[Reader-list] Prabhat Patnaik etc

[hpp at vsnl.com]

Dear Friends

It was interesting to read the piece by Com Patnaik.

In typical Communist fashion he does not heditate to resort immediately to
all kinds of supposed idealogical analysis and justification, all kinds of
gobbledy gook, about objective conditions, princoipal contradsictions etc.
Its sad that the little boys pretending to paly big boy big boy have not
grown up yet, that they have no objective overview of how pathetic all
thissounds.

It is the CPM which has abandoned politics, and embraced power. If Com
Patnaik lived for long years in West Bengal, and saw what really happens
here, at various levels, including most of all the living conditions of the
workers, peasants and labouring poor of the state, then he too would feel
only contempt and hostility for the party.

Its very funny that he has to coin the term "messianic moralism", to
oconceal the fact of the complete immorality of the party, and its moral
degeneration as had been vividly described by Com Badal Bose, a year ago,
while addressing Calcutta district committee cadre who had assembled to
commemorate the November revolution in Russia.

If the party had any space in the hearts and minds of the people, then that
was principally because of the high "moral" standards associated with the
party. With the degeneration of the party - as graphically evident in West
Bengal - peole have only contempt and hostility for the party.

So morality is now to be only for Olympians. While the cretinous CPM carries
on unimpeded by any moral compunctions.

Yes, the CPM is desperately trying to be at the forefront of the
anti-imperial struggle - simply through the freak chance of being in a
position to dictate terms at the centre. That self-assumed position is so
much as variance with the reality of the party where it is in power. That
ugly sordid reality is what the party basically is. But the Delhi-wallahs of
the party want the party to have another image and entity, and at the
national level, which is totally removed from their real strength on the
ground, or in terms of ideology and practice.

Its like the condition of a schizophrenic, who has delusions of grandeur, a pauper who stubbornly believes he is an emperor. Its the CPM which is under delusions of its messianic role! The lure and lust of power, the desire to feel powerful - Com Patnaik is a sad victim of this. A classic case of "Dilli ka laddu".

It is CPM that has abandoned politics, while embracing power. Its
self-professed anti-communal an pro-poor stance, and the reactionary,
socially unjust mores of our society, allow the CPM ruse to flourish. The
alienation of middle-class and well-educated and well-employed Indians from
the common people of the land, has enabled the bankrupt and corrupt CPM to
claim one-ness with the people. Those who work in the grassroots in West
Bengal know how alienated the party really is from the people, their
sufferings, their woes, through well-ensconced in power. In
reality, as the experience in West Bengal has shown, the party is deeply
commuanlised in West Bengal, the status of Muslims here is among the lowest
in India; and cheerful deals abound with and gratifications from cowboy
capitalists and corrupt developers, even as the labouring poor live in the
most abysmal conditions.

In its truck with power, it is the CPM that has become the mirror image of
the enemy.

In the final analysis, notwithstanding all the railing and bleating by Com
Patnaik and others, the CPM cannot avoid facing the consequences of what it
has wrought. And no one gives a damn for their pathetic posturing.

They have talked about real-politics, and shown the way, at Nandigram. They
will have to face the same now.


V Ramaswamy
Calcutta
cuckooscall.blogspot.com