A FOUR-DAY state conference of the CPI(M) commenced on Saturday at Dankuni in Hooghly district to chalk out the party’s strategy for the West Bengal Assembly elections to be held next year as it aims at regaining its footing in the state.
The conference, which was inaugurated by CPI(M) central committee coordinator Prakash Karat is being attended by CPI(M) politburo members Manik Sarkar, Brinda Karat, Surjyakanta Mishra, M A Baby, Tapan Sen, Ashok Dhawale, Nilotpal Basu and Ramchandra Dome.
The party leadership is also worried about the communal polarisation in Bengal which never happened earlier in the state.
“We were zero from the 2019 Lok Sabha election and till date we are continuing that way. Our footings and ground level organisation almost vanished in more than ten districts of the state. Naturally, we got less than five per cent of total votes. In some constituencies, even the security deposit of our candidates had been forfeited. In the organisational report. It is mentioned that we have a serious lack of ground level organisation. Not only that, our workers also have limitations to make or grow ground level organisations,” a senior CPI(M) leader said.
“Our party is now almost full of representatives from the middle class of the society. There is a serious lack of growth movement in frontal organisations like farmers’ groups and trade union fronts,” he further added.
“We failed to fight against communal and identity politics and also failed to break the binary of the society. Naturally, election after election we became irrelevant to the voters,” said a student front leader of CPIM.
According to CPI(M) sources, the internal report of the party shows a significant number of FIRs have been filed against the party’s youth and student leaders and this surge in FIRs indicates robust participation from farmers and trade union fronts in the movements, suggesting a strong grassroot presence of youths and students.
The report also says that representation from farmers and workers specially from unorganised sectors are very low in the CPI(M), said sources. There is a trend that many workers are coming closer to the party but not taking party membership and that there is a disconnect between the local leadership and workers, said sources.
The local leaders are also more focused on climbing the party hierarchy, aiming for area or district-level positions, rather than engaging with workers at the grassroots level, the sources said.
A CPI(M) state secretariat member said, “In recent times, the movement has begun with huge strength. But in the end it was diluted in a short time. In the elections, the middle class mindset of the leaders and activists is creating obstacles. If you think in the long run, the poor people must be brought. That part cannot be excluded. We should not be just the middle class party, we must be a poor people’s party.”
A public meeting will be held at Dankuni on February 25, the concluding day of the state conference, a CPI(M) leader said. The CPI(M)-led Left Front failed to win any seats in the 2021 assembly elections and in the 2019 and 2024 parliamentary polls, where it contested all 42 Lok Sabha constituencies in the state.
— with PTI