Insiders among the Marxists rank and file fear that the party could be facing its second July Crisis with their Delhi leadership’s decision to withdraw support to the Congress-led UPA government on July 8, 2008. During the 1979 crisis, Jyoti Basu was away in London. Party veterans recall that Basu did not endorse the act of toppling the Morarji Desai government but the front-runners in the party and the politburo prevailed.

In almost in a repeat of 1979, senior politburo members like Biman Bose and Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee accompanied general secretary Prakash Karat to Jyoti Basu’s Salt Lake residence on July 5. The purpose was to brief the 95-year-old party patriarch about the decision to withdraw support.

Yet again, party insiders say, Basu was not fully convinced. An ailing, bedridden Basu listened to Karat for nearly half an hour and reportedly hinted at two things. First, the party should be cautious about not providing any opening in national politics for the BJP to exploit. Second, a withdrawal of support should not be seen as synonymous with pulling down the government. The old man’s advice was that the party should not take the blame for toppling a government that it had supported for four and a half years.

Basu apart, there are rumblings within the Left Front, with many disputing the timing of the move and the manner in which it was done. Many feel that higher-ups in the party have misread the political climate and have mistimed the move. The Marxists had actually moved far away from a position that used to be best described by the West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee in his public addresses. Talking about the leverage the Marxists enjoyed in the coalition, Bhattacharjee would often say in Kolkata maidan rallies: “We make this government stand up, we make this government sit down. It is our choice.”

But as the developments reach a climax, the Marxists suddenly seemed to have lost that coveted position. They are no longer in a position to manipulate the government in the manner that they have for the past four years. Eleven months ago, the Left had spurned the offer of a renewed Third Front from Mulayam Singh Yadav and others at just about the time when Manmohan Singh had turned the screws on the Left by saying that if they wanted to quit, so be it. So, comrades admit in private conversations that the timing of the pullout is grossly inappropriate.

The Left’s bastion of West Bengal is emerging as the biggest casualty of this development. Whatever may be Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee’s public posturing, he realises best the advantages of having a personal rapport with the man at the helm. For a change, Bhattacharjee had promoted this trend of “non-confrontation” with the Central government in the two terms he had been serving. He derived the benefits out of it from Atal Bihari Vajpayee as well as L.K. Advani during the BJP-led NDA regime and later from Manmohan Singh’s cabinet. The phase of cooperation seems to be coming to an end. That’s the problem with governance.

Politically, too, Bengal has been put at a disadvantage. In the May panchayat elections followed up by those to some civic bodies in July, the strident posturing of the Left’s leadership in Delhi against the nuclear deal had no positive impact on the rural vote bank. The Left Front was badly mauled in both elections. Significantly, the areas of erosion included the Left Front’s vote in minority belts. Should the party vote against the government during a motion of no-confidence — something the party has announced it will do — along with the BJP, the effect on its support among minority communities in West Bengal might well be even more disastrous.

If the current political mood is any indication, the air of contempt and revulsion at the turn of events is bound to result in a reduced kitty of Left Front MPs in Bengal. Comrades say that the situation is no better in Kerala, where bitter infighting is taking its toll. A reduced number of MPs translates into reduced bargaining power. So, with the Second July Crisis looming large on their personal horizons, the Marxists seem headed into a precarious and grim phase in politics.

subrata.nagchoudhury@expressindia.com