Inaugural Speech A. B. Bardhan General Secretary Communist Party of India Dear Com. Sudhakar Reddy, Chairman of the Reception Committee; Dear Coms. Prakash Karat, General Secretary, Communist Party of India (Marxist); Debabrata Biswas, General Secretary, All India Forward Bloc; T.J. Chandrachoodan, General Secretary, Revolutionary Socialist Party; Esteemed guests from Communist Parties and Revolutionary Parties and Movements from abroad; Dear Com. Delegates, alternate delegates, veteran invitees and friends, I extend my revolutionary greetings to all of you who have gathered here for the 20th Congress of our party. I heartily welcome the leaders of the left parties who have so kindly come here to convey their fraternal greetings to our Congress. On behalf of the CPI leadership I warmly welcome the representatives of fraternal parties who have honoured us by responding to our invitation and have come a long way to attend the Congress. We greet People’s China, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos and Democratic Peoples’ Republic of Korea who are advancing towards building socialism in accordance with their specific conditions and characteristics. We hail the countries of Latin America, who have through theirstruggle and of their free will repudiated the US economic and political order, and are moving a new path of development and democratic progress. Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia are setting glorious examples in health and education fields and in active solidarity actions. We hail the election of the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Cyprus as the President of Cyprus — the first in Europe. Dear Comrades, The 20th Congress of our party is meeting at a very critical time in the country. We are watching with deep concern the government’s policies which step by step are leading to a close strategic partnership between India and the US. Our party along with other left parties have strongly opposed each of these steps. You will recall the large-scale naval exercise in the Bay of Bengal led by the US Navy, which was joined by ships of the Indian Navy. The Left vigorously acted against this, and roused the country against the imperialist design behind it. The much-debated Indo-US nuclear deal, is not just an innocent attempt to gain access to nuclear energy, but an attempt to cap the strategic partnership. The Hyde Act which governs this agreement contains a number of restrictive, intrusive and extraneous clauses that are derogatory to our sovereignty and the pursuit of an untrammeled and independent foreign policy. The government has recently negotiated an India-Specific Safeguards Agreement with the IAEA. This is on the agenda of our joint UPA-Left Committee, though we are not yet at grips with the substance of this agreement. But as we have often stated, we have no problems with the safeguards agreement. Our problem is with and our opposition is to the Indo-US nuclear agreement. The government is entering into huge deals with military-industrial complex in America for purchase of military hardware. India has also become a major buyer of military equipment from Israel — a military outpost of the US in the Middle East which enables it to carry on its aggressive designs against those countries, and indulge in its piratical attacks on Gaza and localities inhabited by Palestinians. India even helped to send an Israeli satellite into space for spying on Iran, justifying it as a commercial enterprise. The government is wilfully violating the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) which commits the UPA to pursue an independent foreign policy aimed at promoting multipolarity in world relations and opposing all attempts at unilateralism — which is what the US pursues. We want friendship with countries including America, but subservience to none. We realise that the US imperialism’s real plan is to impose its hegemony over the world. It has a grand design over Asia, which includes India as an ally. It selectively attacks countries, calling for ‘regime changes’ and targeting some Islamic countries on spurious and fake grounds. Its war on ‘global terrorism’ has generated more terrorists than eliminate them. After five years of the most destructive and genocidal war on Iraq it has failed to subdue the Iraqi people fighting for their liberation from American troops. We demand that the US troops must quit Iraq and Afghanistan. It must keep its hands off Iran. It must end its blockade of Cuba. Our party shall always hold high the banner of ‘anti-imperialism’ in our activities. Dear Comrades, In our immediate neighbourhoood in Pakistan, we are hopefully looking to the installation of a democratically-elected government. We hope that the peace processes and efforts to solve outstanding issues between our two countries would develop in a positive direction. We look forward to the successful holding of election to the Constituent Assembly in Nepal, which will pave the way for abolishing monarchy and declaring Nepal a democratic republic. Comrades, Turning our attention home, we must state that the economic situation despite all the hype about fast economic growth is grim for the common people. They are groaning under soaring prices of all essential commodities. The prices of all items — wheat, flour, rice, dal, edible oil, milk, eggs, vegetables — have sky-rocketed, causing great distress to the poor and even the middle class. Their household budget has gone awry. We have proposed banning ‘forward trading’ in all essential commodities. We have demanded that the Essential Commodities Act be amended and firmly implemented. Our most important demand is that the universal public distribution system should be restored. Foodgrain and pulses should be procured by government agencies giving MSP to our farmers, and stocks built up in government godowns and cuts in quotas supplied to states should be restored. Food for the people should be subsidised. We have opposed raising the price of petrol and diesel, and instead suggested that customs and excise on crude should be reduced. Only such steps can keep prices in check and ensure food security to our people. Peoples’ anger is growing and agitations are breaking out. We will organise militant movements to force the government to wake up and accede to these demands. Indian agriculture is going through a deep and chronic crisis. The farmer is caught in a pair of scissors with rising costs of inputs and un-remunerative prices for his produce. Bank credit has dried up and indebtedness has grown. The farmer is at the tender mercy of sahukars and mahajans. The most shocking symptom of this crisis is suicide by farmers. In the last 10 years, one-and-a-half lakh farmers have committed suicide. The remedy suggested by the authorities is worse than the disease. They are talking of corporate and contract farming, which will actually alienate the farmer from his land. The government has now announced a scheme of loan waiver. Better late than never. But the scheme is full of deficiencies. The limit of acreage proposed will keep large sections out, particularly in dry rain-fed areas. It is necessary to raise it. This loan waiver is only a one-time relief. It is necessary to seek a more abiding