WEST BENGAL

 CPI(M) Resolves To Strengthen Organisational Base

 B Prasant

THE Bengal state committee of the CPI(M) has resolved to further augment Party organisation through a rigorous pursuit of Communist ideology and Communist principles. This decision was arrived at a meeting of the committee held at the Muzaffar Ahmad Bhavan in Kolkata on September 20-21. Shedding light on various aspects of the task to further strengthen the Party organisation, 36 members of the state committee took part in the discussion.

Towards achieving this goal, the rectification campaign shall be strengthened and the ambit of Party education widened to bring in more and more Party members, especially those who have lately joined the ranks.  Party discipline is to be imposed in a stricter manner in the days to come. 

The state committee meting saw the placement of the Organisation report by state secretary, Anil Biswas.  Biman Basu, member of the CPI(M) Polit Bureau, presided.  Prakash Karat, Polit Bureau member of the CPI(M), was present throughout the two-day meeting.

Placing the report, Anil Biswas said that organisation could not be augmented without enhancing the level of political-ideological consciousness.  The task has become imperative what with anti-Communist propaganda perhaps touching a nadir across the world under the aegis of the forces of imperialism and capitalism. 

The state committee meeting has identified the principal sources of the errors and deviations starting to affect the Party in Bengal, and these are: 

•      The increasing predominance of the bourgeois, petty bourgeois, and feudal relations and thinking

•     The liberalisation of the economy at the behest of the forces of imperialism and the spread of a perverted consumerism as its concomitant fall out

•    The massive campaign in the media of values that emphasise the bourgeois principles of self-aggrandisement and egotism

•   The unprincipled behaviour of the bourgeois parties, their political bankruptcy, and the putting into place of money power

•   The aggressive campaign-propaganda of the politics of reaction

•   The uneven level of an adequate awareness of the basic outlook of the Party, and of the Party programme

 The report notes, “While there has been improvements brought about in the organisational functioning, the changes are not enough considering the imperatives.”  Lacunae persist in various tiers of the Party’s organisational structure.  To countervail the weaknesses, a quarterly system of check up of the activities of the Party members have been instituted at the level of the committee as well as of the individual.  However, the process of checking up needs to be further strengthened.

Towards this end, a continuous struggle must be carried out against organisational lapses and errors through a proper implementation of the principles of collective leadership, collective organisational work, and ‘criticism-self-criticism.’  The importance of carrying out struggles against immorality and against the unwanted infiltrators of the ranks cannot be overemphasised.

Taking part in the discussion, Prakash Karat said that the frankness of the discussion being exercised in the meeting of the Bengal state committee would be of great assistance in the conduct of the rectification campaign of the CPI(M) at the all-India level.

Karat added to say that the points, which came up for discussion at the meting, would be emphasised in the task of building up of the Party organisation in several states where the Party foundation continued to be weak. It was essential for the Party, said Karat, to ensure that the level of political consciousness of the Party members was made sufficiently high. 

According to Karat, the task of increasing the number of Party whole timers and Party organisers was very important, now more than ever.  Karat affirmed that there was no alternative to the strengthening of the Party by following Leninist principles.

The Party organisational document highlights how over the past two-and-a-half decades in Bengal have witnessed the martyrdom of more than 3500 party workers, the emphatic and tireless struggles waged by the vast majority of the Party’s workers, leaders, and sympathisers.  The document noted also the massive and increasing support of innumerable people in the political struggles that the Party led.

The organisational document also points, at the same time, to the substantial percentage of the poor people who yet remain with such political parties as are intensely inimical of the Left Front.  The document states that to ensure the solidarity of the unity of the toiling masses, especially of the poor and downtrodden, along with carrying out political struggles, a much bigger initiative than is being taken at the present must be mobilised by the Party and the mass organisations.

The organisational document also outlined a brief summary of the tasks that must be fulfilled in the task of strengthening the Party’s organisational base.

