-Rajesh Tyagi/5.4.2014
Translated by: Anurag Pathak/ 17.2.2017
In the infinite series of counter-revolutionary crimes, committed by Stalinists in the last century, the Telangana peasant revolt (1948-51), that appeared in the mid of the last century, was an important link.
First, pushing the unarmed youth and peasants to confront the
armed forces of the capitalist state, in the name of 'revolutionary upsurge', and
then running away leaving them in the lurch, the opportunist leadership of the CPI,
during the Telangana struggle, had been acting directly under Stalin’s command,
whose sole aim was to nourish the interests of Kremlin’s nationalist
bureaucracy, at all costs.
Telangana period takes-off with ‘Ranadive thesis', presented
by the CPI in it’s Calcutta congress. The thesis had reversed the ‘People’s War’
thesis of PC Joshi which had been in operation from 1941-1948. This ‘People’s War
thesis' of PC Joshi, was in no way a
recipe for the war of workers and toilers upon the British rule, but complete
surrender in favour of the British rule under the garb of defence of the Soviet Union.
Driven by this capitulationist policy of ‘people’s war'
directed by Stalin and the Comintern under him, CPI had betrayed the revolutionary
struggle against British colonialism and joined hands with British rule. Guided
by this thesis, the CPI, not only supported the military expeditions of the British
colonialists and participated in military recruitment but also did the spy duty
for the colonial government during WWII. Just before getting murdered by
Stalin, the great Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky was appealing to workers
and peasants in India that their first and foremost task was to wipe out the
British rule through a proletarian revolution. At the same time, the CPI, under
the command of Stalin, had continued since 1941 to support the British regime, in
name of ‘People’s War'. The CPI supported the Mountbatten Plan proposed by the
British, passing it off as ‘freedom’, through which the Indian and British
capitalists were to divide the power among themselves in 1947, and approved of
the communal partition of the Indian sub-continent.
The ‘People’s War' thesis, promoted in the name of PC Joshi
thesis was not authored by Joshi, but was dictated by the Kremlin under Stalin
and served only the national bureaucratic interests of Kremlin. Based on
collaboration with liberal-bourgeois, this ‘People’s War' policy in itself was
the other end of Stalin's counter-revolutionary line, that in August 1939 had
led to Stalin’s war-pact with Fascist Hitler with whom Stalin had formulated
the masterplan to swallow the whole of the Europe through joint military expeditions.
Joint invasion of Stalin and Hitler upon Poland was the part of this war pact.
But Stalin’s friend Hitler had different plans: to swallow whole of the Europe
along with Russia, too. After betrayal by Hitler and sudden attack on Russia itself,
Stalin, in the name of ‘People’s War' ordered the communist parties of the world
to form an alliance with liberal-bourgeoisie against the Fascists.
Because of this ‘People’s War' thesis, Stalin, not only
signed war pacts with Britain, France and America but also forced the communist
parties in the colonies of these imperialist countries, to abandon the anti-colonial
struggle inside the colonies and instead to cooperate with the colonial
governments. To appease these imperialists,
Stalin in 1943, dissolved the Comintern, the world party of the international proletariat.
Collaborating with one camp of the imperialists against the other, Stalin was calling
the shameful campaign in defence of national-bureaucratic interests of Kremlin,
a ‘People’s War’ and using the communist parties of the world as a bait, was
directing them to sacrifice the revolutionary movements in the colonies under
control of British and French Imperialists.
As a corollary to this policy of Kremlin, based upon total
derogation of Proletarian Internationalism, in India, the CPI, became servile
to the British colonial power that had hanged Bhagat Singh and his comrades and
had crushed the revolutionary movement mercilessly, and betrayed the
revolutionary movement. Applied
worldwide, this policy did not belong to PC Joshi but to Stalin, PC Joshi was
only echoing the same.
This policy of Stalin, actually was based on the policy
document, ‘Dutt-Bradley thesis’, prepared by Stalin himself and presented by
the British Communist Party (CPGB) in June 1941. ‘Dutt-Bradley thesis', criticized
the policy of CPI ongoing from 1931. as ultra-leftist, adventurist and narrow
and was proposed to make national-fronts with national-bourgeoisie. Because of
this line, CPI instead of fighting against the bourgeois Congress, got stuck to
it. ‘Dutt-Bradley thesis' was a plain re-reading of ‘Dimitrov thesis' prepared under Stalin’s dictates and presented to the seventh congress of the Comintern.
In WWII, Stalin tried his best to keep the alliance with British,
French and US imperialists . In the conference of foreign ministers of US,
France and Britain, held in March-April 1947, Kremlin expressed its bright hope
that with the end of WWII, the Soviet collaboration with US, Britain and France
would not come to an end but would get strengthened. But after the extinction
of Fascist camp, now US, British and French imperialists were not prepared for
it. The imperialists had started violating the war-pacts of Yalta, Potsdam and
Tehran achieved during the WWII.
Forced, Stalin again took an about-turn and mingling the
national interests of Kremlin with that of ‘world revolution’, with the hand of
a crook, got chanted a new thesis by his stooge Andrei Zhdanov on behalf of the
CPSU, in the opening session of Cominform in September 1947. According to
‘Zhdanov thesis’, time was again ripe for decisive struggle over the world, against
Capitalism.
