The Communist Party of India (Marxist) ( CPI(M)) is a Marxist–Leninist political party in India. It is the largest communist party in India in terms of membership and electoral seats, and one of the six national parties of India. The party was founded through a splitting from the Communist Party of India in 1964; the CPI(M) quickly became the dominant faction.
The 34 years of CPI(M)-led Left Front rule in West Bengal was the longest-serving democratically elected communist-led government in the world. It emerged as the third-largest party of the parliament in the 2004 national election. Currently, CPI(M) has representation in the legislative assemblies of eight states.
The All-India Party Congress is the supreme authority of the CPI(M). However, during the time between two party congresses, the Central Committee is the highest decision-making body. The Central Committee shall elect from among its members a Polit Bureau including the General Secretary. The Polit Bureau carries on the work of the Central Committee between its two sessions and has the right to take political and organisational decisions in between two meetings of the Central Committee.
CPI(M) had a total income of ₹1.62 billion in fiscal year 2021–22. The party reported zero funding from electoral bonds.
Name CPI(M) is officially known as in Hindi, but it is often known as , abbreviated MaKaPa, in press and media circles. During its initial years after the split, the party was often referred to by different names such as 'Left Communist Party' or 'Communist Party of India (Left)'. The party has used the name 'Left' because CPI people were dubbed 'rightist' in nature for their support of the Congress-Nehru regime. During the Kerala Legislative Assembly elections of 1965, the party adopted the name 'Communist Party of India (Marxist)'. It also applied to obtain its election symbol from the Election Commission of India..
Background
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) emerged from a division within the Communist Party of India. The CPI had experienced an upsurge in support during the years following the World War II; it had also led armed rebellions in Telangana, Tripura, and Kerala. However, it soon abandoned the strategy of armed revolution in favor of working within the Parliament framework. In 1950, B. T. Ranadive, the CPI general secretary and a prominent representative of the radical sector inside the party, was demoted on grounds of left-adventurism.
Under the government of the Indian National Congress party of Jawaharlal Nehru, independent India developed close relations and a strategic partnership with the Soviet Union. The Soviet government consequently wished that the Indian communists moderate their criticism towards the Indian state and assume a supportive role towards the Congress governments. However, large sections of the CPI claimed that India remained a semi-feudal country and that class conflict could not be put on the back-burner for the sake of guarding the interests of Soviet trade and foreign policy. Moreover, the Indian National Congress appeared to be generally hostile towards political competition. In 1959 the central government intervened to impose President's rule in Kerala, toppling the E. M. S. Namboodiripad cabinet (the sole non-Congress state government in the country).
History
Formation (1964)
The basis of difference in opinion between the two factions in CPI was ideological—about the assessment of the Indian scenario and the development of a party programme. This difference in opinion was also a reflection of whether the Communist Party in India would toe the line of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) or follow an independent path based on the concrete analysis of the Indian situation. The alleged 'right-wing' inside the party followed the Soviet path whereas the 'left-wing' wanted to follow the mass party with a class line with national characteristics, based on the 'independent' development of socialism in accordance to the India situation. Moreover, the faction of CPI which later became CPI(M) referred to the "right" strategy as a national approach of class collaboration; this was a damning charge within the communist movement, in which the prioritization of working-class interests and independence is considered paramount. Ideological difference also grew on the analysis of the role and character of the Indian bourgeoisie and the character of the Indian revolution. While the 'right wing' in the party sought the Indian bourgeoisie to have a 'progressive' character and called for a national democratic revolution, the 'left wing' sought the character of the Indian bourgeoisie to be essentially reactionary and called for a peoples' democratic revolution. However, as the 'left wing' grew, the Congress and the party's 'right wing' dubbed them as pro-Chinese and essentially made extensive efforts to incriminate them of committing 'anti-national' activities. This ideological difference later intensified, and ultimately gave rise to the establishment of CPI(M).
Hundreds of CPI leaders, accused of being pro-Chinese, were imprisoned. Thousands of Communists were detained without trial. The CPI(M) has a strong history of championing labour rightshttps://indianapolitics.in/communist-party-of-india-marxist-deals/ workers' welfare and it supports the rights of industrial labourers, demanding fair wages, safe working conditions, and the right to unionize.
In 1962, Ajoy Ghosh, the General Secretary of the CPI died. After his death, Shripad Amrit Dange was installed as the party chairman (a new position) and E.M.S. Namboodiripad as general secretary. This was an attempt to achieve a compromise.
At a CPI National Council meeting held on 11 April 1964, 32 Council members walked out.
The leftist section, to which the 32 National Council members belonged, organized a convention in Tenali, Andhra Pradesh 7 to 11 July. In this convention, the issues of the internal disputes in the party were discussed. 146 delegates, claiming to represent 100,000 CPI members, took part in the proceedings. The convention decided to convene the 7th Party Congress of CPI in Calcutta later the same year..
