proletariat should not go away from their demo-
cratic allies. Yet, this is precisely what the Labour
Party will ask the proletariat to do.



U



114 THE FUTURE OF

Chapter XV. The People's Party and the
Proletariat

The people's fight for freedom must be led by the
party of the people — a party organisation which
will be broad enough for all the forces of national
revolution. The proletariat will be in it, but it will
not be a proletarian party, nominally or essentially.
In this party the proletariat will stand side by side
with the petty bourgeois and peasant masses, as the
most advanced democratic class. The petty bour-
geoisie, disillusioned by the treachery of capitalist
Nationalism, are gravitating towards the formation
of a revolutionary political organisation to carry the
fight for freedom further. But the petty bour-
geoisie are incapable of independent political action.
Their revolutionary discontent often deviates into
the futile channels of conspirative terrorism. The
decline of bourgeois Nationalism has given a new
impetus to the terrorist organisations. At the same
time, the tendency of ** going to the masses *' is
gaining ground among the Nationalist intellectuals
of advanced views. This tendency has of late mani-
fested itself in attempts to form revolutionary poli-
tical organisations, essentially Nationalist, but
nominally proletarian or peasant. Naturally, this
new orientation towards the working masses is
either Utopian or very superficial — not based on a
thorough grasp of the situation. Nevertheless, it
is evident that the petty bourgeois intellectuals are
feeling^ their *' way to the masses.'' They are
beginning to understand that the revolutionary
fight for national freedom cannot be organised with-
put the active participation of the working masses,



INDIAN POLITICS 115

and that the latter cannot be rallied under the
banner of freedom unless the movement for that
freedom is based on a revolutionary democratic pro-
gramme reflecting the interests of the oppressed
classes. This radicalisation of their social outlook
will not lead the petty bourgeois intellectuals
straight inside the ranks of a proletarian party.
Nor is it desirable that the party of the proletariat
should be flooded with non-proletarian elements,
even though they take on a Socialist or Communist
complexion. The radicalisation of the petty bour-
geois intellectuals — the search for the way to the
masses — indicates differentiation in the ranks of
bourgeois Nationalism. The political consequences
of this differentiation will be the organisation of a
petty bourgeois Nationalist Party with the pro-
gramme of a fight to the finish against Imperialist
domination and of democratic republicanism. The
crystallisation of forces in this direction is not only
to be noticed in the petty bourgeois ranks of the
National Congress, but also in the Left Wing of the
Swaraj Party. The consciously bourgeois leaders
of the Congress as well as of the Swaraj Party have
all along suppressed this revolutionary tendency.
For example, in the successive annual sessions of
the Congress in the last years, the resolution for
the change of the aim of the National Congress
from undefined self-government (lately defined as
self-government within the British Empire) to com-
plete independence, secured an increasing numix:r
of votes. In fact, the majority of the rank and file
would have given the resolution a majority, had the
leading machinery not been put into motion to sup-
press it. In 1924, the resolution got a majority in
the Subjects Committee; but Gandhi, as the
president, ruled out its introduction in the plenary



ii6 THE FUTURE OF

session of the Congress. Many provincial confer-
ences adopted resolutions recommending such a
change in the Congress programme ; but, to the
contrary, the aim of the National Congress was
clearly defined as self-government within the
British Empire last year, and once more empha-
sised this year. This has created great dissatis-
faction among the rank and file. Even in the
Swaraj Party, several important members have
publicly condemned the " capitalist outlook of the
party," and declared that the " party conspired
with the vested interests to betray the people."
These markedly revolutionary tendencies are bound
to crystallise into a Party of Revolutionary
Nationalism in the near future.

