Dangerous politics

It says the conflagration — with very dangerous implications for the unity and integrity of India — is being created in order to reap electoral and political benefits. “This has serious implications threatening the very security of our country in this border state and creating a fertile ground for cross-border terrorism to raise its ugly head,” it says.

It also criticises the Prime Minister for not convening an all-party meeting earlier to resolve the “grave and serious” situation that has engulfed the state.

The issue carries an article written by veteran Marxist leader Jyoti Basu on Harkishan Singh Surjeet, who died recently. Basu, who had walked out of the CPI in 1964 along with Surjeet and twenty nine others to form the CPM, says he is feeling somewhat alone and lonely after his death. Though Basu talks about his experience of working with Surjeet and the former CPM General Secretary’s role in national politics, he is silent on the party shooting down a proposal to make him the Prime Minister in 1996, an idea strongly favoured by Surjeet at that time. Basu had since described the party’s decision as a historic blunder.

Ace strategist

An article by CPM General Secretary Prakash Karat titled ‘Comrade Harkishan Singh Surjeet: an intrepid Marxist leader’ says the bourgeois media has always sought to portray Surjeet as some sort of modern day Chanakya. By this they imply that he was a crafty politician devoid of any principles and there can be nothing further from the truth, he says. “The fact is Surjeet was the most skilled in implementing the political-tactical line of the Party. He was a master tactician in creating the opportunities and exploring the avenues by which the Party’s tactical line would be advanced,” he notes. In doing so, he says, Surjeet did not lose sight of the tactical goals set out by the Politburo or the Central Committee. “This skill was seen in the period when the Left sought to build an anti-Congress unity without compromising with the BJP in the period between 1987 and 1991 and later when a combination of secular parties had to be built against the BJP and the communal danger without allying with the Congress”, he says....