The story is utterly misconceived.One, BTR never supported Chinese line.Neither Bardhan nor Doraiswamy was a leader of national stature during the split. Even presently, Gurudas Dasgupta is much more known as a national leader.Third, Hannan Mollah? He is a leader of CPI(M)'s farm labour front AIAWU which doesn't have a set up in the state, even after 23 years of existence.
Facts speak for themselves 1.LF lead Bengal's industrial decline 2. The bullet was chosen over the ballot in land reforms -- what Biswas calls revolutionary terrorism, ask those who survived 3.Messed up language teaching 4. Spearheaded urban Bengal's decline 4. Unable to control it's own cadres. 5. Buddha admits these were all 'mistakes' and wont be repeated. 6. Mass exodus of educated Bengalis abroad or to the rest of India. Slowly coming back because of the private sector IT opportunities (not CPM). This is the reality.
Though the writer seems to be a little biased and i believe everything in left front is not bad. But look at the history with current gloabalzation left front is the only party who oppose all sort of globalization. Russia failed, west bengal is also failing (WB only have govt. offices. all industries are shutdown because of influence of politics within those orgs.). When world goes for globalization and world is becoming small you cannot be not part of it. China's left front policies definitely worked. No harm redefining policies and become competitive. No one is perfect!! I guess Lenin also knew!! :))
Nothing matters cause lifestyle or life of ours will not change cause we dont want to be part of the new age. Good luck!!
Since Mrs Gandhi and Congress have scripted a massive victory, the hatred and disgust is palpable among many rediff columnists and commentetors. It is expressed as sneer towards congress and it's allies. Probably common people in India know about Left front and it's agenda better than Rediff and it's special brand of readers and the special ineterst they represent.
The writer has made obvious his contempt for leftists and total ignorance of reality. We readers expect objective judgements. Thanks to the left parties, the nation has been discussing economic and social issues over the past one week and not matters like destroying and building places of worship, dividing people on the basis of religion and forcing certain eating habits on 100 crore people.
The problem with most of these puerile analytical pieces is that these are written by those who have too many axes to grind as far as the Left is concerned. The header is misleading. Perhaps you ought to change it to "What SF Ashraf thinks of the Left". Some cases in point:
(i) The author has conveniently not mentioned the fact that it was this same CPI(M) which attuned its revolutionary fervour with the country's democratic fabric. The CPI(M) opted for the ballot to the bullet. India is the only country where these Communists have come to poweer and stayed in power because of the ballot, and not the bullet.
(ii) The author has not mentioned Tripura in his list of the states where the Left is in power. The Left has been in poweer there practically since the time that it captured Writers Building in West Bengal. The only interregnum was when the Congress made the best of the President's Rule in the state in the late Eighties.
(iii) It is only Ashraf's view that political analysts believed Mamata would have trounced the Left in 2002. Anti-Left analysts had HOPED the Left would lose, not BELIEVED.
I don't agree with the author written about the reasons for CPI(M) not joining the government now. He feels that it is a golden opportunity, but not so. If CPI(M) joins the ministry, it would be a total failure as it is difficult to muster opinion in favour of the decisions in the parliament, as majorityof the MPs are against the principles and policies of CIPM. The majority opinion in a democracy has to be taken into account and in such case, the very ideological principle to which the CPIM members are wedded can not be implemented. Therefore, the minority members of CPIM in the parliament can not change the opinion as there are clear evidence that big tycoons from national as well international levels have access to the policies of the Government. Hence, I fully agree with the CPIM for not joining the ministry. It is right on their part to give support from outside. I am sure, the CPIM & other left parties will give full support to the Congress and prevent BJP coming back to power.
