A ground rule for a columnist is that he should not write about himself, except when doing so is required to make a larger point of public importance. I, therefore, seek readers’ indulgence for the personalised nature of this week’s column, which is about an issue that has caused me deep anguish.That the relations between the CPM and RSS-BJP are far from cordial is well known. In Kerala, they are marked by recurrent violent clashes resulting in the loss of precious lives. The victims, mostly, are RSS workers, a truth that can be easily verified by the number and identity of those killed. It is further reinforced by the fact that Communists have been the dominant political force in Kerala, where the BJP has so far won not a single MLA or MP seat. Recently, some RSS swayamsevaks were murdered in Kannur. A few days later, there was an attack on A.K. Gopalan Bhavan, the CPM headquarters in New Delhi. On the same night, there was an attack in Bangalore on the residence of V.J.K. Nair, secretary of the CPM’s Karnataka unit. I am greatly alarmed and distressed by this train of events.For me, V.J.K. Nair is not just another name. He was my leader and close comrade during my association with the CPM, as an activist in its student and trade union organisations in Karnataka in the early 1980s. They were some of the best years of my life, since I learnt about the life of poor workers first-hand by living with them, participating, along with Nair, in numerous struggles with them and also, on a couple of occasions, going to jail with them. I was much impressed by Nair’s (and his wife Rajamma’s) fighting spirit, impeccable integrity and selfless devotion to the cause of the downtrodden and exploited.A Malayali based in Bangalore, he was incarcerated for 19 months during the Emergency in the same jail in which L.K. Advani and other stalwarts of the Opposition were imprisoned. Although I ended my association with the CPM in the late 1980s (one of the reasons for doing so was the Indian Communists’ justification of the unbelievable level of violence perpetrated by the communist rulers in the Soviet Union and China), and later started working for the BJP, my personal regard for Nair and several other leaders of the CPM and CPI has remained undiminished. Just as I have been influenced by the life and teachings of Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya, I cannot deny — and never will disown — the inspiration I have received from the lives of great Communist leaders such as AKG and P. Sundarayya.A few days ago, I received an e-mail from Nair, which mirrored both his concern and conviction. “I am forwarding these pictures for you to see. It is the scene after criminals attacked my home on the night of 9th March. They failed to get me as I was away. Otherwise the hacker’s knife, seen in one of the pictures on the bed, would have ended my life and I would not have been writing these lines . . . I am writing this to you only because I consider that you had been the liberal face of the BJP . . . I used to see your column in Blitz, and recall your arguing with me that Marxism and Hinduism must come together for the good of our country. I have been working hard for the last 40 years for the good of our country. I have never worked against any religion, much less the Hindu religion. But I can never accept the argument that it will be in the interest of Hinduism to kill Marxists. I am sure of one thing. These methods definitely go against the grain of our country’s development. How can the country progress with rule of law and principles of democracy being thrown to the winds?”I condemn the attack on A.K.G. Bhavan in New Delhi and Nair’s home in Bangalore. At the same time, I believe that the CPM leaders too have a duty to introspect whether the methods of terror that their party employs against RSS workers in Kerala and political opponents in West Bengal can be justified on any ground. The situation, as it is now developing, has dangerous portents. There must be firm and honest recognition on both sides that, in a democracy, violence can never be the way to score over one’s ideological and political opponents. It is high time that some eminent public figures came forward to act as intermediaries to establish a dialogue between the rival groups.Let me add here that during my years in the Prime Minister’s Office, I was involved in a small, albeit stumbling, effort in this direction, along with my good friend M.A. Baby, a senior CPM leader in Kerala, who is now the state’s education minister. Baby was the president of the Students Federation of India when I was an activist of this students’ wing of the CPM. For the sake of India and its democracy, we must strengthen our age-old ethos of tolerating and respecting differences in ideology, rather than resorting to violence in a bid to silence one’s opponents. sudheenkulkarni@gmail.com
