Volume 3, No. 7, July 2002

These stinging remarks against the revisionists and the Right opportunists in the ML movement were made by none other than Kondapalli Seetharamayya, a one-time vetaran revolutionary leader who rebuilt the CPI(ML) in Andhra Pradesh after the severe setback to the movement in the entire country following the martyrdom of Com. CM in 1972. But ironically, his death on April12 brought more grief to these very opportunists than anyone else. All the veterans of the revisionist camp were present at his funeral two days later and expressed their heart-felt condolences at his death describing it as a great loss to the communist movement. There was BV Raghavulu, the state secretary of the CPI)M); Suravaram Sudhakar Reddy, the state secretary of the CPI; leaders of some so-called ML parties, and even important state leaders of the Samata Party of ex-socialist—turned—social-fascist and presently the most vociferous spokesman of the Indian expansionist ruling classes, Union Defence Minister George Fernandes. There were, of course, some revolutionary well-wishers too at the funeral especially those who knew KS closely when he led the revolutionary movement for over two decades prior to 1991.

But what was glaringly conspicuous in the 1000-odd crowd (barring a few revolutionary well-wishers) that attended the funeral was the absence of the revolutionary masses whom he once led and inspired into revolutionary action. It was indeed a sad—one would rather say, a tragi-comic —end for a man who had established the CPI(ML)[People’s War] 22 years ago on April 22, 1980; led it through several ups and downs; and transformed it into a formidable force starting literally from scratch after the setback of Srikakulam struggle in the early 1970s.

In sharp contrast, the death of even a local Party organizer or mass organization activist, or a civil liberties activist brings thousands of people to the funeral processions despite the severest restrictions and threats issued by the police to the people not to attend the funeral rallies of those associated with the banned Party.

Why is it that a Subhash, a Ramakant, a Dr. Narayan, or a Purushotham inspires and draws tens of thousands of people even in their death but the passing away of a veteran revolutionary of the 1970s and 1980s passes away as a non-event unnoticed by the masses? Why is it that the death of a Shyam, a Mahesh, and a Murali brings tears in the eyes of millions of revolutionary masses while that of a KS, who himself had trained up such leaders, is mourned only by a handful of people and even by the revisionists? How could a man who had been a veritable challenge to the ruling classes until the beginning of the 90s, become so irrelevant to the revolutionary masses of AP in so short a time? To answer this, one has to go into the dialectics of the rise and fall of KS, the transformation of a revolutionary into a non-revolutionary, the dialectical relationship between great personalities and the movement.

The life and death of KS is a living example of how a person who lives as a great revolutionary for the most part of one’s life, can turn into its opposite if he/she fails to be modest, fails to learn from the cadres and the masses, becomes complacent with one’s own limited experience and knowledge, and fails to grow in accordance with the requirements of the movement. The long political life of KS offers both positive and negative lessons for the revolutionaries. Though KS had become irrelevant for the masses and the revolutionary movement in the country today, it is necessary for the revolutionaries to undertake an evaluation of his political life in order to derive important lessons regarding the making and unmaking of a revolutionary.

As Com. Mao said: It is easy for a person to be a revolutionary communist for sometime; but it is a hard thing for one to be a revolutionary communist all one’s life. Thus the real test for a communist revolutionary is just not how he/she lives the life of a communist most of one’s life but how he/she lives and dies as a communist. KS lived the life of a Communist revolutionary for the most part of his life but all his achievements and recognition among the masses came to naught when he turned into a non-communist towards the fag-end of his long revolutionary career.

We have heard of a Plekhanov and a Karl Kautsky in the history of the international communist movement—great figures who had inspired millions of people and guided the Communist Parties in the initial years but who turned into revisionists and even into renegades as the revolutions advanced. Now we have such a Plekhanov or a Kautsky right in front of our eyes.

Like Plekhanov before 1905 and Kautsky prior to 1912, KS too was a great revolutionary until 1991. The revolutionary qualities that he exhibited until that period—such as concrete analysis of concrete conditions, adherence to revolutionary mass line, revolutionary vigilance, uncompromising struggle against revisionism and Right opportunism, etc., are qualities that should be emulated by all revolutionaries. At a time when the revolution in India received a severe jolt with the defeat of the Naxalbari-Srikakulam and other armed agrarian movements; when the Central Committee itself went out of existence following the martyrdom of comrade Charu Majumdar; when some important leaders like SN Singh, Kanu Sanyal, Nagabhushan Patnaik and others were vomiting venom against Comrade CM and negating all the achievements of CPI(ML); when Right opportunism was ruling the roost and the movement was being betrayed, KS was among the few revolutionaries who defended Naxalbari and the revolutionary line of the Party and enriched it further by correctly summing up the past and drawing appropriate lessons. This summing up document known as the ‘Self-critical Report’ is still the only document that objectively sums up the movement of the late 60s and the early 70s.

It was based on the lessons drawn from this self-critical evaluation that the AP state committee led by KS rebuilt the movement and established the CPI(ML)[People’s War] in 1980. The Party and the movement soon spread to several states acquiring an All India character. KS waged an ideological-political struggle against the Right opportunist line of T Nagi Reddy—CP Reddy—DV Rao group in AP and the SNS group during the 1970s and 1980s, and the Liberation group during the 1980s. While Right danger was identified as the main danger in the ML movement after the set-back, the Left Adventurist line which still had a considerable influence in the Party in AP during the 1970s was correctly identified and efforts were made to bring the Party on to the correct track of revolutionary mass line. It was based on this line that a state-wide mass movement and an armed agrarian movement in parts of North Telangana was built by the late 70’s that soon spread to entire Telangana, Dandakaranya and other parts of AP. Building the movement in North Telangana and Dandakaranya with the vision of developing the strategic regions into guerrilla zones with the long-term perspective of establishing Base Areas goes to the credit of KS. KS trained up an entire generation of professional revolutionaries and Party organizers. He also moulded his family members as sympathizers of the revolutionary movement and lost his son, Chandrasekhar, in police firing in 1969.

