New Delhi: Senior leader Sitaram Yechury is one of the most pleasant faces of the Communist Party of India - Marxist (CPI-M). Member of the party's politburo, he is among the most influential of the younger leaders in the party.








 


Not one to look for scapegoats, Yechury has nevertheless come clean on the recent controversy over the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) first raised by Bharatiya Janata Party leader L.K. Advani.

"The Left is not implying that it lost [the Lok Sabha elections] because of the EVMs. But it has been brought to our notice by some competent technical people how the machines can be manipulated. They demonstrated the possibility of tampering. It is not that the machines were tampered with, but if they can be, it is not good for democracy. Many countries in the West have reverted to ballot papers. We have to seriously consider this experience because it is alarming."


In an exclusive interview, Yechury spoke to Gulf News on how after the poor show in the general elections, his party intends turning things around.


GULF NEWS: There are long-standing differences within the CPI-M wherein the Kerala lobby has always dominated the West Bengal lobby? What is the main bone of contention?


SITARAM YECHURY: Kerala is the largest unit of our party, but it does not dominate. The problem is factionalism within the party born out of parliamentary opportunism. People wanting to become ministers, MPs and MLAs is eroding the basic communist ideology. All this is reflecting itself in groupism.


Despite the poor performance in the recent Lok Sabha elections, there has been no change in the party's leadership either in Kerala or West Bengal. Then how do you expect things to change?


In a communist party, things do not change with the leader. That happens in non-communist parties, where the decisions are of the leader and not of the collective. In parties where the leader is supreme and takes the decisions, this question becomes more relevant.


Valued at one time, your party's image has fallen in the eyes of the people. What ails the CPI-M?


We have done a lot of introspection and analysed a great deal. Our conclusion is that the manner in which we tried to create an alternative government to the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party-led alliances in the Lok Sabha elections, that effort was neither credible nor viable.


India is such a diverse and pluralistic country that there is a need for a non-Congress and non-BJP political alternative. But the way it was projected, it did not evoke confidence. The drive for an alternative government that was planned at a national level by us on the basis of understanding with some regional parties went wrong, apart from the specific factors that are there in Kerala and West Bengal.


Are the doctrines flawed in some manner ?


It is not the doctrines, but our tactics that were at fault. It is not as if we are fossilised in some philosophies, which are no longer relevant. In fact, our whole approach and understanding is that it (communism) is a creative science and has to keep changing with the situations. It means concrete analysis of concrete conditions, which, as we say, is the essence of our philosophy.


You have admitted that distancing from the people and issues concerning them have been the party's undoing.


In both Kerala and West Bengal we have won 32 successive elections. There have been some issues that we have taken up in West Bengal, which had created certain apprehensions in the minds of the people, particularly the agriculture sector, that there land is going to be taken over for industrialisation. Though the facts of the matter are different, the perception is something that we were not able to allay the peoples' fears on it. Our links with them became weaker and that is why we could not convince them. Now we have to rectify that.


In all these decades all sorts of wrong alien trends and tendencies have crept into the party organisation. We need to correct those.


The stage where the party has reached, there will be very less time between now and the next elections to turn things around. What is the party's strategy?


One could say, it is both a short time as well as adequate time and we hope to turn the short time into an adequate time.


It is going to be a two-pronged strategy. First, we will have to win back the confidence of the people. That will have to be through a process of rectification of our leaders at various levels and strengthening their links with the people.


Second, at the level of the governments in Kerala and West Bengal, we will have to re-orient the policies towards being more people-oriented then they presently are. It is important to pick up issues that are actually affecting the daily life of the people.


Do you think it would do some good if there were a merger between the CPI and the CPI-M?


The unity among the Left parties has been improving and the merger can happen in two ways. One, by way of a handshake between the leaderships followed by the announcement of the merger. The other through a process that can come from the bottom, where all our mass organisations, trade unions and student youth organisations can start working together.


That is the manner in which we feel unity will be sustainable.


Of late, there have been instances when major decisions were taken by the Politburo while you were away. Were these timed deliberately?


I agree it has happened on two-three occasions, but there was nothing deliberate. I travelled on the basis of the party decisions and some major decisions took place while I was away.


 


Were you consulted before the decisions?


No, in our party, the normal practice is all those who are available at that time take a decision.


 


One of the decisions was regarding former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee. Don't you think the party has wronged by 'driving out' a veteran leader, from the organisation?


It is unfortunate that he is no longer with us. But I will not say that the party had driven him out. The situation was such that he took a position which was not tenable with the party's position. I wish such a situation had not arisen.


What are your personal ambitions in the party?


Personal ambitions do not drive me. There are larger social ambitions. I sincerely believe positions come to you only when you do not seek them. My ambitions are of changing the society and having a more egalitarian society.


Profile: Long journey from Hyderabad to the corridors of power 

- August 12, 1952 Born to Kalpakkam and Sarveshwara Somayajulu Yechury in Hyderabad.
- Early education at the All Saints High School, Hyderabad. 
- 1969 Moved to Delhi. 
- 1970 Stood first in the All India merit list in Higher Secondary.
- 1973 BA (Honours) in Economics from St. Stephen's College, Delhi University.
- 1975 M.A. in Economics from Jawaharlal Nehru University.
- 1974 Joined the Students Federation of India (SFI). 
- 1975 Joined CPI-M and was arrested during the Emergency. 
- 1972-78 President of the JNU Students Union. 
- 1978 All India President of SFI. 
- 1984-85 Joined the Central Committee of the CPI-M. 
- 1992 Elected to the Politburo. 
- 2005 Elected member of the Rajya Sabha. 
- Currently a Politburo member.