Communist Party of India, Leftist

Movement and Working Class

Movement

Working Class Movement

Factors behind the development of Communism
• One was inspiration, guidance and support
provided by the international communist
movement since the time of the Russian
Revolution (1917).

• Other one was provided by the growth of the

national movement dominated by the Indian
National Congress under Gandhi, from 1920-
21 onwards.
Role of the communists in the working
class movement
• Decline of the trade union spirit after 1922
onwards
• after the majority of the strikes had failed the
immediately preceding years for
disappointment and demoralisation among
the workers
• The apparent failure of the non-cooperation
movement
• The first communist party of India had been
established away from home in October 1920
at Taskhent under the auspices of the
Comintern.
• Initialy the communists were only a handful
number and were rather a collection of
separate groups, constituting only an
ideological centre
• In this period, the influence of the
communists was markedly noticeable in the
trade union movement
 Government positions
• Firstly, the government alarmed at the
increasing influence of communists in the trade
union field
• Secondly, the government launched like famous
Cawnpore Trial (1923) against prominent leaders
like M N Roy, Muzaffar Ahamed, S A Dange,
Shaukat Usmani, Nalini Gupta, Singaravelu
Chettiar, Ghulam Hussain
• Thirdly, the government put restrictions on the
import of communist literature
 Posture of the communists
• Government attempts could not change the
advance of communist ideas
• Communism had spread rapidly by 1926-27
• Separate unites of Workers and Peasants’
Party sprang up in different provinces
• Militant elements in the trade union
movement united with left elements in the
congress
 Decession of International Communist
According to the executive Committee of Communist
International decession in June, 1924
1. The Indian communists must bring the trade union
movement under their influence
2. Must reorganise it on a class basis
3. Must purge it of all alien elements

Aims of the Communists

1. The ultimate aim of labour was to be the establishment of
socialism

2. their immediate concern should be redressal of specific

economic grievances for the attainment of which a presistent
struggle was to be waged by them
Outcome of the Communist Strategies
• From 1926-27, working class unrest intensified
again
• Increasingly militant trade unionism
• A strike wave with its accompanying slogans of
class war
• The government itself admitted that the
growth of communist propaganda and
influence among the industrial workers caused
its anxiety
 Government Action
• In March 1929, most of the active communist
and trade union leaders were arrested all
over India and the Meerut Conspiracy case
was initiated against them.

• This was the major setback to the labour

movement

• But the Intelligence Department admitted that

the movement had not be wholly crushed
 Communist Activities
• Thus by this time, the communists, operating
mainly as the Workers' and Peasants’ Party
• Communists had become quite a formidable
force, particularly in the Calcutta industrial
belt
• Until the Meerut case, there was every
possibility of a link-up between In the pre-
Meerut phase, the communists had worked
out a unity-cum-struggle strategy
 The Period of Isolationism : 1929 -35
• The 6th Comintern Congress in 1928 led to a reversal in the
policy of the CPI for it was now called upon to concentrate on
its own party organisation rather than to cooperate with other
nationalists through the Peasants and Workers' parties or with
the AITUC
• The Indian communists were severely weakened by the
Meerut arrests
• Kept aloof from the civil disobedience movement
• Communist spent most of their time quarreling among
themselves and bitterly criticised even the left-leaning
nationalists like Subhas Bose and Jawaharlal Nehru
• Most of the senior leaders behind bars
• The CPI was now being led by a group of inexperienced and
young ultra radical
 Splits of the AITUC
• Already, the increasing activities of the communists in the trade union
field and their growing influence over the AITUC had made the non-
Communist elements apprehensive. Very soon the backlash was in full
swing.
• First, the moderate reformist elements left the AITUC
dominated by the radicals and formed the Indian Trade Union Federation
(1929).
• In 1930, the communists themselves seceded from the AITUC
and formed a separate organisation of their own, "The Red Trade Union
Congress
• These splits sapped the morale of the trade union movement in the
country.
• This was also the period when the condition of the working class was
deteriorating due to world-wide economic depression (1929-34).
• Large-scale retrenchment, rationalisation, wage reductions etc.
• created an almost intolerable situation for the workers
End of a Chapter in the Communist Movement
• Moreover, in the early 30's, the communists
themselves, in Bengal as in t e rest of India, passed
through several factional squabbles
• Finally, a provisional central committee of a united
CPI was established at an all-India conference in
Calcutta in December 1933 uniting most of the
isolated communist groups existing in the country
• The apparent unity, however, did not stop a number
of groups, sometimes overlapping and sometimes
acting at cross purposes, to go on working as' before.
• In September, 1934, the Government of India
banned the CPI and its allied organisations
 The period of “United Front”:1936 -39
• A new chapter began in 1935 when the Comintern
formally shifted to the line of a united front with the
national bourgeoisie against imperialism.
• The outlawed Communist Party of India also changed
its policy and sought to move into the Congress
Socialist Party and through it into the main Congress
organisation.
• It was also at this time that systematic and successful
attempt of the Communists to function through an all-
India centre began
• In the begining of 1936 an underground centre was
formed and work also started in the provinces
• Between 1935 and 1941, the CPI, as a small but
determined group within the Congress, rapidly,
increased its power
 Activities of CPI: 1935 - 36
• As elsewhere in India, during the period 1935-36, in Bengal,
too, the CPI wholly concentrated on industrial labour

• The communists were prominent in a number of trade

unions, such as, the Calcutta Tramway Workers' Union, E. B.
and E. I. Railway Workers‘ Union, Dock Workers' Union
(Metiabruz), Jute Workers' unions in a number of jute centres,
and among the textile workers of the Mohini Mills at Kusthia
an d in the iron workers of Burnpur-Kulti.