•     The problems of the wide section of the people who approach the Party on matters of governmental functioning must be listened to carefully, and the Party must attach the highest importance to the problems and the statements of the poor people

•        No Party collection must be made on an individual basis, and certainly never without proper receipts/coupons being issued; and house-to-house collection must be adhered to

•        The various complaints that the Party receives from the people must be looked into early for a quick resolution or for organising enquiries into the charges made

•         If a Party member suffers from deviation, he/she must be spoken to for rectification; only when he/she fails to abide by the principle of rectification must an initiation of measures against him/her be considered

•         The terrorist attacks machinated and led by the opposition must be resisted by taking along and organising the masses

•         All people’s representatives and administrative officials must be driven by lofty principles

•         A special initiative must be organised to bring within the Party, leading activists among workers, poor peasants, and women through imparting Party education

•         Along with Party education, general and practical education, too, must be emphasised while conducting struggles and movements

•         Everyday tasks must be completed while taking due note of the need to build up of a living contact with the masses

The state committee meeting adopted at the end of two days the following programme of tasks for strengthening of the Party organisation:

•      The issues of errors, deviations, and unprincipled behaviour must be discussed at every functional level of the Party and the Party workers must be inspired to fight against these tendencies; The entire Party must be educated on a) why the Party cannot survive without the principle of democratic centralism and b) on the objectives and principles of the Party

•      As a preliminary step, the drive to further emphasise the principle of democratic centralism must be started with the members of the state committee itself

•       All fears and apprehensions must be done away in bringing to the notice of committee to which a member belongs and/or to the next higher committee, against whom complaints have been lodged on grounds of immorality

•        A party worker must be questioned if an instance of increase in his/her movable and immovable assets, without an appropriate or proper source of income, is brought to notice; if sensible reasons are not cited, steps should be initiated against him/her

•       If a complaint is received, a one-member or a two-member committee of inquiry must be formed and the task before the committee should be expeditiously dealt with on the basis of priority

•      A political struggle must be waged to win elections and the people must be taken along in offering resistance to the terrorist attack of the opposition

•       All grey areas in the inter-relationship between the Party and the mass organisations must be cleared up and in this task the functioning of mass organisations and TU’s in democratic manner must be ensured; In place of the predominance of the individual and the authority of a single person, collective leadership and collective organisation must be established

•        No funds are to be collected without receipts and if one goes ahead with spending the funds raised as per will, the act will be considered a criminal one; mass collections twice a year and regular collections from the Party sympathisers must be emphasised, the Party funds must be strengthened for meeting the demand of every functional level

•        People’s representatives and office-bearers in the administration must be guided by high ideals and they must abide meticulously by the principles laid down by the Party’s central committee and the state committee

•        The NGO office-bearers must remain accountable to the state/district/zonal/local committees in accordance with their geographical area of operation; in the task of organising festivals and fairs, Party’s committees concomitant to the location/area of the event must be consulted with and the event must be organised under the supervision of the concerned Party committee

•        Emphasis must be further increased on the tasks of reading and propagating Party publications; a mass drive for the sale of party publications must be organised at least once-a-month in the rural areas, at least once a week in the cities and urban stretches

•        Emphasis must be attached to the building up of Party members from among the toiling masses and the poor peasants.  It is a difficult task to ensure their promotion to the rank of leadership but the task must be attempted nonetheless. If necessary, emphasis should be attached to the organisation of separate political camps for those Party members who are poor, who belong to the toiling masses, and who remain backward in general education but who show a lot of promise.  The progress made in the case of women members is not satisfactory.  Not all Branches have women members. A special plan must be initiated to induct into the Party those women who are leading workers in various movements, and who have been elected in the three-tier Panchayat system

•        Importance should be attached to the proper preparation and placement of quarterly reports based on the evaluation of work done at every level, on an objective evaluation of the workers, and on an examination of the reports at the higher level and to the removal of weaknesses that draw the Party’s attention.