At the same time, CPI took an accidental and spontaneous
turn. Criticising the line advocated by PC Joshi, ‘Ranadive Thesis’ was put
forward in 1948, calling for the Telangana Peasants’ Revolt in India. The CPI
that only yesterday had supported the ‘Mountbatten Plan' in June 47, the communal
partition of India under it in August 47 and had accepted the power sharing
arrangement of August 47 as ‘freedom’, took a somersault to chant the virtues
of ‘Zhdanov thesis’. ‘Ranadive Thesis' was again nothing but simple and plain re-reading
of ‘Zhdanov Thesis'. First and second chapter of ‘Zhdanov thesis’ was copied
word to word. ‘Ranadive Thesis' was in no way based on concrete understanding
of India's and world's political scenario, but was copy of ‘Zhdanov thesis'.
The great theorist of CPI were only swallowing the vomit of Stalin! According
to the ‘Ranadive thesis' the political equation of the world had undergone a
sea change with the end of WWII.
If in 1941, the PC Joshi's line was the only revolutionary Marxist-Leninist line, now ‘Ranadive line' was the only revolutionary Marxist-Leninist line.
The actual intention of bureaucracy behind ‘Ranadive Thesis' was not to foment the revolutions, but to pressurise the
national-bourgeois governments to enter
into agreements with Kremlin. Following this line, once again the communist
parties started taking up strike struggles in France, Britain and US and mounting
pressure upon national bourgeois in colonies to join the Soviet camp.
Nehru's government till now was emulating Britain in British
Commonwealth. It needed a push towards the Soviet camp. The Telangana peasants
struggle had the potential to do this and it did it!
Criticising the PC Joshi's line as opportunist, right-reformist
and petty-bourgeois revisionist, the CPI in follow-up to ‘Ranadive Thesis', but
without any concrete analysis and preparation, called for the armed struggle in
Telangana. ‘Ranadive Thesis' claimed that the illusions among the people in
system of bourgeois have shattered and it is restive for a change!
In follow up to ‘Ranadive Thesis', PC Joshi and his
followers were expelled from party organs, and the isolated peasant squads were
fielded in front of the army, armed with modern weaponry.
Unarmed peasants and youth fought with indomitable courage
against the Nizam and his rulers till Nehru on the recommendation of his Home-Minister
Patel sent the armed forces to suppress the revolt. These forces brutally suppressed
the revolt. More than fifty thousand men, women and children were sacrificed in
this struggle. Despite this, the revolt continued for 3 years.
The Nehru government, trapped in Telangana, was now ready to
maintain good relations with Kremlin. Soviet Ambassador in India, Vaisinsky,
the old Menshevik who had issued warrants against Lenin and Trotsky in July
1917 and had prosecuted Bolshevik core in fake Moscow Trials on dictates of
Stalin, congratulated Nehru for adopting Indian Constitution, that was based on
bogus 1935 government of India Act and arranged a feast in his welcome. In
return, India recognised ‘People’s republic of China’ and declared herself as
‘non-aligned’. Stalin's aim was now fulfilled. Now, Telangana struggle was of
no use to the Kremlin bureaucracy.
Stalin, by taking another about-turn, returned back to
‘Dimitrov line'. ‘Ranadive Thesis' was now criticised as a left deviation.
Under directives of Stalin, a new policy was formulated for British Communist Party,
under the “British road to Socialism”, that stated clear that the road to
revolution in all countries now would not go through armed rebellions but
through peaceful parliamentary struggles and the Communist Parties were
instructed to seek the democratic and progressive sections among the national
bourgeoisie and to make alliances with them.
After myriad sacrifices in Telangana struggle, the workers,
peasants and the youth were told that the ‘Ranadive thesis' was a leftist
deviation from Marxism-Leninism and on a return back to bourgeois
parliamentarism, the same has been corrected.
In fact, the Stalinist bureaucracy, in opposition to the
program of proletarian internationalism and world socialist revolution, was
toeing to a nationalist policy whose sole purpose was to preserve the power in
Kremlin at any cost, including sacrificing the vital interests of the world
revolution.
Telangana’s failure, was also the failure of that path which
was promoted as ‘China’s Path'. The misconceived notion of ‘Chinese Path’ that assigns
the central role in the revolution of backward countries to the partisan, disintegrated
peasantry while pushing down the urban proletariat to fringes, runs against the
strategic lessons of the October Revolution. Peasantry, despite being in whatever
great numbers in a country, can never rise on a national scale into a power, independent
and sufficient for a revolution. It can only exercise it’s political role either
under the leadership of bourgeois or the proletariat.
Secondly, it remains miles
away from that close proximity to the nervous system of capitalism, that is
essential to disperse the economic and political system of capital. Innumerable
socio-economic layers, among which the peasantry remains divided, support or
oppose the revolution, taking different attitudes to it, in different times and
in different parts of the world. Above all the peasant and the village, depend
directly upon the city. That’s why, to destroy the power of the national bourgeois,
the rural organisation of peasantry is totally inadequate and peasants, can
march to revolution against the power of capital, only under the leadership of the
urban proletariat.
Neglecting these characteristic features of peasant movement, Stalinists turn away from the lessons of October Revolution and, prepare the road to destruction of the revolutionary movement.
The brief history of Telangana’s peasant struggle, is the
history of failures of its Stalinist leadership, one after the other. Telangana
neither was, nor is the way. In reality, Telangana needed to be led to the path
of October Revolution. This meant, a bitter political struggle against the
Nehru government centered around the key cities like Delhi, Bombay and Madras,
which would have been supported by dozens of peasant movements like Telangana, from
all sides. But the bogus policies of Stalin and the Kremlin under him, the
revolutionary movement got suffocated and its sad demise took place in the feet
of national-bourgeoisie where its dead corpse is lying still.
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