Published: Liberation, June 1968
Source: Selected Works of Charu Mazumdar
Transcription: CPI-ML
HTML Markup: Nik McDonald for MIA, June 2006
Public Domain: Marxists Internet Archive (2006). You may freely copy, distribute, display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet Archive” as your source.
The victory of the People's Democratic Revolution in this country of 500 million people will lead to the inevitable collapse of world imperialism and revisionism.
The People's Democratic Revolution in this country can be led to a victorious end only in opposition to all the imperialist powers of the world. Particularly, we shall have to reckon with U. S. imperialism, the leader of world imperialism. U. S. imperialism has not only adopted all the aggressive features of prewar Germany, Italy and Japan, but has further developed them to a great extent. It has extended its aggressive activities to all corners of the globe and has enmeshed India in its neocolonialist bondage. The Vietnamese people are in the forefront of the struggle against this aggressive imperialism, which is raging in the countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America. The victorious Indian revolution will destroy this imperialist monster.
The People's Democratic Revolution in this country will have to be carried through to a victorious end by actively opposing the Soviet Union- the lard of the great October Socialist Revolution. This is because the present leaders of the Soviet state, party and army have adopted a revisionist line and set up bourgeois dictatorship in their country. In collusion with the U. S. imperialists, they have extended their exploitation and established their domination over various countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America. In India, the Soviet leaders have become the chief pedler of U. S. imperialism despite their flaunting of the name of the great Lenin. With the help of their stooges (the Dange clique and the neo-revisionist clique), nurtured by themselves, the Soviet leaders are turning India into a field for their unrestricted exploitation and are deceiving the fighting masses, thus proving themselves to be the running dogs of U. S. imperialism and friends of the Indian reactionaries. The victory of the Indian revolution will not only bury Soviet revisionism and its Indian lackeys in the soil of India, but also ensure its death all over the world.
The People's Democratic Revolution in our country can be led to a victorious end only on the basis of the thought of Chairman Mao. The extent to which one assimilates and applies the thought of the Chairman will determine whether one is a revolutionary or not. Moreover, the extent of the revolutionary upsurge will depend on how widely we can spread and propagate the Chairman's thought among the peasants and workers. This is because the Chairman's thought is not merely the Marxism-Leninism of the present era, the Chairman has advanced Marxism-Leninism itself to a completely new stage. That is why the present era has become the era of the Chairman's thought.
The People's Democratic Revolution in India has to be directed against the bureaucrat and comprador bourgeoisie in the country and against feudal exploitation in the vast rural areas. Because forty crores of people out of the total population of fifty crores live in the rural areas in our country and because even today, feudal exploitation continues to be the main form of exploitation to which they are subjected, the contradiction between the peasants and the landlords in the countryside remains even today the main contradiction. This contradiction can only be resolved in the countryside through the establishment of liberated zones by the peasants' armed forces under working class leadership. This is the biggest and most important task that faces us today, for India is at present going through a period of revolutionary upsurge and this path pointed out by the Chairman is being increasingly accepted by growing numbers of peasants and revolutionary masses.
Our revolution has to be directed against the Congress government which represents the bureaucrat and comprador bourgeoisie and which, frightened by the postwar mass upheaval, came to terms with the imperialists with the help of the feudal lords. The leaders of the so-called Communist Party of India actively cooperated with these reactionary forces either in the name of making compromises or by open betrayal. They have disgraced the red banner which was dyed in the blood of the heroes of Kayyur, the fighters of Punnapra and Vayullur, the fearless heroes of Telengana and hundreds of martyrs of Bengal and other parts of the country. Today, all the political parties of India have turned into active accomplices of U.S. imperialism, Soviet revisionism and Indian reactionaries, and become enemies of the revolution. That is why the new democratic revolution in India can be victorious only under the leadership of the working class and by following the thought of the Chairman.
To organize this new-democratic revolution and lead it to victory we need a party of the working class, a Communist Party, whose political ideology will be Marxism-Leninism and its highest development-the thought of Mao Tse-tung. But how can such a party be built? Could we perhaps gather together the various so-called Marxists who profess the thought of Chairman Mao Tse-tung and revolt against the leadership of their party, and declare that a Maoist party has been formed? Certainly not. Because merely raising the banner of revolt is not enough to build up a Maoist party. These rebel comrades must apply in practice the thought of the Chairman and must thereby train up worker and peasant cadres. Only then can we claim to have made progress in building up a genuine Maoist party.
