Given the Left’s considerable clout in the current government, it is but natural for a paper whose editor is a staunch Communist, to indulge in certain veiled exultation cloaked in respectable language. So, according to this piece, the Left is now torn between ideological compulsions and pragmatism, for:

Ideological purity can help create political parties, but is not a viable long-term electoral strategy.

What then, is a viable long-term electoral strategy? The following line may give a clue to it: I am of course, examining this from the commie, secular-Indian-press lenses.

But in case of the CPM, the disjunction between the views between the central high command and its state units has its source in one simple fact. The state units now have experience of government. Hence they understand the complexity of the economy they manage and have understood that ideological sabre-rattling is not a substitute for good governance.

And these super-intelligent souls took 30+ years to “understand” this basic fact? After blackening and blocking every genuine attempt at giving freedom–economic and political–the Communists are having a change of heart given their “experience in governance?” And what is the record of their governance? Later on this. The editorial cites West Bengal to bolster his/her claim of the Commies’ experience in governance. More so, its recent attempts at courting investment. Their doings over the decades have sent potential and existing investors and businessmen packing from West Bengal to friendlier states. Now, when they realize their coffers are empty, they want to reverse their stance, ideology be damned. What guarantee do they show to support their new-found investor-friendliness? How can they ensure that their Red comrades will not resort to strikes at the drop of a pin? In the event that they do ensure these, can they afford to antagonize the powerful labour unions on whose support they exist? It is widely known that West Bengal’s treasury has been repeatedly replenished by ample funds from the central government. However, their record of accountability for these funds is all but nil. The state’s PSUs have been little more than luxurious hangouts for the Comrades who show scorn for accountability, as Arun Shourie has clearly demonstrated.

Given this record, the editorial comes across as pretty presumptuous when it says that

It is not an accident that Buddhadeb Dasgupta and his finance minister, Asim Dasgupta, have emerged as amongst the more thoughtful voices on economic reform in the country. West Bengal is actively wooing foreign investment, encouraging privatisation, and is trying to make the case that appearing pro-business and being pro-poor is not incompatible.

I’ll mention again that the stuff about “encouraging privatisation” goes against their lovingly-held tenet that capitalists are bad. Also, their idea of equating pro-poorness with anti-richness is absolutely absurd. The rich have always been portrayed as evil: remember the saying, “behind every fortune there is a crime?” This automatically puts even honest well-to-do people on par with frauds and criminals of every hue. And gets them votes. Why do they always assume that all businessmen are out to exploit? Businessmen do exploit: land, labour, and capital. In the process (yeah, provided appropriate laws, rules, codes, etc are in place), they also make wealthy these very elements: a prosperous city (land) definitely is endowed with better roads and amenities, employees who work for these businessmen become wealthy in proportion to their abilities, and profits are ploughed back to generate more wealth. Basics of a business economy. Try drilling this into the Red Heads? For so many years, first under Stalin Nehru, and then under successive Congress governments (barring PVN to an extent), the Commies and their fellow-travellers seemed to think that money grows on trees. Their slogan of bettering the lot of the oppressed masses gave rise to the destructive syndrome of stealing from one class and giving it to the others. Tell me, what percentage of our rural population pays taxes, if at all it does? And out of the enormous sum collected mostly from the salaried and business class, how much is spent on bettering the lives of these honest men and women who endure the pollution, overcrowding and congestion of cities?

The editorial takes digs at the Central Politburo of the CPM while it completely tries to absolve the Commie government of West Bengal, to show that the “bad boys of the yore” have grown up and are cleaning their act. But I’m curious. Can the state units of the Communist parties act in a manner that the High Command disapproves? Does Sitaram Yechury or Surjeet Singh command more power than the West Bengal CM?

Or do I detect something more sinister, going by this editorial? Because West Bengal’s image has been tarnished pretty badly, the Commie relics at the New Delhi level will step up their hollering, thereby slowing down whatever growth India has achieved recently. And then, once the growth slows down sufficiently or (God forbid) to the same degree as West Bengal, their case would’ve been made: West Bengal would then be their “model state” to showcase their Red achievements.

Tags: Commentary, Indian Politics