Introduction
In this age revisionism is
counter-revolutionary ideology. That is why the inner-party struggle—the
struggle between revolutionary ideology and counter-revolutionary
ideology—will continue. “Unity, struggle, unity” this means that
counter-revolutionary revisionism must be fought and defeated. Only then
unity is possible but that unity is not lasting. New contradictions
will arise, revisionism will try to appear in new forms. That is why
struggle has to be waged at a new level… The Party will develop through
constant struggles both against the enemy outside and against alien
trends within. Through these struggles the Party will grow in strength,
act as the vanguard of the revolution in order to serve the people,
transform itself and transform the whole society.
Readers familiar with the world
situation and the situation of the domestic politics today would know
very well that the International Communist Movement (ICM) and the
communist revolutionary movement in India is in a state of setbacks, and
severe crisis plagues it from within. Amid the ideological, political
and military attacks of the enemies from all sides, there has arisen a
section within the Indian revolutionary movement that seeks to betray
the interests of the exploited and oppressed Indian people, destroy the
communist party, dissolve the people’s army and surrender itself to the
Indian state. The charades are all nauseatingly the same. The Indian
state parades them around like trophies, and they give interviews to the
media talking about how they have finally seen the light of truth about
the futility of armed struggle and Protracted People’s War, and finally
embraced the constitution to “serve the people”. Such enlightened men!
The names are many — Balraj, Sonu, Devuji — all mere faces of the
Opportunist-Liquidationist-Revisionist (OLR) camp. The disease, however,
runs much deeper.
The OLR forces seek to subvert the
movement from within, render it toothless in the face of the enemy’s
attacks, and divert the people from the goal of revolution and
emancipation. Comrade Lenin fought ruthlessly against the opportunists,
liquidationists and revisionists of his time, both in Russia and
internationally. Comrade Mao carried on that struggle within the CPC and
then on an international scale through the Great Debate with the modern
revisionist social-imperialist clique that restored capitalism in the
USSR. This calls on us “foolish old men” who still dare to dream of
“moving mountains”, of a world free of exploitation and oppression, to
continue the struggle carried out by our great teachers. For the
communist movement to advance, it must get rid of the OLR muck holding
it back, and that struggle is continuous and never ending, for
revisionism is like the Hydra of Ancient Greek mythology — if you cut
off its head, a couple more grow to take its place.
The history of the desire and
struggle for emancipation from exploitation and oppression is as old as
exploitation and oppression itself. Ever since human society has been
divided into classes, these classes have struggled between themselves
and this class struggle has been the driving force of history. Spartacus
in times of slavery and Thomas Münzer in times of feudalism, went down
into the annals of history as great men who led armies of rebels to
overthrow the exploitative social orders of their times. But despite
their great struggles, this task remained incomplete as, throughout
history, one exploitative social order has only been replaced by
another, specific forms of class society were overthrown but classes
themselves remained. The Communist programme for liberation of humanity
from the clutches of class society, from all forms of exploitation and
oppression, is therefore a culmination of the oppressed peoples’ long
yearning for freedom from exploitation and oppression. It is only the
Communist programme that is also capable of overcoming the
contradictions of these previous liberation struggles. Indeed, “Communism is the riddle of history solved and it knows itself to be the answer.”2
Therefore, it is only obvious that
the bourgeoisie finding its heaven of liberty, equality and fraternity
being threatened by the earthly demand for real liberty and freedom,
would try its utmost to render this movement incapable of achieving its
goals. Thus it corrupts a section within the revolutionary movement
directly through bribery, promises for a better life, etc. or indirectly
through helping germinate the existing seeds of non-proletarian class
trends and ideologies within these people.3
The key link in the chain of Opportunism-Liquidationism-Revisionism is
the tendency of liquidationism. Liquidationism is the line promoting the
dissolution of the communist party, the only party capable of leading
the proletariat and all oppressed and exploited masses to realise
communism. The liquidationist does this by the “renunciation of the
underground”.4
Lenin had pointed out during the
inner-party struggles of the Bolshevik party that it is only a core of
professional revolutionaries — communists who have dedicated the entire
purpose and objective of their life to the revolution and liberation of
the oppressed — staying clandestine, leading the communist party and the
revolution by masterfully combining the illegal and legal work, that
can guarantee the success of the revolution.5
Why is this so, the reader might ask? Would not the communist party be
cut off from the masses if their structures are hidden off, if their
members do not openly participate in mass movements? To this Lenin
answers: “It is obvious to all that contact with the masses has been
maintained only by those who have not renounced the past and who know
how to make use of ‘open work’ and of all and sundry ‘possibilities’ …
for the purpose of strengthening, consolidating and developing” the
underground organization.”6
What Lenin is arguing for here is that the communist party maintains
its connection with the masses not by dissolving itself into open legal
activity, but by preserving its clandestine organisation and utilising
every legal opportunity to strengthen that organisation. Open work is
important, but its significance lies in it being a means to extend the
party’s influence among the masses, politicising the masses and drawing
its ranks from among the masses, consolidating the underground apparatus
that can survive repression, and provide leadership to the
revolutionary movement.
So why should a communist party be
clandestine? We must begin from the basic fact that no exploiting class
in history has ever given up exploitation through persuasion. The basic
essence, the central question, of every revolution is the seizure of
political power.7
Class struggle, in its final sense, is the struggle between classes for
political power, for political power is nothing but a means required
for a class to transform or shape society according to its class
interests. But no class will peacefully give up its monopoly over
controlling the society. Therefore, this recognition of seizure of
political power must also extend to the fact that this seizure is only
possible through war.8
