People's Democracy

  TRIPURA

CPI(M) Calls For Ideological Campaign

IDENTIFYING ideological campaign as the key to the Congress-INPT combine’s electoral rout and massive mandate to the Left Front in Tripura against overwhelming odds, the CPI(M) has decided to update its ideological arsenal to consolidate the victory the Left Front achieved in the February 26 assembly elections. This message emerged from the press conference organised on April 3 at the party headquarters, following its state committee session of April 11-12, in which the party Polit Bureau member Prakash Karat also participated. The party spokesman and state secretariat member Gautam Das narrated to the newsmen the discussions and decisions of this two day session of the state committee which mainly deliberated on the review of the results of the February 26 assembly polls, on the basis of a draft prepared from booth-wise reports issuing from the grass roots level upward, through party local and divisional committees.

Gautam Das said that, in the days to come, the party would lay utmost emphasis on ideological reinforcement of its leaders and activists as well as on significant strides made in the direction of public security and development in Tripura. To that end, the party has adopted the programme of an extended session of its state committee on May 4-5 next, and a party education camp in each of the divisions by the end of this year, in addition to a four day state level party education camp in July next. The extended session of the state committee will involve the divisional committee members and frontal organisation leaders, besides the state committee members, with a view to deliberating on issues like strengthening the party organisation, expansion of its frontal and political-ideological base, ideological upgradation, expeditious implementation of government programmes and policies, overhaul of the administrative apparatus towards effectively combating insurgency, etc. The education camps are meant for numerous cadres that have joined the CPI(M) camp in the recent period.

As part of the ongoing programmes, the party state committee conducted a successful  drive for collection of money and medicines for the imperialist-struck Iraqi people on April 18 and observed Lenin’s anniversary on April 22. It has also decided to mark the international workers’ solidarity day on May 1 and fully work for the success of the countrywide strike on May 21 at the call of trade unions.

Explaining the review of the election results, Das stated that by forming the fifth Left Front government in Tripura, the people have given a massive mandate in favour of peace, stability and development in the midst of a ceaseless campaign of terror carried out by the Congress party, the INPT and the outlawed NLFT extremists. On the other hand, the party also had to face the tremendous imperialist economic, cultural and psychological attack via the BJP-led centre on the people of Tripura.

Das said it was the ceaseless ideological campaign of the CPI(M) and the Left Front that stripped bare the above two-decades long clandestine collaboration of the Congress party with extremists, climaxing in its open alliance with the extremists’ overground political mask, the INPT, as well as the Congress party’s fundamentally anti-people stance that it shares with the BJP. It was this ideological war waged by the party, coupled with the sacrifices made by the CPI(M) cadres, including the martyrdom of over 500 CPI(M) leaders, activists and supporters over the last five years that over came the challenges posed by the extremists as well as the centre’s nonchalance and non-cooperation, Das pointed out.

Citing statistics, Das said that while the incumbent governments were swept out in three out of the four states where assembly elections were held in February, in Tripura the Left Front government not only returned to power by winning 41 out of a total 60 seats, but also polled a bigger number of votes. Had the opposition Congress-INPT combine been prevented by the centre’s adequate security assistance from hijacking the polls with the help of extremist guns in many tribal areas, the Left Front could have won at least seven more seats, he maintained.

Armed with the gun-power of the misguided militants as well as of the big business-controlled media, the Congress-led alliance had boosted its support base and tried to demoralise the Left Front voters by mounting a psycho-blitzkrieg that “we are going to be back with bang”. Now when erosions in the ranks of the crest-fallen militants and their mentors are leading to surrenders by some of the militants or bloody internecine conflicts among the others, conspiracies are again afoot to destablise the Left Front government and its development activities with diabolic extremist strikes. People’s pressure alone can withstand such ravages and it is to consider this aspect that the extended session of the CPI(M) state committee is going to be convened, Das  stated.

Replying to a  question, whether the party is satisfied with 1.83 per cent  rise in Left Front votes over the 1988 elections, in view of the concurrent 11 per cent rise of votes in Tripura, Das emphatically said satisfaction was out of question and this is what the state committee’s extended session and the series of party education camps are going to be all about. The idea is to intensify the ideological campaign to win over the huge section of the toiling masses who are still stuck to the reactionary camp and wage, with renewed vigour, the ideological war on the heinous Congress-extremist conspiracy to set the clock back in the state, he clarified.

The April 11-12 session of the CPI(M) state committee, through three resolutions, deeply condoled the Iraqis killed in Anglo-American aggression on Iraq, the common people including the CPI(M) activists and supporters killed in post-poll extremist attacks in Tripura, and, the demise of Comrade L B Gangadhara Rao, a  pioneering leader of Telangana peasants’ armed struggle in Andhra Pradesh. (INN)