SITARAM YECHURY
Explaining the role of the Left in the overall opposition strategy for the 2024 Lok Sabha election, Sitaram Yechury, general secretary of the CPI(M), said the objective is not merely to defeat the BJP in the election or replace the government but, in fact, to safeguard the Constitution and its foundational pillars and to ensure that the constitutional guarantees are implemented for all its citizens. Yechury added: “It is imperative that all efforts be made to ensure that this government that has been systematically undermining the Constitution is defeated. The objective therefore is not merely to hold power, but to safeguard the secular democratic Indian republic. The effort must be to unite all opposition parties who are willing to take on this communal offensive of incendiary hate speeches and religious bigotry. That is our effort. As far as the CPI (M) is concerned, the effort has to be to forge the broadest possible unity of secular forces to take on this challenge.”
According to Yechury, any effort cannot be a pan-indian effort to begin with but has to be State-specific. He said that in every State,
“the leading secular force which is anti-bjp must take the lead in forging unity among all secular forces like it was done by the
DMK in Tamil Nadu.”
On this State-wide understanding of seat sharing, a national alternative could emerge.
Yechury pointed to the facr that historically, on various occasions, the national-level government formations came into existence only after general elections.
Yechury said that an electoral understanding is important but it is more important to reach out to people and rally them towards this effort. According to
Yechury, the Left has been playing a seminal role in forging the unity of working people. “Be it the historic year-long farmers’ struggle or the struggle of the working class against privatisation, the loot of national assets and dilution of labour laws, the Left has been playing a role in galvanising public opinion against the government’s policies.” He hopes that this combination of people’s struggles and electoral understanding between secular forces will take forward the
2024 battle.
Yechury added: “We have seen parties that oppose the BJP at the level of the State but in Parliament, they support the BJP. They have to decide for themselves where they stand. Our appeal to them is that they should realise the gravity of the attacks on federalism that is eroding rapidly the constitutional rights of the State governments. Unless this is arrested, the regional parties running State governments may well find themselves at the mercy of the Union government to survive. For this reason alone, the regional parties must come forward to safeguard federalism and the basic features of the Constitution. Every regional party can and will have ambitions. Nothing wrong with that. It has repeatedly happened that before every general election, there will be talk of a third front, a fourth front or a regional front. But finally a government comes to life only after elections. The regional parties must realise, just as the Left does, that India is a “Union of States” and that federalism is its foundational principle. The BJP’S effort in advancing the RSS’ fascistic agenda requires a unitary state structure hence the interests of the States and the regional parties can never be protected unless this tendency to push a unitary state structure is rebuffed.
“The Left has been working very well with some regional parties, like the DMK in Tamil Nadu. With some others, there have been situations where the Left, in the interests of the people, has led and will lead protests against anti-people policies and the regional parties know this. But today that is not as important as safeguarding India’s constitutional order and the challenge is to isolate and defeat the BJP. As for the Congress, it is a reality that it still constitutes the largest single opposition force in the country. Among the opposition parties, it has the largest share in the electoral college that elects the President of India.”
The political resolution passed in the 23rd Congress of the CPI(M) held in April in Kannur made it clear that isolating the BJP was the main objective. It ruled out a political alliance with the Congress. The Resolution recognised the weaknesses of the Congress, its diminutive role in the present context, its declining political influence and organisational strength. The Congress, while it proclaimed secularism, was unable to effectively mount an ideological challenge.
On the subject of fiscal space of the