The old political cadres will no doubt be in such a party. But, basically, such a party will be formed with the youth of the working class, the peasantry and the toiling middle class, who not only accept the thought of the Chairman in words but also apply the same in their own lives, spread and propagate it among the broad masses and build bases of armed struggle in the countryside. Such a party will not only be a revolutionary party but will at the same time be the people's armed forces and the people's state power. Each and every member of such a party must participate in struggles in the military, political, economic and cultural spheres. We must immediately take in hand the task of building such a party. It may not be possible right now to build up such a party on an all-lndia basis but that should not discourage us. We must begin our work wherever we can build up such a party no matter how small that area may be. We must shed fears of being in the minority and advance with unshakable faith in the thought of the Chairman. Our task is in no way easy, but is extremely difficult. Our struggle will generate new enthusiasm in the minds of all the fighting people of the world. Only thus can we successfully help the heroic fighters of Vietnam. Only such a revolutionary party can successfully lead the armed struggle and build up the broadest united front-the two weapons with which the revolution can be led to a victorious end.
Those who think that our main task is to attract the great majority of the members of the so-called Marxist parties towards us and that a revolutionary party can be built up in this way, are consciously or unconsciously thinking of forming only another party for fighting elections. They forget that the members of these so-called Marxist parties, whatever revolutionary qualities they may still possess, have been accustomed to the practice of unadulterated revisionism and as a result of this practice, have lost many of their revolutionary qualities. They must undergo the process of new practice to become revolutionaries again. This is why a revolutionary party cannot be built up by relying upon the members of the old party. The new party must be built up with the fresh revolutionary youth of the working class, the peasantry and the middle class by educating them in the thought of the Chairman and through revolutionary practice.
The primary condition for building up a revolutionary party is to organize armed struggle in the countryside. Until this task is taken in hand all talk of revolution simply amounts to accepting revolution in words only. And so they are, as the Chairman has said, revolutionaries in words. But our party will be built up with those who are revolutionaries in deeds. Otherwise, the party will be reduced to a debating society, like the Burdwan plenum(*).
What happened at Burdwan? The Soviet ruling clique has become the number one enemy of the national liberation movements of various countries and is openly working for the destruction of the national revolutions; yet, people engaged themselves in a heated controversy at Burdwan over the extent of restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union. To engage oneself in a controversy over the restoration of capitalism in a country where the proletarian dictatorship has already been abolished and bourgeois dictatorship established, is to confuse the people and to blunt the edge of struggle against the main enemy. So, what happened at Burdwan has gladdened the hearts of the revisionists of the world, and marks the success of the revisionist conspiracy. Not a single person attending the Burdwan plenum broke away from these revisionist traitors.
So, if we rely on the revolutionary force inside the party we shall never be able to build up a revolutionary party. We must lay our main stress on the hundreds of thousands of young people outside the party. Only then can we build up a genuinely revolutionary party and establish revolutionary bases of armed struggle.
Comrades! A great responsibility rests on us. All the reactionaries of the world have turned our country into their base and are using it as the centre for destroying the liberation struggles of Southeast Asia. They are trying to use India as their base for supplying cannon-fodder for their aggression against the great Chinese people. It was precisely this that the renegade Kosygin, Tito and Chester Bowles conspired about with Indira Gandhi in New Delhi recently. So, to make revolution in our country is a great international responsibility. This is exactly why the little spark of Naxalbari brings joy and enthusiasm to the fighting people of entire Southeast Asia, to the leaders of the great Chinese Party-the leaders of the world revolution and to the revolutionary peoples of the entire world.
A most sacred international responsibility lies on our shoulders and we absolutely must fulfill it. There is no doubt that this would demand heavy sacrifices from us, but what revolutionary ever feared to make sacrifice?
Chairman Mao teaches: We must dare to fight and dare to win. He is still with us. Victory shall be ours!
Long live Chairman Mao Tse-tung!
A long, long life to Chairman Mao!
Long live India's new-democratic revolution!