The CPI-M politburo met in Delhi last weekend. The focus of the debate was on its stand vis-à-vis the Congress. It will be a burning issue at the time of the general election in 2019. The discussion was not up in the air. Two documents were gone through with a fine toothed-comb. One was prepared by former General Secretary Prakash Karat. The other document has been drawn up by the present chief, Sitaram Yechury. The 16 comrades who constituted the brains trust of the party could not arrive at a decision. The debate will continue in a larger forum, the party’s Central Committee(CC). The CC has nine members and ten invitees. If these members cannot arrive at a consensus, the party congress to be held in April next year will have the last word on the major issue. The discussions are surprisingly going on in a highly civilized manner. Such polite exchanges cannot be expected in the BJP or the Congress. These parties hardly devote time to a serious analysis of the character of potential allies. For instance a Bengali Muslim labourer was killed in Rajasthan recently but there were hardly any repercussions in the higher echelons of the BJP. The CPI-M is the only party in India which takes a long time to deliberate on an issue even if without any result.
The CPI-M’s tally in the Lok Sabha has fallen from 44 MPs in 2004 to 9 in 2014. There is something unrealistic about Communist polemics on the role of the Congress which has also lost strength significantly. The alliance of the Congress with the CPI-M was a historical fact in the past and was very productive. Why are the CPI-M theoreticians splitting hairs over an urgent and unavoidable strategy?