fanaticism in the name of secularism. The Communist Party and the Communist ideology from the beginning took a defiant stand against all feudal social institutions like religion and demanded that the people should be freed from the influence of these social institutions. In its announcement of programme or platform, it never compromised with any of these principles, any of these institutions though for tactical purpose, it had to adopt different tactics on different occasion. Sundarayya shared this hatred for these feudal institutions perhaps long before he came over to communism: In his early days when he joined the freedom struggle, he has already started fight against the caste system and the ostracism of harijans. It required a great individual personal courage in those days for a young man to stand in opposition to the entire upper class village and demand that he is entitled to treat harijans on equal terms. This defiant spirit to challenge the injustice of the entire old institutions stood in him firmly when he came over to Communism and when his outlook became much more broadened challenging every aspect of the present social system. Many of our comrades, Party leaders and cadres shared this opposition to all these old social institutions which are reactionary. But, yet, in a major chunk of the ranks of our Party, there is not a burning hatred for these institutions. In our everyday Party life and Party activity, we have to keep in mind this heritage left by Comrade Sundarayya along with all other things. We must not forget these feudal institutions because our revolution itself is partly anti-feudal. The outstanding period of his life, which also marked in the earlier period, was Comrade P. Sundarayya’s continuous fight in de4fence of Marxism-Leninism and the Party of the Marxist-Leninist doctrine. When Comrade P. Sundarayya joined the Communist Party, the task initially was much easier because we had to fight anti-communist tendencies outside and we had to gather growing communist groups together on the basis of common ideology. The immediate task was to unify all the communists on the basis of a common platform and common programme and on the basis of common outlook and attitude towards the nationalists and anti-imperialist struggle and on the basis of how to develop the leadership of the working class for the agrarian revolution during the course of this struggle. But, subsequently, when the Party became big and developments began to take place in the country, there were vacillations inside the Party also. The inner-Party struggle became sharp after the achievement of independence. In all newly liberated countries, at one stage or the other, certainly the inner-Party struggle does take place, because of the very composition of the Party. Our biggest inner-Party struggle took place in 1962 or 1964or a little bit earlier; for five to ten years, it had been going on. It was the struggle between the two wings of the Communist Party of India as it was there. What was the essence of this struggle and inner-Party difference? As Stalin pointed out “The inner Party differences often echo the feelings of the different sections of the people outside the Party. They are the reflections of the bourgeois influences within the Party.” It happened in India in the same form. What to do with the Congress government? How near it is? How distant it is? Why did it happen? It happened because during the course of anti-imperialist struggle, as it is bound to happen in any colonial country, a large number of anti-imperialist honest elements form the middle-classes and petty bourgeoisie found place inside the Party. While remaining honest, they unconsciously identified Communism and Socialism with the struggle against imperialism and achievement of independence. When he question of carrying forward the victory of anti-imperialist struggle to the stage o the democratic revolution and to the stage of relieving the peasantry from exploitation came up, then they began to show vacillations. Now it is not the direct struggle against imperialism. It is the direct struggle against the bourgeoisie-landlord combination of our own country. The condition of these sections in the Party in similar to the condition of Arjuna during the Mahabharat war. Seeing the Kaurava army, he said, these are my ‘Mamas’ and ‘Chachas’, how can I fight with them. The revisionists in the Party developed the same phobia. After all, they are Nehru Chacha and Patel Mama, how can we fight with them. It is a clear case of bourgeoisie influence inside the Party which was recognized by some of our leaders like P. Sundarayya, M. Basavapunnaiah and others. And serious fight has gone on, and in 1964 it came to an end. The Party has split into two. Here an uncompromising role along with others was played by comrade P. Sundarayya in defence of purity of Marxist-Leninist doctrine in defence of Marxist-Leninist Party and fight against revisionism. This was one of the main contributions which Comrade P. Sundarayya made in our fight against revisionism. Without this fight, a genuine Marxist-Leninist Party would not have survived in this country. Comrades, you must ask yourself a question why only some leaders of the Party were able to carry on this fight while other leaders deserted this fight. The difference lies in the fact that some leaders, s section of the Party and leadership were able to understand and master the application of Marxism-Leninism to the concrete conditions of india and were firmly wedded to defend the basic truths and principles of Marxism while others neglected their study and wanted to sacrifice the basic principles in he name of practical politics. Now the