Marking a difference from the official sector of CPI, the Tenali convention was marked by the display of a large portrait of the Communist leader of China, Mao Zedong.
At the Tenali convention, a Bengal-based pro-Chinese group, representing one of the most radical streams of the CPI left-wing, presented a draft programme proposal of their own. These radicals criticized the draft programme proposal prepared by Makineni Basavapunnaiah for undermining class conflict and failing to take a clear pro-Chinese position in the ideological conflict between the CPSU and the CPC.
After the Tenali convention, the CPI left-wing organized party district and state conferences. In West Bengal, a few of these meetings became battlegrounds between the most radical elements and the more moderate leadership. At the Calcutta Party District Conference, an alternative draft programme was presented to the leadership by Parimal Das Gupta (a leading figure amongst far-left intellectuals in the party). Another alternative proposal was brought forward to the Calcutta Party District Conference by Aziz ul Haq, but Haq was initially banned from presenting it by the conference organizers. At the Calcutta Party District Conference, 42 delegates opposed M. Basavapunniah's official draft programme proposal.
At the Siliguri Party District Conference, the main draft proposal for a party programme was accepted; some additional points suggested by the far-left North Bengal cadre Charu Majumdar were added. However, Hare Krishna Konar (representing the leadership of the CPI left-wing) forbade the raising of the slogan Mao Tse-Tung Zindabad (Long live Mao Tse-Tung) at the conference.
Parimal Das Gupta's document was also presented to the leadership at the West Bengal State Conference of the CPI leftwing. Das Gupta and a few others spoke at the conference, demanding the party ought to adopt the class analysis of the Indian state of the 1951 CPI conference. His proposal was, however, voted down..
The Calcutta Congress was held between 31 October and 7 November, at Tyagraja Hall in southern Calcutta. Simultaneously, the CPI convened a Party Congress in Bombay. The group which assembled in Calcutta would later adopt the name 'Communist Party of India (Marxist)', to differentiate themselves from the CPI. The CPI(M) also adopted its own political programme. Puchalapalli Sundarayya was elected general secretary of the party.
In total, 422 delegates took part in the Calcutta Congress. CPI(M) claimed that they represented 104,421 CPI members; this is 60% of the total party membership.
At the Calcutta conference, the party adopted a class analysis of the character of the Indian state, that claimed the Indian bourgeoisie was increasingly collaborating with imperialism..
Parimal Das Gupta's alternative draft programme was not circulated at the Calcutta conference. However, Souren Bose, a delegate from the far-left stronghold Darjeeling, spoke at the conference asking why no portrait had been raised of Mao Tse-Tung along with the portraits of other communist stalwarts. His intervention was met with huge applause from conference delegates.
Early years (1964–1966) The CPI (M) was born into a hostile political climate. At the time of the holding of its Calcutta Congress, large sections of its leaders and cadres were jailed without trial. Again on 29–30 December, over a thousand CPI (M) cadres were arrested and detained and held in jail without trial. In 1965, new waves of arrests of CPI(M) cadres took place in West Bengal, as the party launched agitations against the rise in fares in the Calcutta Tramways Company and against the then-prevailing food crisis. Statewide general strikes and hartals were observed on 5 August 1965, 10–11 March 1966, and 6 April 1966. The March 1966 general strike resulted in several deaths during confrontations with police forces.
Also in Kerala, mass arrests of CPI(M) cadres were carried out during 1965. In Bihar, the party called for a Bandh (general strike) in Patna on 9 August 1965 in protest against the Congress state government. During the strike, police resorted to violent actions against the organizers of the strike. The strike was followed by agitations in other parts of the state.
P. Sundaraiah, after being released from jail, spent the period of September 1965 to February 1966 in Moscow for medical treatment. In Moscow, he also held talks with the CPSU..
The Central Committee of CPI(M) held its first meeting on 12–19 June 1966. The reason for delaying the holding of a regular CC meeting was that several of the persons elected as CC members at the Calcutta Congress were jailed at the time. A CC meeting had been scheduled to have been held in Thrissur during the last days of 1964, but had been canceled due to the wave of arrests against the party. The meeting discussed tactics for electoral alliances and concluded that the party should seek to form a broad electoral alliance with all non-reactionary opposition parties in West Bengal (i.e. all parties except Bharatiya Jana Sangh and Swatantra Party). This decision was strongly criticized by the Communist Party of China (CPC), the Party of Labour of Albania, the Communist Party of New Zealand, and the radicals within the party itself. The line was changed at a National Council meeting in Jalandhar in October 1966, where it was decided that the party should only form alliances with select left parties..
Naxalbari uprising (1967)