International Encyclopedia of Revolution and Protest

Extract

Charu Mazumdar joined the Communist Party of India (CPI) in 1941 and participated in the Tebhaga Movement of 1946 (demanding two-thirds of the crop for sharecroppers). This movement, led by the CPI-dominated Kisan Sabhas (peasants' association) in rural Bengal, petered out after independence under massive repression. The lessons of Tebhaga led Mazumdar to conclude that the peasants had to be equipped to face armed state repression. During the Sino-Indian border dispute of 1962, Mazumdar was arrested for raising pro-Chinese slogans and holding the Nehru government responsible for the dispute. By 1964 the CPI had transformed substantially from Stalinism to social democracy, abandoning all pretence to a revolution. This led to the split of 1964, whereby the Stalinists and Maoists in the CPI walked out of the Tenali Convention and formed the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI (M)). Mazumdar joined the new party in the hope that the CPI (M) would finally launch a class struggle. In 1967 India was preparing for the fourth general elections in which both of the communist parties participated. Mazumdar did not approve of CPI (M)'s participation. As is evidenced by his article “Eight Documents,” written between 1965 and 1967, he aimed at a struggle against revisionism, pushing for peasant uprisings and formation of a genuine revolutionary party which would engage in guerrilla warfare ... log in or subscribe to read full text