“Politics”, Hiren Mukherjee, the renowned CPI parliamentarian of yesteryear and a regular contributor to The Statesman, once wrote, “fundamentally speaking, calls for passion in its pursuit. And passion, in Latin and Roman languages, has for its first meaning ‘suffering’ which none in true political life should wish to escape.”

Yes, it was passion welded onto ideology that drew a large number of bright young intellectuals to the fold of the Communist Party of India from the 1940s onwards. They were inspired by the concept of revolution, more concretely, by the Bolshevik revolution in Russia, to serve the cause of the toiling community.

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Moreover, the dynamic leadership of P.C. Joshi gave a fillip to their embracing the red umbrella. It is the same passion or zeal that in 1950 compelled a bunch of Indian communists at Cambridge who wanted to contribute to the Telengana antiRazakar and peasant upheaval. Back home, rampant hooliganism with political support and unbridled police atrocities caused panic in the minds of the common people.

Nehru at that time was visiting England. The Indian communists at Cambridge had planned to “pour a bucket of tar with feathers” on Indian High Commissioner V.K. Krishna Menon.

Rajani Palme Dutt, the leader of the British Communist Party, did not like the idea and an alternative plan was chalked out. Thus, the party members stood in front of the High Commission in London with placards “Fascist Nehru and his faithful servant V.K. Krishna Menon.” Ironically however, it is the Communist Party of India that sided with Nehru for his non-aligned policy and during the 1962 Sino-Indian conflict. In 1975, the party supported the notorious Emergency declared by Indira Gandhi.

Many inside the party lamented the decision. Bhupesh Gupta, a remarkable orator and one of the leading CPI leaders of that time who was very close to Indira, abandoned her in protest. Over the decades the CPI’s fluctuations in fortunes are in harmony with its contradictions regarding its ideological stance vis-àvis parliamentary democracy, nationalistic approach, foreign relations, organizational structure and a host of other issues.

Nearing one hundred years of its existence, the CPI, once the largest Opposition party, has dwindled into a regional one as per the recent declaration by the Election Commission of India. Ahead of the 2024 parliamentary polls, the Election Commission withdrew the national party status of CPI along with that of a few other parties.

With only two parliamentary seats in its kitty, it is a poor fall of a party that was once recognised among communist nations across the globe and held in high esteem not only by the prime minister and his ruling party, but also by people cutting across the political and ideological divide.

Founded in 1925, the CPI was given the national party status in 1989, but the honour was withdrawn following its lacklustre performance in the last assembly elections in West Bengal and Odisha. It is to be noted that to earn a national party status, a political outfit has to be recognised as state party in four states and have at least two members in the respective legislative assemblies according to the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) order, 1968. But in spite of the brilliant profiles and great performances in the legislature of many of its elected members, the CPI’s growth has never been spectacular.

Decades of simmering tensions and factional infighting have been largely responsible for this. As India got her independence in 1947, differences cropped up regarding how to adjust to the changed scenario. P.C. Joshi, the then party secretary, was of the opinion that India’s independence was a great achievement, yet B.T. Ranadive and his supporters considered it a sham. For a long time the CPI considered Nehru to be a puppet of the US and British imperialism and a votary of capitalism.

When relations between Nehru and Soviet Union improved, a section of the party sought cooperation with the Congress and the PM. The leader of this group was S.A. Dange whose role by that time was being fiercely criticised by members belonging to the opponent faction. The feud worsened in 1962 when the Sino-Indian war broke out. Dange’s opponents in CPI, who did not criticise Chinese action, were thrown into jail.

When these leaders came out of jail, they refused to accept Dange’s leadership. The Sino-Soviet split created further turmoil inside the party. While one group opted for the Chinese line the other settled for the Soviet.

Added to this was the personality-oriented factionalism that became the outfit’s undoing. Before the split, the leftists inside the party included B.T. Ranadive, A.K. Gopalan, Promode Dasgupta and M. Basavapunnaiah while the Rightists were led by Dange and Joshi.