However, the political and organizational limitations began to show up after 1987 when he was afflicted with Parkinson’s disease. From late 1980s, he was unable to grasp the dialectics of the movement, failed to grapple with the complex and manifold tasks of revolution and fell behind the movement. But though he failed to give political, organizational and military guidance to the Party in accordance with the growing requirements of the movement, he refused to acknowledge it and became increasingly bureaucratic. As a result, he became a hurdle to collective functioning in the AP state committee and the COC which was formed in August 1990. A small opportunist coterie of careerists rallied around him. The members of this coterie—Prasad, Bandayya, Venu and a few others—formed into a liquidationist anarchist clique who placed personal interests before the interests of revolution. Basking in the aura of KS, they unleashed a vilification campaign against the Party leadership in AP and indulged in anti-Party activities. Instead of disassociating himself from this bunch of anarchists, KS defended them and he himself began to indulge in anti-Party activities by 1991. By mid-1992, KS and the opportunist-disruptionist gang that he led were expelled from the Party. A Right Deviation too developed in KS at this stage.

Thus although KS continued as a revolutionary until 1991, bureaucratic trend became dominant in him after 1987; he grew conceited by seeing the successes of the Party and the fame he himself had attained; failed to see the relationship between the leader and the cadres, abandoned the revolutionary mass line, and like a petty bourgeois egoist, fell under the delusion that the movement owed its success to his genius. He abandoned collective functioning and placed himself above the committee of which he was the secretary. He displayed extreme intolerance to any criticism placed on him by the committee members and other cadres and adopted a completely individual style of functioning. By 1991, he turned into his opposite leaving no other option before the Party leadership than to expel him from the very Party in whose rebuilding he played an instrumental role.

Thus for the Party and the revolutionary masses, KS was politically dead long ago—in 1991 itself, and hence his physical death on April 12, 2002 became an irrelevant episode.

In the past one decade, the practice of KS and the bunch of anarchists who were either expelled or left the Party in the name of political differences, vindicates the assessment made by the PW leadership while expelling them. That the leaders who came together to form the anti-Party group had no common bond other than careerist pursuits (and blind, feudal loyalty towards KS in the case of some) was proved soon when they squabbled among themselves and split up. None of them did any revolutionary work on their own; some turned into businessmen, some became the henchmen for the ruling TDP, while KS led a lonely, desolate life. For most of the time he was ill, lost his mental faculties, made incoherent statements in the Press that only revealed the loss of all critical mental faculties. But for a brief period of two years in prison he spent the rest of his last days with his family members and leaders of the revisionist CPI and had no connection with the revolutionary movement in any manner. It should, however, be mentioned that KS did not also indulge in any malicious campaign against the Party and he harboured the illusion that all the so-called Left parties and the Maoists should unite into a single party.

Initially, the media tried to prove that with the expulsion of KS the Party became extremely weak and its very survival was at stake. It prophesied that in the absence of such a leader as KS the Party would soon disintegrate and the movement would suffer a severe set-back. But the dialectics of development of a revolutionary Party belied all their expectations; the Party emerged stronger than before, collective leadership came into operation at all levels particularly at the central level for the first time after the formation of the CPI(ML) in 1969, the Party became further consolidated, the movement in the guerilla zones of NT, DK, AOB, and in other parts of AP gained depth and soon spread to several states acquiring an All India character for the first time after the setback in the early 70’s. The All India Special Conference of erstwhile PW in 1995 had consolidated the Party further and following the merger with CPI(ML)[Party Unity] in August 1998, the unification of the forces belonging to the revolutionary stream of CPI(ML) was basically completed. The Party had shed the provincial character it had at the time of KS and established fraternal relations with the ML forces both inside the country and abroad. Overall, the Party has made significant advances in all fronts after 1992 despite the heaviest losses in terms of leadership at various levels during this period. The historic 9th Congress held in March 2001 marks a qualitative leap in the process of advance of people’s war in India.

The KS episode demonstrated once again the dialectical relationship between great leaders and the movement; it proved that no leader, however great his/her contribution and genius may be, can guide the Party and the movement once he/she is divorced from the movement, fails to develop in accordance with the requirements of the movement, grows conceited and dizzy with the successes achieved, and places oneself above the Party. The revolutionary movement has its own dialectics; it does not stop with the betrayals by its leaders and throws up new leaders as long as the Party adheres to the correct line and does not deviate from class struggle.

Marxist-Leninists should always adhere to the method of objective analysis, of assessing movements and individuals historically. In assessing the role of KS, the fact of his degeneration after 1991 should not prejudice the revolutionaries from acknowledging the great and positive contributions that he had rendered to the Indian communist movement over a long period prior to 1991. His role in pre-1991 and post-1991 periods should be historically assessed. That is the only correct method. It is indeed a tragedy that the death of a man who will be remembered for his great contribution to the Indian revolution passed off as a non-event.

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