Opinion Freedom fighters?

With the CPM’s third front project coming under attack from the Congress,General Secretary Prakash Karat and Politburo member Sitaram Yechury used the latest issue of party mouthpiece People’s Democracy to take on prime minister Manmohan Singh and UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi. In an article,Karat replies to the Prime Minister’s charge that the Left has often been on the wrong side of history and that they never participated in the Quit India movement. “Coming from a person who showered praise on British rule in India as marked by ‘good governance’,this is a bit rich.” Manmohan Singh had made a speech in Oxford University in July 2005 where he spelt out the beneficial consequences of British colonial rule in India. “It is significant that this speech came a few days before his visit to Washington where in a joint statement with former president George Bush,a global partnership for spreading democracy was declared. Probably,the American experiment in spreading democracy to Iraq inspired the prime minister. Manmohan Singh knows very well that communist leaders made great sacrifices and spent many years in jail fighting British rule. Being on the ‘right side of history’,that is the United States,seems to have clouded his judgement,” Karat says. He also pokes fun at the Congress and the BJP for accusing each other of “copying” their manifestos. “It is irrelevant for the people who has copied whom. But what should be noted is that they are admitting that their manifestos are similar — the same promises and the same policies,” he says. On the other hand,Yechury questions the prime minister’s silence on the BJP’s role in the Quit India movement and claims that it was in tune with the “current political game” the Congress is playing in tandem with the BJP. He quotes an observation made by the Bombay Home Department during the Quit India movement which said the Sangh has scrupulously kept itself within the law and in particular has refrained from taking part in the disturbances that broke out in August 1942,to back his charge. “Even a former leading light,Nanaji Deshmukh,once raised the question,“Why did the RSS not take part in the liberation struggle as an organisation?” he says.

G-20 fiasco

In an article titled “India plays a reprehensible role”,economist Prabhat Patnaik argues that the 1.1 trillion package dollar help announced by the G-20 recently ostensibly for the developing economies in effect gives a fresh lease of life to the “dying” International Monetary Fund,thus rejecting the demand of the Third World for democratisation of the world financial structure: “This victory was made possible because of the total betrayal of the cause of the Third World by those countries of the developing world which happened to be represented at the G-20; and among them were India and Brazil. India’s role was particularly reprehensible.” “It not only espoused the cause of international finance capital with much enthusiasm,against the interests of the Third World,and against the general efforts to democratise the financial structures of the world economy,such as for instance characterised by the Stiglitz Commission report,but it actually even put up an ideological defence of financial interests,going beyond countries like Britain in this respect.” “Prime minister Manmohan Singh in his speech reportedly even cautioned the assembled delegates against ‘bank bashing’!” he says. He,however,claims that as long as the hegemony of international finance capital is not attacked,“the world will continue to remain sunk in crisis. As in the thirties,there might be mild recoveries but these would again be followed by fresh onslaughts of crisis. The anger against finance capital will only increase as a result; and the more the assembled group of G-20 world leaders ignore this anger,the more it will take forms that by-pass them.”

Compiled by Manoj C.G.