question comes because all of you are paying genuine tributes to Comrade P. Sundarayya, will you be able to defend the heritage which Comrade P. Sundarayya leaves behind? That is, are you, personally, individually in your own capacity, capable of defending the Party of Marxist-Leninist doctrine and carry on the burden which Comrade P Sundaryya left on us? Of course, the answer is no. Because such defence can be made only by those who make it their lifetime business to go on studying the Marxist-Leninist doctrines and draw inspiration every day and every minute of their life. Lenin once said, he alone is a real Marxist who makes Marxism a part of his inner-consciousness, that is Marxism and Marxist reaction must come automatically. Very few among our Party cadres and Party members can justify this to say that they are devoting that much time to the study, restudy and restudy of Marxism-Leninism which would ensure the complete defence of the Party of the Marxist-Leninist doctrine. To be able to pay a genuine tribute to the memory of Comrade P. Sundarayya all of us must resolve to study and restudy the Marxist-Leninist doctrine. Another part, which perhaps is now commonly accepted and perhaps the testing time has not come, is the question of proletariat internationalism. Our Party is a Party which believes in proletariat internationalism and the unity of the entire working class of the world in the common fight against capitalism for the establishment of world socialism. You obviously also understand and that is how the various contingents of the international movement act, each Party has its own work in its own nation, but, it must continue to work as a contingent of the single world order. There were many socialists, some of them Communists who were contemporary to Comrade P. Sundarayya, but after wards, we do not find their name either in Socialist or Communist movement. There were parties of various socialist roots which later on either merged in Lokdal, Janata or some of them have honest people, but they could not establish a proper link between India’s struggle for freedom and the international working class and socialist movement. Sundarayya came to the Communist Party and along with it accepted the discipline of Communist international, has well understood that the struggle for India’s independence, the struggle for socialism, in the world and the struggle of the other countries for freedom are all linked in the single chain – the chain of fight against world imperialism. Forty years back, ours is the only Party which correctly understood this relationship and of course, faced the comments from other parties like Indian National Congress. Only a few days back, all our critics, including the rulling Congress Party, were celebrating the fortieth anniversary of the anti-facist victory of soviet forces over fascism. Now, everybody accepts, that it was an earth-shaking even which led to the changing of the entire shape of the world, the complete elimination of the British empire and a complete abolition of old colonial system. Our Party foresaw this fury and told the people the direction in which we had to move. In this proletarian outlook, Sundarayya played an outstanding role in keeping the Party on the correct path. But, still more severe test came when the India-China conflict began in 1962. at the time, the Party was still one. But, only those people who took a correct proletariat stand like P. Sundaraya and Basavapunnaiah and others were jailed by the Congress government. This section of Communists were called china agents. This happens every time when you take a correct proletarian stand. This fight, which our Party put up, which created proper proletariat international outlook, is of importance in the life of the Communist movement. If this fight was not there, the Party would have become a chauvinistic Party, completely anti-Chinese Party divorcing itself from the great victory of Chinese revolution. It was an acid test for our courage and proletariat internationalism as the fight was not only against the ruling congress government but we had to cross swords with such a big Party like the communist Party of the Soviet Union. We all pay high tributes to what CPSU is doing today. It has guarded its socialism and it is fighting Reagan’s war-mongerism. But at that time, we had to criticize that great Party also for its failure to understand what has happened on India-China border. Once again, the question comes up when one has to show courage to criticize the very big Party, to stand in defiance of the ruling Party here and also at the expense of some misunderstanding with the people of our own country. This courage comes from the firm belief in proletarian internationalism. The same leadership did not show any vacillation in expressing its differences with the Communist Party of China when they appeared to go wrong. Once again came from the innate loyalty to the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism, such qualities were in abundance in P. Sundarayya and other leaders. To honour the memory of Comrade P. Sundarayya, we have to carry forward this understanding of internationalism and strengthen it in the minds of all our Party members. Comrade P. Sundarayya along with others took a very prominent and leading role in not only fighting the right revisionism in the country but also the Naxalite dogmatism and Naxalite Left-Sectarianism. These are the reflections of two tendencies in the international communist movement – the revisionism on one hand and the sectarian dogmatism on the other hand. For standing face to face with the big parties, who in our understanding are committing mistakes, our Party got