There was also a centrist group comprising leaders like Ajoy Ghosh, Jyoti Basu, Bhupesh Gupta and E.M.S. Namboodiripad. The cold war between Ranadive and Dange or between Dange and Namboodiripad did not allow the party to take any unified decision regarding many ideological and organisational issues. Joshi, Mohit Sen and Dange, the chief leaders of the United Communist Party of India (UCPI), wanted to steadfastly ally with the Congress for the national revolution.

All these leaders were either expelled from the party or they themselves left before any action could be initiated against them. Mohit Sen, in his autobiography A Traveller and the Road regrets: “In India and other democratic countries, our crimes did not reach the level of communists in Soviet Union and China. But we were unjust, including to ourselves. What did some of us not do to try to destroy P. C. Joshi and S. A. Dange?”

Under Ranadive’s stewardship, the communists organised mass struggles during the Telengana and Tebhaga movement eschewing the hitherto-followed tactical line of legal battles nurtured by the moderate Joshi. Ranadive favoured the new party line of mass upsurge and democratic revolution through class struggle.

The crisis came to a head in 1964 when the party was divided into two and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) was born. As the CPI was divested of the National Party status, one leader, Binoy Biswam, tweeted: “National recognition is of course important from a technical point of view. CPI’s recognition is in the hearts of the toiling masses. It is built up with the blood, sweat and tears of the fighting people.

The party will intensify its battle for democracy, secularism and socialism.” However, talking of left ideology or making vows is one thing, but reaching out to people or running a government to implement people’s agenda is another.

Today the CPI as well as other communist parties are left searching for reasons for their disconnect with once steadfast allies – the youth, farmers and the working class. This may have to do partly with the retreat of communism across the globe. Adjusting to the zeitgeist of free market economy and identity-based politics in the country has proved a tough challenge for the organisation. There is also a leadership crisis in the party.

Although the CPI has been in electoral politics for decades, it has failed miserably in forming or running a government successfully in any state leave alone the Centre. In West Bengal, it has been in power for more than three decades, but only as an ally of the fiercely dominant CPI (M). In 1957, when the CPI got a historic electoral victory in Kerala, it became the first communist party in the world to win an election.

Yet within five years of that victory, the party had fragmented beyond recognition. The Namboodiripad government in Kerala was torn by internal discord. Not only that, in reaction to a serious food crisis and issues over education and land, violence erupted as communist cadres took to arms to quell people’s protests.

Nehru finally dismissed the government in 1959 citing the deteriorating law and order condition in the state. In the following election, the communists lost two-thirds of their seats.

Though the CPI never performed enough to form government at the Centre or even the states, its illustrious legacy is largely due to the enviable profiles of its parliamentarians or leading comrades. Dange, Joshi, Hiren Mukherjee, Bhupesh Gupta, Indrajit Gupta, Ila Mitra, Gita Mukherjee and many other stalwarts of the now dwindling party are truly memorable characters in independent India’s political history. Most of them were highly educated and their lives were marked by honesty, dignity and high ethical standards.

They were respected even by their political opponents for their integrity of character and lofty ideals. The only thing most of the communists of the 1930s and 1940s had, as Mohit Sen reminisced, was the party – no income, no home, no family. They were proud of the party even when they left the outfit or were expelled.

It is a far cry from the political scenario of today’s India where changing floors or affiliations is like changing everyday garments and where people are used to seeing politicians and ministers engaged in large-scale corruption, hooliganism and many nefarious activities.

But as of now, we are not sure whether the grand old party will ever stage a comeback or pale into complete insignificance. Be that as it may, countrymen will continue to cherish the glorious legacy of high thinking and plain living, of fair speech and decent conduct, left behind by a great number of towering personalities belonging to this Left party.

(The writer, a Ph D in English, teaches at the Government-sponsored Sailendra Sircar Vidyalaya, Kolkata. The views are personal.)