Tripura: The Failure of Uniting anti-BJP Votes Caused Disaster
Sankar
BJP has won in North-east including Tripura. It is an absolute disaster for the democratic people of the country. In our pre-poll article we said that Tipra Motha was going to emerge as one of the important political forces in the election. Actually, this was such a simple thing to understand that nearly all the political forces assumed this, without the leadership of CPIM. It was undoubtedly true that the leader of opposition in the Tripura Assembly Election was no other than CPIM. Therefore, the success of the anti-BJP front depended mainly on the political wisdom of the unwise leadership of this poor party. And the result is in front of us. In the 60 seated Assembly of Tripura, CPIM bagged 11 seats and their electoral ally Congress won only in 3 seats. Their cumulative vote share is 33 percent. On the other hand BJP won in 32 seats and their electoral ally IPFT won in one seat. Their cumulative vote share is 41 percent. The vote shares of both of the fronts have decreased around 10 percent. And TipraMoha has emerged as the largest opposition party with 13 seats. They bagged 20.1 percent of vote share in the election. Therefore, it can be stated that Tipra has been able to snatch almost an equal number of voters from both the alliances in order to emerge as the single largest opposition party in the state.
One may argue that the cumulative number of seats of the CPIM-CONG Front and Tipra does not exceed the number of seats bagged by BJP. Then how can it be said that if there had been an alliance between these two, then BJP would be defeated? However, if we add the vote percentage of CPIM-CONG Front and Tipra, then it can be easily understood that their joint share of votes is larger than BJP’s. We must see that in most of the seats the anti-BJP votes were divided between these two forces and as a result BJP won with a smaller percentage of vote share. For example, we can see the results of a few seats. In Amarpur-42 seat, BJP got 44.21 percent whereas LEFT-CONG Front got 32.92 percent and Tipra bagged 19.94 percent. Similarly, in Bagma-30 the Left-Cong alliance got 25.08 percent and Tipra bagged 34.6 percent. However, BJP won with only 38.74 percent. This happened in almost all the seats where the BJP-IPFT alliance won. Only in nine seats they had a majority. Therefore, if there were an all out alliance against BJP, then it was not possible for BJP to win.
We said it earlier that once upon a time the Communist Party made a splendid advance in Tripura only because it worked for the cause of the Tribal people. Party fought for a separate homeland for the tribals and formed many tribal organizations for struggle and reforms. Basically, in Tripura the Communist Party was a tribal party where a considerable section of leadership came from tribal background. But after a certain point of time with the demagogic change in the state, CPIM gradually transformed itself into a party of Bengali middle class. The anxiety within the Tribal community went increasing leaps and bound, however, the Lefts never paid attention to this danger. History teaches that no section of people so far extends support to any political outfit without any material basis. All revolutions in history took place for concrete material demands and aspiration. It can not be otherwise in the case of the Tribal people in the north-east. However, without realizing this basic truth the Lefts formally called Tipra to join in the alliance but they were never ready to address their anxiety and demands. On the contrary they always expressed the view that the demand for a separate homeland of the Tribals was unjust. How could a party ally with such a political force which viewed their demands as unjust and unapproachable?
As a result an all out alliance against BJP could not be materialized. Although the Left and Congress always said that the united fight against the Fascist BJP was the need of the hour, they did not take it seriously. What is the meaning of anti-Fascist United Front? An anti-Fascist United Front must be a united front of the oppressed masses. There are many divergent demands, aspirations and views among different sections of the oppressed people. But the leader of the Front must be capable of searching out the common thread of the divergent aspirations of different sections of the masses. It is the basis of unity against the common enemy. And at the same time this common thread is the basis of an ani-Fascist narrative as well, without which an anti-Fascist struggle is not possible. But what did the Left do in Tripura? Firstly, they understood the anti-Fascist struggle as anti-BJP electoral struggle only. This reductionist approach led them to a particular political position according to which, the anti-Fascist front was tantamount to an alliance with Congress! The Left leaders possessed the blind faith in Congress on such a high level that they were in this illusion that the Left-Cong combine was going to come into power even keeping Tipra outside of the Front.
Secondly, CPIM is always adamant to reject the demand of a separate homeland or a separate state for any section of the people, especially in those states where they rule or they have a considerable chance to rule. In West Bengal a long drawn and bitter fight took place between the ruling CPIM and the Gorkha people in the hills of the Himalayas. Several thousand political workers were killed on both sides in this fight in the 1980s. However, this hill area once upon a time was a citadel of Communist Party and many important leaders of the party came from them. The hill areas up above the mountain have no ethno-cultural or linguistic similarity and even connection with the plain land of Bengal. It is an undisputed truth. Therefore, there was merit in the demand for a separate Gorkha state. Sometimes it may happen that although the demand is justified but due to many practical political reasons it can not be achieved or can not be translated as a rational demand in practical politics. In that case too, the party which calls itself communist and the leading political force must have the duty to engage with the dissenting section of the people in a meaningful way. But CPIM has a record of developing rivalry with the dissenters in different states where they ruled. As a result of a full fledged conflict with the Gorkha people at that time the party organizations were wiped out from the hills in West Bengal. Widespread Bengali chauvinism replaced democratic values. And the party faced setbacks.
In Tripura almost the same thing happened. Lefts have become weak in the Tribal dominated state and still they are not willing to develop a rational engagement with the Tribal organizations. They do not even have any sympathy for their cause. Now, what is the situation in Tripura? The post poll violence has reached an unprecedented level. Several left and Congress workers have been attacked physically, their houses have been torched, party workers are fleeing from one place to another. More than one thousand incidents of attacking and torching took place since March 3rd. Even a fact finding team of opposition MPs and MLAs was brutally attacked by the miscreants of the saffron party. Frontline reports the following: “From March 2, after the election results were announced, Tripura has been racked by political violence. Supporters and activists of the Left and the Congress, which joined forces in the elections, have been under continuous attack allegedly at the hands of the BJP. Their houses, shops, and other properties have either been gutted or damaged extensively, as have been their means of livelihood. More than a thousand people have allegedly left their homes; many are apparently being forced to pay money either to return to their homes or as fines for supporting the Left or the Congress. One CPI(M) activist from Sepahijala district told Frontline that he could return to his house only after paying Rs.50,000 to the local BJP leaders. “Apart from the money I was made to promise that I would not engage in political activities any more,” he said.”
Now Jitendra Choudhury, the state secretary of CPIM is blaming Tipra for helping BJP to come back in power. He alleged, “Tipra helped them to win”. But the real fact is that it is nobody other than the unwise leadership of the Left-Cong combine who helped BJP to come back in power in the state. They must bear the full responsibility for the distress of several thousand party workers who have lost their means of livelihood and whose lives are at stake. The defeat of the Left-Cong alliance in Tripura can be taken as a negative lesson to understand what not to do in the anti-Fascist struggle.