alienated from both sides and Comrade Sundarayya was singled out for leading the Party in this. When we are taking this stand, Comrade Sundarayya was the general secretary of our Party and he had to bear the burnt of attack and abuse from both sides. It is became of this quality of standing firm for the basic principles of the Party that when Party Congress took place in Calcutta, Comrade Sundarayya was unanimously elected the general secretary of the Party. One cannot forget the historic struggle of the Telangana peasants while talking about Comrade P. Sundarayya. It was the most glorious part of the history of our Communist movement. The lessons of this struggle were not completely mastered either in Andhra or anywhere else. It’s pride is not properly shared by all our Party members. The book which Comrade P. Sundarayya has written on Telangana struggle, will go a long way in teaching our people as to what great heights our Party and the people of Telangana reached during the course of this struggle. There you come to grips with the common people and you see what is made up of common man and woman when they are fired by Marxism ideology and by the ideology of agrarian revolution. Heroes are not born or drawn from the drawing rooms. Heroes are not produced only through study circles. Heroes and heroines are born when the revolutionary ideology becomes the weapon of the common man and they arise from the common man. Then you see a qualitative change in these persons who are down-trodden yesterday and would not open their mouth and put up with oppression. Then you see the fire of revolution and fire of hatred burning in them and they become qualitatively different human beings. That is what the Telangana struggle did to the peasantry of Telangana. Then the revolutionary slogans of the Party become the slogans of the masses. Stalin long ago said: the tactical slogans are meant to see that the slogans of the Party become the slogans of the masses. In Telangana, we followed the tactics which resulted in the slogans of the Party becoming slogans of the agrarian masses. This movement also showed that when the revolutionary ideology of the working class and its Party is wedded to the fighting spirit of the peasantry the real revolutionary movement is born. That leadership we could not have given without the Party, ideology of the working class and the Party bracing up the ideology of the working class. Combined with the revolutionary outlook and the revolutionary tactics of the working class movement in the agrarian revolution is the lesson that can be drawn from Telangana and Comrade P. Sundarayya’s life. If that lesson is mastered, our movement becomes ten times more powerful. Can we be able to do it? Then, we have to take the corresponding tactics of the present period so that the two revolutionary forces – the working class movement and ideology and peasant unrest and ideology, can come together. That is very important because our Party programnme also says that unity of the workers and peasants is the axis of the people’s democratic front. Comrade P. Sundarayya was able to score all these achievements because of certain special qualities in him. I have already talked about his devotion, his mingling with the masses. Perhaps there is not other leader of the CPI(M) who was moving so much with the masses, who was for the masses, from the masses and the masses; Comrade P. Sundarayya and A.K. Gopalan are the two leaders who are always with the masses. That is why, though he was implementing and carrying forward the Party line, because he was in the masses, he was able to awaken more and more masses and became an outstanding leader of the implementation of Marxism-Leninism. Another distinction in Comrade P. Sundarayya is his passion for details Comrade P. Sundarayya would not speak unless his brief was complete. He would like to make a thorough study of every problem facing him and only on the basis of that study and the details he mastered, he would venture to give guidance. For him, Party work was always planned work. It must be planned properly executed properly, and implemented properly even for an ordinary thing, he would say as if you want to do this thing, what is the Party membership and influence there? The whole idea was to find out whether the Party is in position to guide this or that thing must be firmly decided on how Party exists and it carried on its work. Another great quality of Com P. Sundarayya is his complete accessibility to the Party cadres and members. It is because of this together with all rewarded he received, he earned the confidence of the Party members, cadres and people outside the Party and he became the outstanding leader of the Party. Implementation of Party line alone would have not made him an outstanding leader. Personal sacrifice and characteristics alone would not have made him an outstanding leader. The combination of devotion towards Party line, simple life and availability to the cadres has made Comrade P. Sundarayya a complete outstanding leader. To pay tribute to his memory is to endeavor every time to become one like him, who would be equality efficient in discharging all the tasks the Party sets on us. How his personal influence also extended beyond the Party was seen yesterday when so many lakhs of people attended his funeral. The masses loved him and the other Party leaders respected him. But, it is privilege of our ranks to carry forward the heritage left by him. Let’s all be worthy of it. (Transcript of speech delivered at the Memorial Meeting for P. Sundarayya at Vijaywada on May 21, 1985.)
Posted on: Sat, 09 Nov 2013 10:14:48 +0000
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