’ as the common denominator. The split in the Communist Party of India occurred at a time when the Communist movement all over the world was in disarray, showing polycentric trends on account of Sino-Soviet polemics. In addition to this, the Sino-Indian border war of 1962 also put serious strain on the party unity. Therefore, most of the studies that were undertaken on the C.P.I, split ascribed it either to the Sino-Soviet schism or to the Sino-Indian border war, or to both. However, an analysis of the authoritative pronouncements of two factions and an examination of their political resolutions indicate sharp differences on such issues as the character of the Congress Party, the nature of its government and the progressive and reactionary contents of its economic, home and foreign policy. The rightsts in the C.P.I, considered the national bourgeoisie Congress Party and its government as a progressive force and consequently advocated a policy of ‘Unity’ with it, in its fight against the parties of the Right reaction, such as the Jana Sangh, the Swatantra and the two variants of the Socialist Party.

Type
Articles
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 10 , Issue 3 , July 1976 , pp. 349 - 360
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1976

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References

1 See, for example, Gelman, Harry, ‘Indian Communist Party between Moscow and Peking’, Problems of Communism, Vol. XI, No. 6 (11–12 1962);Google ScholarDevlin, Kevin, ‘Boring from Within’, Problems of Communism, Vol. XIII, No. 2 (03–04 1964), pp. 27–39;Google Scholar and Wood, John B., ‘Observations on the Indian Communist Party Split’, Pacific Affairs, Vol. XXXVIII, No. I (1965), pp. 47–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Ghosh, Ajoy, New Situation and Our Tasks (New Delhi: Communist Party Publication, 1961), p. 7.Google Scholar

3 ‘Statement of meeting of Representatives of the Communist and Workers' Parties, November, 1960’,Basic Documents of Communist and Workers' Parties (New Delhi: C.P. Publication, 1972), p. 43.Google Scholar

4 C.P.I., (Draft) Political Resolution (New Delhi: C.P. Publication, 1961)Google Scholar and, C.P.I., Alternate (Draft) Political Resolution (New Delhi: C.P. Publication, 1961).Google Scholar

5 White Paper on Vijyawada, Nationalists' Marxist Association of India, pp. 30–1.

6 Basavapunniah, M. et al. , Threatening Disruption and Split of the Party— How to Avert the Disaster? (Delhi: Communist Party Publication, 1963), p. 3. It may be noted that Mohan Ram in his study of Indian Communism talks of 17 signatories to this note but gives only 14 names. He omits the names of P. Ramamurti, K. Ramani and M. R. Venkatraman.Google Scholar See Ram, Mohan, Indian Communism—Split Within a Split (Delhi: Vikas, 1969), p. 171.Google Scholar

7 Ram, , Indian Communism, p. 171.Google Scholar

8 Ibid., p. 187.

9 Ram, , Indian Communism, p. 189.Google Scholar

10 Ibid., p. 188.

11 All voting percentages in this article have been calculated from voting figures given in Dass, R. Chandi et al. (eds), India Votes—A Source Book of Indian Elections (Bombay: Popular Prakashan, 1968). For the states where elections were not held in 1957 or 1962, the figures refer to the nearest year when elections took place. The figures in respect of the state of Punjab relate to the area of the present state of Punjab.Google Scholar

12 New Age, 16 July, 1961, p. 6.

13 Link, 23 July 1961, pp. 15–16.

14 New Age, 6 August 1961, p. 3, and 19 November 1961, p. 10.

15 C.P.I., (Draft) Political Resolution, pp. 37–41.Google Scholar

16 Link, 2 July 1961, p. 11.