solution, such as making credit accessible and available at four per cent. The farmer is also facing attack in the form of largescale acquisition of agricultural land in the name of setting up Special Economic Zones (of which there are already 600), or for grandiose and unwanted projects. Large tracts of farmers’ land are being grabbed by big business houses actually for real estate purposes. Stiff resistance from farmers is meeting with stern repression by the state governments. We are with the farmers in their struggle for land. In fact land struggle is at the centre of our activity and movement in the countryside. Land with the government is not being distributed to the landless. Our party in Andhra has in recent months conducted a big campaign — occupying land in the hands of government or illegally occupied by landowners and distributing them to the landless for tilling or for house sites. We shall intensify this struggle in the coming days, both in Andhra and in other states. The government takes great credit for what it calls India’s fast economic growth. Actually this economic growth has been a bonanza for the private corporate sector. As the economy grew, the lion’s share flowed into the coffers of a small section at the top, leaving the vast mass of our people high and dry. Never has there been such a shocking disparity between the rich and the poor. We have islands of super prosperity and unprecedented concentration of economic resources and decision-making power in a vast ocean of hunger and poverty. India has now the dubious distinction of having four among the ten richest individuals in the planet, while at the other pole are the poor and vulnerable whose daily per capita consumption is less than Rs. 20 a day. They constitute about 78 per cent of our population, i.e., nearly 836 million. Bourgeois governments repeatedly speak of development. Development must mean growth with equity and justice. It must mean satisfaction of the basic needs of the people. The harsh reality is that high economic growth and social development are moving divergently. We cannot flaunt our nine per cent growth, and also sink down to the 128th position in the Human Development Index. Official talk about ‘inclusive growth’ mean nothing since there is no change contemplated in the present growth strategy dictated by neo-liberalism. What the country needs is a new strategy which is employment-friendly, people-friendly and bases itself on policies for poverty reduction, investments for health and education, as a matter of priority. What justification can there be for allowing MNCs and domestic big business to move into retail trade, and thereby displace 40 million families of retail traders who earn their livelihood by this trade? The struggle for protecting our public sector against moves for privatisation, for protecting and improving peoples’ livelihood against unemployment, against outsourcing and contract labour, against attacks on trade union rights, for laws on providing social security to unorganised workers, for a comprehensive legislation for agricultural labour shall always be our priority tasks. These are our class duties as the party of the working class, peasantry and other sections of the working masses. We, as Communists have also to take note of the problems of the deprived communities in our society and pay special attention to them. These are for instance the dalits, the adivasis and the minorities, especially the Muslims. We shall actively support the demand that reservation should be extended to the private sector, especially when moves for privatisation are afoot. An Act has been passed with active Left intervention to protect the rights of tribals and traditional forest dwellers in forests. We have to be vigilant and fight to ensure that the Act is implemented so as to benefit the tribals. We were always aware of the neglect and the discrimination against the Muslims. The Sachar Committee has brought out that the condition of the Muslim minority is in many aspects worse than the already recognised marginalised sections, especially in the matter of education and employment. We shall boldly champion the cause of the minorities, and fight for ensuring full implementation of the recommendations made in the Sachar Report. It is a healthy sign that gender issues are figuring prominently today on the national agenda. But though the UPA government is committed to bring in legislation for 33 per cent reservation for women in Parliament and state assemblies, there is resistance both from inside and outside UPA. The CPI, the Left and other democratic parties should mount pressure to ensure that this pledge is carried out within the life-time of this Parliament. Dear Comrades, Waiting in the wings is the BJP, and its allies. Bereft of any credible programme in the new situation, it has swung back to its old Hindutva slogans. It has seized upon the Sethu Project and given it a communal colour. Its hypocrisy, its double-talk and double-think are there for all to see. However, utilising all the failings of the UPA government and trying to exploit the popular discontent it is making a bid for power. It has already announced its prime minister-in-waiting and is holding a series of ‘Vijaya Sankalp’ rallies. The BJP is a right reactionary communal party. Anti-communism, contempt for democratic norms and fascistic violence from an integral part of its ideological and political baggage. This was seen in action just a few days back. Only common effort by all Left and secular-democratic forces can fight back this communal reactionary danger. We shall always hold high the banner of anti-communalism and for secular unity. Dear Comrades, The existence of democratically elected Left Front governments in three states and their success in repeated elections, the presence of a strong Left in Parliament shows, both the relevance and the strength of the Left in Indian politics. The latest resounding victory of the Left Front in Tripura shows the confidence that peoplehave on the Left. We have through our policies and actions generated support among large sections of the Indian people. At the same time we are acutely conscious of our weakness in large part of the country. Our party thinks it is time we should make every effort to build a left and democratic alternative to both the Congress and BJP rule through common struggles on people’s issues and by evolving an alternative left and democratic programme. There are other secular democratic parties and groups who are also looking for an alternative. We have to interact with them and try to draw them into common struggles for forging such a third alternative based on a Left and Democratic Programme. Present here today are the leaders of the left parties. We may sometime have little differences. But we are together on most issues affecting our country and our people. We have to further strengthen and consolidate this left unity, for that is the only way we can advance to build the third alternative, the left and democratic alternative in India. Long Live Left Unity. Long Live the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of India! Inquilab Zindabad.
Posted on: Mon, 24 Jun 2013 14:30:29 +0000
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