Revisiting A. K. Roy

A. Excerpt from “The New Dalit Revolution” - A. K. Roy

20. There is always an over-simplified understanding of two postulations of Marx. First the developing nations see in the developed nations the image of their future. Secondly a system is not changed till all the scope of development of productive forces are exhausted in that. Even a socialist like Rosa Luxemburg wondered whether the October Revolution was not early as the world capitalism was yet to reach its dead end. But the history has told us that it is never repeated and nobody can take dip in a flowing river twice. The English Revolution of the seventeenth century was different from the French in the eighteenth and the October Revolution in Russia was qualitatively different from them both. The Revolution in China was again a great leap forward. The direction is always towards more radicalism. Any revolution in India would be even more radical both in form and concept. As belated capitalism is even more reactionary, a belated socialism is even more radical as a compressed system produces more work when the pressure is released in an orderly way.

21. Those in search of a proven technology in Revolution would be disappointed with Lenin when he warned that there was no such set formula, no handbook of revolution available in the archives of history. Lenin described Marxism thus:

“The Marxist doctrine is omnipotent because it is true. It is comprehensive and harmonious, provides men with an integral world outlook irreconcilable with any form of superstition, reaction or defence of bourgeois oppression. It is the legitimate successor to the best that man produced in the nineteenth century, as represented by German philosophy, English political economy and French socialism.”

And in the twentieth century Mao has added to it the best that was in the oriental culture, its humanism, tolerance and moral values, with science and compassion combined. According to Lenin again:

“All nations would arrive at socialism-This is inevitable, but all evil do .so in not exactly the same way, each will contribute something of its own to some form of democracy, to some variety of the dictatorship of the proletariat, varying rate of socialist transformation in the different aspects of social life.”

So Russia contributed 'soviet', China contributed 'commune' and Vietnam initiated revolution with the concept of ‘liberated area’. The Indian revolutionary also must create their models whereever they could assert whether in a village, panchayat, state or even in their own life making an example before all through struggle and creative work through which the demoralised millions, living in despair may see their liberated future even for a moment.

22. According to Marx, ‘violent outbursts take place sooner in the extremities of the bourgeois organism than the heart, because here regulation is more possible.” Russia was the

extremities of the world capitalism where the chain was snapped and today Asia, Africa and Latin America are the same where the

violent outbursts are the order of the day. This is also true in a country like India where the revolution would follow the pattern of periphery to the center and not the center to the periphery as has been attempted so long. The feudal and backward regions of India around the metropolis are the periphery where the revolutionaries should concentrate. In this respect the Naxalites first made the correct move but could not succeed as they could not assess the tremendous drag of the social phenomenon, neglected completely the question of Indian nationalities and what is more they had no constructive model to offer.

23. Revolution is never a negative politics. It is not the politics of the opposition but the politics of the alternative. It is not the politics of merely a new party, it is the politics of a new class. The revolutionaries are the greatest creator of history. We call upon all the Marxists and revolutionary communists to make an honest introspection and speak out, look to the ground before looking to the sky. Anticus could not be defeated by Hercules as the Greek leend said had he not been separated from the ground. The communists are the sons of the soil and toil combined. Dalit Revolution starts even from behind. It begins with injecting the hunger for rights. But starting from one step back it leaps two steps forward. It is a march to discover the might of the million and the moral needed to transform the society. We call upon the working people, the dalits to take the path of New Dalit Revolution with liberation, socialism and cultural revolution to emerge as the new political force to storm all the bondages, social, economic and political and to lead the country out of the perennial crisis which the ruling class has thrusted on this great land.  

B. Excerpt from “On Party's Political Tactics” - Vinod Mishra, Liberation, 1991

Our experience in Karbi Anglong, at a very small level though, in combining the question of tribal autonomy with economic and social transformation of the society itself is worth mentioning here in some detail.

ASDC, a common front of communists from among the same nationality and the democratic elements of the nationality movement, emerged through a popular mass movement. The movement was directed against the corrupt rule of the Congress(I)-controlled district council. Incidentally, the Congress there, too, champions the cause of an autonomous state. The movement, from the very beginning, had an element of class struggle in it, comprising primarily the broad majority of landless, poor and middle peasants pitted against mahajans, landlords and other reactionary elements patronised by the Congress(I). The reactionaries, too, in the majority of cases, belonged to the same nationality. The movement was led by the communist elements who received communist education under the overall impact of ML movement and later translated it into the Karbi movement and not vice-versa. Elections to the district council were won amidst the rising flames of powerful and militant mass movements, where victory over the reactionary elements was first won in the social arena. Since then, efforts have been going on to deepen mass work, enhance the democratic values and sharpen the class struggle. Free from chauvinistic overtones, ASDC has extended its influence over other national minorities, brought about a polarisation among Biharis and draws support from sections of Bengali and Assamese people of the region.

In our Party's tactics, ASDC is sought to be used as a launching pad to provide a revolutionary democratic orientation to the other tribal autonomy movements of Assam and North-East and for democratic restructuring of the Assamese society itself instead of just remaining confined to the district council. It is this full-fledged political role of the ASDC and its ever-increasing influence over the other sections of the people and other regions which provides it a distinctive feature.

The question naturally arises in the light of the experiences in Karbi Anglong as to whether we should make a fresh appraisal of our tactics towards Jharkhand, Uttarakhand and other such movements.

Comrade A.K. Roy was mistaken when he thought that Jharkhand, the state of tribals, whose society contains the features of primitive communism, would itself transform into a Lalkhand. In the process he could only give birth to a primitive bourgeois Sibu Soren.

The point is to transform the Jharkhand movement into a Lalkhand and that can only be done by developing the elements of class struggle in the Jharkhandi society and uniting with the democratic elements against the reactionary elements within JMM. Only a strong communist party, having a strong communist group among Jharkhandis, can successfully pursue this tactics.

JMM itself has been toning down its demand for a Jharkhand state, to a state confined to the Bihar districts only and then again to some sort of autonomous region within Bihar. It is divided among powerful sections differing in their attitudes towards the political forces and towards the contradictions in Jharkhandi society. Our Party's influence too has been growing in the area and we are now placed in a better position to take up the policy of active intervention which does not rule out temporary alliance with JMM or factions within it.

Courtesy:

1. https://otheraspect.org/2014/09/27/new-dalit-revolution-a-draft-for-debate/#more-884

2. https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mishra/1991/10/x01.htm

[Note: The above excerpts are meant to incite inquisition among the readers. ‘The Diligent’ neither rejects nor accepts either views.]