Indian Marxists can’t put a national matter before a delectable international issue. Indian Marxists have to carefully calibrate its position on any dispute that involves “invasions” by countries from the communist family. In fact, the fault line on “internationalism” pertaining to Soviet Russia and China has been one of the key reasons that led to the split of the communists and the birth of the CPM in 1964. The CPM was then viewed as more friendly towards China and the CPI towards the Soviet Union.
When China attacked India in 1962, a comment attributed to communist veteran EMS Namboodiripad had caused considerable outrage and saddled the Marxists with a liability that is cited even today to question their nationalist credentials.
Apparently, EMS was asked in a press conference whether he thought the Chinese committed aggression. He said that the Chinese had entered territory that they thought was theirs and hence there was no question of aggression. At the same time, the Indians were defending territory that they considered theirs and so they were not committing aggression either.
Just then, Dange, the chairman of the then unified Communist Party, walked in and sarcastically asked EMS, ‘and what is your opinion about the territory in question?’ Even as EMS fumbled for a reply and Dange stated that the Chinese had attacked India, occupied Indian Territory and the communists supported Nehru’s call to the nation to defend itself and repel the Chinese forces.
When rivals later brought up the issue to needle the CPM, the party held up EMS’s comments as an example against chauvinism. “He was a true internationalist in the true sense of the term. During the India-China war in 1962, braving the chauvinist onslaught, EMS campaigned throughout the country advocating a peaceful settlement of the border dispute. As a true communist, he always thought the Indian communist movement to be part and parcel of the world revolutionary process.
Ironically, the same Dange backed the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, known as Prague Spring.
Those days, the communists used to devote more time to pulsating international affairs. By 1968, the Communist Party had split and the national council of Dange’s CPI debated for three days and adopted the resolution supporting the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia by a majority of just one vote.
The CPM was once used to be viewed as more friendly towards China and the CPI towards the Soviet Union. So, the CPM has not desisted from criticising Putin’s party, the United Russia for using “unfair” and “undemocratic” means in the elections. Similarly, CPM acknowledges that both the European Union and Russia are driven by similar instincts of “economic” and “military” interests and were engaged in luring Ukraine to their side.
With China embracing the market, the CPM has lost its international bulwark. Cuba and Venezuela do not have the punching power of a Soviet Union or China. Probably the leaders themselves do not know which world power the CPM would be more aligned to now. Is it North Korea?