The task of the proletariat in this situation is to
meet the petty bourgeois Nationalist revolutionaries
half-way. Left alone, on their own initiative, the
petty bourgeois radical intellectuals will never
find their '* way to the masses." They are still
encumbered with traditional class prejudice which
survives economic ruin and political servitude.
The very complicated Indian system of land
ownership gives the middle classes in several pro-
vinces a rather precarious share in the unearned
income from land. As far as the lower strata of
the middle classes are concerned, this share is an
illusion — it does not save them from economic
bankruptcy perpetually verging on starvation.
Nevertheless, this meagre share in land rent has
effectively prevented the petty bourgeoisie as a class
from advocating any agrarian reform affecting the
system of land ownership. Under such circum-
stances, the desire of the petty intellectuals " to
go to the masses " (Swarajist programme of village
reconstruction) will not take them very near to the



INDIAN POLITICS 117

peasantry, unless they are drawn into the com-
pany of a more fundamentally revolutionary class
— the proletariat. Since the petty bourgeoisie wiii
not, and cannot, enter a real proletarian party, the
proletariat must enter, even take the initiative 01
organising a broader party. Ever since 1923, the
Communists have kept before the country a pro-
gramme of Revolutionary Nationalism. In spite of
the joint efforts of Imperialism and the Nationalist
bourgeoisie to condemn this programme as " Bol-
shevism" and thereby terrify the ]xtty )x)urgeois
Nationalists, the fundamental principles of demo-
cracy, republicanism, and agrarian revolution con-
tained in that programme have enlisted numerous
adherents. The slogan of a revolutionary peoples*
party arouses wide response.

A democratic party of the people with a pro-
gramme of Revolutionary Nationalism (complete
independence, establishment of a republic govern-
ment, radical agrarian reforms, advanced social
legislation, etc.), will bind together all the
oppressed classes of contemporary Indian society,
namely, the petty bourgeoisie, peasantry, and the
proletariat. Under the present conditions, the first
two will constitute the overwhelming majority ;
but. the proletariat will act as the conscious van-
guard of the democratic army — as the leaven of
life of the gigantic mass. In this revolutionary
combine of the oppressed classes, the role of the
petty bourgeois intellectuals cannot be over-esti-
mated. The proletariat will contribute the revo-
lutionary driving forces ; the peasantry will lend
their massive weight; and the petty bourgeois
intellectuals will bring in knowledge and education.
Considering the cultural backwardness— genera!
illiteracy— of the working class, an educated ally



ii8 THE FUTURE OE

will be immensely valuable, provided that the intel-
lectual accomplishments of that ally are devoted
to quicken the revolutionary consciousness of the
oppressed classes. Linked up with the prole-
tariat in the actual and ev-ery-day fight, the petty
bourgeois intellectuals will undergo an ever-
quickening process of radicalisation. They will
demand more democratic freedom in such a revolu-
tionary atmosphere than they would do alone.
Pushed by the proletariat, the petty bourgeoisie
will also go further towards agrarian revolution,
thus drawing the peasant masses into the struggle
for democratic national freedom.

For years India has been seething with growing
agrarian discontent. But no political expression
has been given to this revolutionary factor. A
party of agrarian revolution, in the democratic
sense, must appear as the organ through which the
peasant masses will be actively drawn in the fight
for national freedom. Such a Revolutionary
Nationalist Party will fight under a programme of
agrarian revolution. It will unite the petty bour-
geoisie and the peasantry in a democratic struggle
under the leadership of the proletariat. It will be
a party representing the majority of the people
and actively supported by them. It will fight for
popular freedom. It will be the Peoples' Party.

The future of Indian politics will be an intensi-
fied fight for national liberation with revolutionary
democratic ideals, under the standard of a people's
party. The proletariat, led by its own party — th-:
Communist Party — will exercise hegemony in this
revolutionary struggle for democratic national free-
dom.



THEDOR^I^ITPREirj



â– TO LANT rrREET // ^ BOI^O- LOhDON /t l



Tu Th Roue nOuT



14 DAY USE

RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED

LOAN DEPT.

RENEWALS ONLY—TEL. NO. 642^405

This book is due on the last date stamped below, or

on the date to which renewed.

Renewed books are subject to immediate recall.



MAR 2 3 1970 n§.



ECEIVED



M/>R|270 > 4p |Vj



JLOi^N PgPT>,



J 1971 7 5



REC'D LD AUG



2071 •5PM4



m



mH2



^.Q



ro7



K T P, DEC 18 1 98 1



,<»>'



>^



vS^



im



fiacrC/a, (j^



W^



^



â– ^



\"i!>




^^



LD21A-\(Wg»rD9
(J9096slM476-A-32



General Library

University of California

Berkeley



Illllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll