Editor,
Apropos to Amulya Ganguli’s article on the Indian Left (Nov 6, 2014), may I point out a few things in addition to his otherwise cutting-edge analysis. Three things that I would like to mention regarding the dilemmas of the Left in India are:
1. The Indian Left really failed to take into account the cultural specificity of this country called India and accordingly devise the strategy. The mere name-dropping of Lenin and Mao, which failed to strike a chord with the masses because of their foreign roots, remains a permanent obstacle to its ideological penetration and thereby incapacitating it in confronting BJP’s Hindutva rhetoric. In spite of the fact that we have a vocabulary of materialism of Carvaka and Lokayata which could have been utilised or for that matter, figures like Kabir, Chaitanya who could have provided the ideological inspiration for the leftist cause, remain sadly neglected in the Indian left pantheon. Along with this, turning a deaf ear to the caste question which could have been easily tagged with the class factor because of the caste-class continuum in Indian society only made it completely paralysed in making inroads into Indian socio- political life.
2. The Indian Left failed to tackle the question of bourgeois parliamentary democracy as to what it could do with that. The CPI-M, after an initial stint of militant activities in the late sixties and early seventies finally settled for participation in state governments whole-heartedly and taking up ownership of what Indian capitalism and the Indian state has to offer. The result was its thorough incorporation in the System and massive alienation from its class base of poor peasants and workers, which led to its total rout in the 2011 elections in West Bengal, the citadel of the Indian Left. The other more radical faction, CPI (M-L), started boycotting elections for the goal of immediately capturing state power in the late sixties and early seventies, resulting in bloodbath and police mayhem and finally finishing in complete decimation. The still surviving element of this faction in the form of CPI (Maoist) seems to be receding more and more into the jungles and its tactics of terror and violence seems to have very little appeal to the broad Indian masses.
3. The Indian Left’s ostrich-like approach to the nationality question in India, with its overtly simplistic position that there is no domination of one nationality by the other in India, fails to give a proper honour to this much complex issue, ratified by its almost non-presence in the North-East ( except Tripura) along with several other factors. Its determinate position in favour of a heavy centralised State polity or at least without a serious criticism of it, only made it irrelevant in those areas where this question is particularly acute.
Yours etc.,
Bibhas Bagchi
UGC-ASC Guest House,
NEHU, Shillong.
The question of land
Editor,
Apropos the special article “Landownership and survival of the community” (ST November 10 2014) by H.H.Mohrmen, land is limited by nature and is the main factor of production and development without which no socio-economic development can take place. It is a fact that the prevailing land tenure system has created many problems in Khasi and Jaintia Hills for the progress of socio-economic development. Mohrmen rightly pointed the stalling and delay of important infrastructure projects like airport, highway, power and water supply as a result of the peculiar land tenure system prevailing in Khasi and Jaintia Hills. In the concluding paragraph of his article he raised many pertinent questions which could have been solved had the successive governments in Meghalaya since 1974 implemented the recommendations of the Land Reforms Commission (LRC) 1974 scripted by (L) R.Tokin Rymbai, Chairman of the Commission. Among the many recommendations listed in Chpater XI of the Report of the Land Reforms Commission for Khasi Hills on land and inheritance, the Commission had recommended that “a survey of the entire land (Ri Kynti, Ri Raid and Government) should be taken up in a phased manner, and cadastral maps thereof prepared and on the basis of this survey and maps record of rights should be prepared”. The Meghalaya Legislative Assembly in 1980 has passed a resolution for surveying of land and providing record of rights however the resolution remains unimplemented.
Late Brington Buhai Lyngdoh, the first Finance Minister and former Chief Minister, Meghalaya in a seminar organized by the Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council on May 8 1991 where 60 heads of the Elakas attended in Dinam Hall where the District Council was inaugurated in 1952 pointed out that “the process of administration should be less political and more economical in its approach for all round development of the people.” He called upon the Elaka chiefs to cooperate with the District Council and the State Government in conducting the cadastral survey of land and giving records of rights to the people. He said “the Elaka Chiefs should help in dispelling fears from people’s minds that in conducting a survey and providing records of rights the Government and the Councils were out to grab land”. Had the Government implemented the recommendations of the LRC 1974 and the people cooperated, the problems of landownership and survival of the community would have not arisen today. Truly the world does not wait for those who stand and stare.
Yours etc.,
VK Lyngdoh,
Via email