No blushing

The CPM has many reasons to be mortified by the latest WikiLeaks disclosures — reports of conversations between US officials and senior leaders reveal the uncomfortable gap between party catechism and their own informally expressed opinions. The then West Bengal chief minister,Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee tells the US representatives his party must “change or perish”,the Kerala CPM dedicatedly chases after American investment even as it deplores US imperialism. However,despite all these revelations,the party seems unflappable. At a press conference,CPM General Secretary Prakash Karat confirmed that these meetings had taken place,but pointed out that most of this WikiLeaks content was second-hand analysis by US officials that could not be taken as credible fact. “There are two aspects,one a factual report of what transpired and second,the observation and interpretation of US diplomats on these meetings,which need to be taken with a pinch of salt… we need not accept them,’’ he explained.

That is a perfectly unobjectionable assessment,in line with what most people would say about the chatty,impressionistic diplomatic cables that WikiLeaks has raided,but where was the CPM’s worldliness a few months back? When the first batch of WikiLeaks cables were outed,mostly to do with the UPA-US government interaction,Karat wrote an op-ed calling out the prime minister’s claim that this information was unverifiable,as an attempt to “brazen out the exposures”. The CPM didn’t let the unreliability of foreign office gossip and the shallow readings of US officials come in the way of its sanctimony then,and every shred of damaging information was seized upon as the revealed truth. Karat dismissed the government’s “pathetic excuse” saying that “everyone knows that the US secretary of state,Hillary Clinton,herself had called the Indian foreign minister to warn about the leakage of these cables and the consequent embarrassment they may cause”. WikiLeaks chatter on the “cash for votes” scandal was all the confirmation the CPM needed to attack the prime minister.

Now,Karat has swung around to the position that WikiLeaks must be read with editorial filters firmly in place. What’s truly impressive is the conviction with which he and the party have espoused both positions. There’s no outward trace of discomfort,or even the slightest flinching at having to make this sudden 180-degree turn. Or do Marxists just know how to deal with contradictions better?