The idea of a Third Front government was termed “unrealistic” and as having “failed as a viable and credible alternative at the national level”.
After two days of deep discussions, which often turned heated, the central committee of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) allowed those at the helm of the party the fig leaf of “collective responsibility” to escape individual responsibility for their electoral debacle.
The idea of a Third Front government was termed “unrealistic” and as having “failed as a viable and credible alternative at the national level”.
Party general secretary Prakash Karat refused to take responsibility for propping up the idea of a Third Front. “As the party’s general secretary, I can only take responsibility for the implementation of the decision, which was taken by the central committee,” he said.
It was the central committee that had endorsed the decision to form a Third Front as an alternative to the Congress-led and Bharatiya Janata Party-led alliances, he said.
In a statement full of nuances, the third alternative was deemed to be the correct course taken except that “in the absence of a countrywide alliance and no common policy platform being presented, the call for an alternative government (not alliance) was unrealistic”.
The defeats in West Bengal and Kerala were also analysed over the past two days. The party admitted that in West Bengal “there were shortcomings in the functioning of the government, panchayats and municipalities, based on proper class outlook while the apprehension about land acquisition contributed to the alienation amongst some sections of the peasantry”.
Karat, however, ruled out any change in the state CM. “We’ll rework the industrial strategy in the state,” he said.
In Kerala, where the two factions, led respectively by chief minister VS Achuthanandan and party state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan are, are at loggerheads, the party has called a special politburo meeting on July 4 and 5 to decide on the matter.
Strong words were used in the central committee’s statement on “certain wrong trends within the party organisation, the disunity within the LDF and the party and the association with the PDP (People’s Democratic Party, led by Abdul Hasan Madani)”. The statement also blamed the church in Kerala for working against the LDF.
But no action was proposed on the open war between the party’s two principle leaders in the state except to say that a decision had been postponed till the politburo meeting.
Senior party leaders say this is “the way” the party begins its introspection and course correction. It is, of course, a moot question whether it will be enough for the party during the West Bengal assembly elections due in 2011.
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