• But according to Intelligence Branch reports, communist

activities did not create much inpression upon the labourers
themsalves.
• Till 1936, a number of rival parties and groups,
all claiming to be communists, were active in
Bengal.
• Everything is in a state of flux and at the moment
the search for a United Front and generally for
formulating principles and policy is delaying any
serious attempt at preaching to the proletariat
and fostering mass methods
• In other words, leaders so often changed
organisations and office bearers
of unions were so busy trying to keep, themselves
in power that little real work could be done
among workers
• In the middle of 1936, the CPI decided to
participate in the ensuing provincial assembly
election
• Its main purpose, it said, was "to develop and
build the mass movements based on the partial
demands of the toiling masses"
• In the labour constituencies, the communists
tried to come to an arrangement with other
leftist groups and to set up candidates jointly
• In different provinces, some communists were
elected to the provincial assemblies mainly from
the labour constituencies on the Trade Union
Congress tickets backed by the Indian National
Congress)
• In Bengal Bankim Mukherjee, a communist, was
elected from the colliery labour constituency.
 Crisis of Political Scenario
• After the election, the CPI pleaded for the implementation of
the TUC election manifesto promise that independent labour
and peasant blocs would be formed in the legislature to
remain distinct from the Congress parliamentary parties.
• The CPI said it had full support for the Congress in its anti-
imperialist struggle
• But reserved for itself complete independence on all matters
affecting labour and peasants
• But the relationship between the TUC and the Congress
inside the legislatures continued to be ambiguous.
• This created a difficult situation in Bengal. Attempts of the
communists to form the Bengal Parliamentary Labour
and Peasant Party were nipped in the bud by the provincial
Congress."
• with the installation of Congress ministries in
seven out of eleven provinces, the relations
between the main body of the Congress and
the communist elements within it became
further strained.
• The number of industrial disputes increased
and the Congress governments often had to
take repressive measures which brought forth
criticism from the leftists.
• Many in the Congress could not endorse the
radical militant policy often pursued by the
communists
 Process of the ‘United Front’
• On the all-India plane, the 'united front' policy in regard to the
trade unions reached a high water mark at Nagpur in April, 1938

• This time the National Trade Union Federation provisionally merged

into the AITUC

• The Red TUC of the communists had been united with the AITUC in
April 1935
• Thus the AITUC became the voice of a united working class after
about a decade

• At this time the communists held that trade union unity was badly
needed because this field had immense possibilities for the
national struggle and for the socialist movement

• To them the ‘united front' strategy had both trade union and
political implications.
• At this time, the CPI strategy vis-a-vis the Congress
waw two-fold:
1. To penetrate the Congress organisation from
within
2. And to pressurise the Congress to adopt a radical
policy through struggles from without.
• They had to keep a fine and delicate balance
between these two.
• On the one hand, we find several communists
serving as members of the executive committees
of the district, provincial and even all-India
Congress committees On the other hand, since
the Nagpur Conference, the CPI
made determined bid to force its line in the labour
field in particular
 Change of the Party Policy in 1939
• The tight-rope walking of the communists is clearly
revealed from a party document of May, 1939.
• It said that the party's labour policy would be based on
"an attempt to secure the cooperation and support of
the Congress Committees" and that "any tendency to
force a leftist stand upon a non-communist labour
leadership was nothing short of disruption".
• It said the old traditions of conducting workers
struggle in isolation must be ended
• Party wanted the strike tactics to be conceived with a
view to winning public sympathy and Congress support
• The communist policy of a united front of all leftist
forces received a great boost in early 1939, with the re-
election of Subhas Bose as Congress president
• But there was an anti-climax :
1. By the middle of the year with the expulsion of Bose
from the Congress
2. And the virtual dissolution of the left consolidation
committee he had formed.
• The communists finally parted with the Bose and sided
with the Congress led by Gandhi.
• The position of the communists became embarrassing
in Bengal where the supporters of Bose still had a
predominant position.

• Perhaps to retrieve their lost image the communists,

particularly in Bengal, took a rather militant posture
from this time on
 The Communists and the early war year : 1939-41
• With World War lI imminent, the CPI had two choices:
1. It could continue the alliance with the Congress
2. and attempt to strengthen its anti-war orientations
or
it would renounce that alliance, and seize the
opportunity provided by the Congress
vacillation to attempt to lead a more aggressive
movement against both imperialist rule and the war.

• The CPI increasingly turned to the latter option

 Posture of Congress and CPI During the War Time Period

• After the outbreak of second world war in September

1939, while the Congress was still hesitant about its
policy,
• The CPI stated forthwith that the task before the
people was the "revolutionary utilisation of the war
crisis for the achievement of national freedom“
• It called for the transformation of the imperialist war
into a war of national liberation
• Almost immediately after the war began there were a
number of strikes in different industrial centres all over
India, including the jute mills of Bengal, most of which
were spontaneous.
• The communists came to take charge of these after the
strikes had started and in some cases, after the workers
had already gained certain concessions
• The-communists returned once again to a
militant trade union policy

• In spite of repressive measures, the CPI

popularised the slogan of "Mahgai" (Dearness
Allowance) struggles in every Industry

• Mass meeting and conferences were organised

in support of the "Mahgai“ campaign

• On 12 March, 1940, a Mahgai Day was

celebrated at the initiative of the Communists
• Naturally when a war was on, the government
was in no mood to allow these disruptive
activities and decided to come down heavily
on the prominent communists and trade
union leaders

• In spite of all these repressive measures, the

communists could not be wholly subdued

• Externment of active workers and lack of

funds considerably reduced communist
activities in the industrial areas