Storm On The Red Sea

• November 2006 The Sachar panel report on Muslims reveals that the community is badly off in Left-ruled West Bengal.
  
• March 14, 2007 Police firing in Nandigram kills 14 villagers protesting the setting up of an SEZ on their farmland. Liberal left-leaning intellectuals and right activist up in arms. The Nandigram episode is expected to haunt the Left in elections to come. It already took a toll in last year's panchayat elections.
  
• September 21, 2007 The alleged murder of Rizwanur Rehman who eloped with the daughter of a rich well-connected Hindu businessman becomes a source of major embarrassment.
  
• November 21, 2007 Violence erupts in Calcutta over Taslima Nasreen. Muslim groups wanted the writer-in-exile to leave the city. She leaves the following day.
  
• July 8, 2008 After weeks of dithering, Left withdraws support to the UPA government over the N-deal. Left wants Speaker Somnath Chatterjee to quit. But he hangs in. UPA later wins trust vote.
  
• October 3, 2008 Tatas pull out Nano project from Singur, shift to Gujarat. A big blow to the Buddhadeb Bhattacharya government.

• September 2006 CM Achuthanandan urges the Centre for a CBI probe into the Kiliroor sex scandal allegedly involving the sons of two CPI(M) ministers belonging to the Pinarayi Vijayan camp.
  
• December 2006 CM feigns ignorance of an ADB loan negotiated by the local self-government department for city corporations. The politburo intervenes and pushes the loan.
  
• December 2006 CM directs IG Rishiraj Singh to raid a CD unit run by the wife of an officer close to Pinarayi camp. The DGP calls off the raid.
  
• May 2007 CM sends three handpicked officers to the Munnar hills to bulldoze illegal constructions. Part of the local CPI office razed. The mission is later aborted.
  
• November 2008Political secretary to the Kerala CM visits the Bangalore house of Maj Sandeep Unnikrishan, martyred in 26/11. But he never lets it be known that he has come at the government’s behest, resulting in a huge embarrassment for the CM. He later visits but is sounded off...which led to the infamous "dogs wouldn’t visit" comment.
  
• January 2009CBI sends request to Kerala governor R.S. Gavai for sanction to prosecute Pinarayi. This sharpens the divide.
  
• February 2009 As a pressure tactic, VS keeps off Pinarayi’s much-touted Nava Kerala Yatra.

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Central government sources told Outlook that while there is certainly a case worth investigating, the CPI(M)'s accusation on the "politically motivated" timing of it is equally true. "You can't frontally attack the Congress at every opportunity and then," said these sources, "hope for a friendly cover-up". The key issue relates to the contractual promise made by SNC-Lavalin—as an aside to the CPI(M)—to give Rs 98 crore to finance a cancer hospital in Malabar, which it apparently reneged on, giving only Rs 8.98 crore. The Congress alleges the company did deliver the rest of the money but it ended up in the CPI(M)'s party coffers.

Given the pace and tenor of investigations into instances of corruption, the CPI(M) may well have succeeded in riding the scam. Unfortunately for them, their own chief minister, V.S. Achuthanandan, who has been engaged in a bitter ideological and political battle with Pinarayi for many years now, has refused to toe the central line. Humiliated by the party—which has ensured that his cabinet is packed with Pinarayi loyalists who in turn miss no opportunity to embarrass him—he has reportedly presented the leadership with a 302-page document. The document includes the state Comptroller and Auditor General's indictment that the state had lost Rs 374.5 crore in the deal, the Balanandan committee report which had recommended that the renovation/modernisation of the three power plants in Kerala be given to Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd, rather than to the Canadian conglomerate SNC-Lavalin; and the State Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau's chargesheet against eight officials in the deal. This is to demonstrate that he cannot bypass the CBI's request and retain his credibility with the masses (indeed, Achuthanandan was made CM because of the widespread grassroots support he enjoys, rather than to the traditionalist position he clings to). Complicating the situation is a letter purportedly written by the late party veteran E. Balanandan in 2005 warning the CPI(M) leadership about the implications of the SNC-Lavalin deal (the CPI(M) denies any such letter). "Let us not forget," a sympathetic central committee member told Outlook, "that the CM is not just a partyman. ..he is also a constitutional authority. Now that the CBI has asked the governor for permission to prosecute Pinarayi, the issue has to be discussed by the cabinet. It would not be proper for him to take a position as yet." But he also admitted the stand-off was embarrassing the party and he'd rather not speculate on the outcome.

It is this battle that will be played out on February 14, when the CPI(M) politburo meets in Delhi to try and resolve the long-running war between the two men. Top sources in the CPI(M) indicated to Outlook that Achuthanandan would be asked to toe the party line. Asked what the party would do if he refused to oblige, the reply was: "We don't think that will happen." But long-time CPI(M) watchers are not so sanguine: they say given the hard position Achuthanandan has taken, he might find it hard to retract—in which case his exit cannot be ruled out. And that will certainly give the Congress some fodder for its 'Save Kerala' campaign. "Transparency in public life is the most important issue here," state Congress chief Ramesh Chennithala said recently, adding, "Unfortunately the CPI(M) is trying to shield the culprits...we'll expose them to the people."

The fact that the CPI(M) politburo so readily and fiercely endorsed the Kerala unit's stand is being attributed to two reasons: one, Kerala, with only about 3.10 per cent of the country's population, still accounts for 34.28 per cent of the CPI(M)'s nationwide membership of 9,82,155. Two, the state unit controls several businesses and has demonstrated an ability to attract donations from commercial interests, making it a big contributor to the party's national coffers.

Red stains: Buddhadeb addresses a CPI(M) rally at the Calcutta Maidan

If the news from Kerala is giving the party sleepless nights, the news from West Bengal isn't very promising either. The Opposition Trinamool Congress is using the Kerala case to hit out at the CPI(M) in the state. "There are several NGOs here benefiting financially because of their proximity to members of the ruling Communist Party," TMC leader Partho Chatterjee alleged to Outlook, adding that "these need to be investigated. If the CBI can chargesheet a CPI(M) secretary in Kerala for corruption, why shouldn't they do the same in West Bengal?"

He cites the case of central committee member Nilotpal Basu who had reportedly taken bank loans for his NGO, GRASSO, but failed to pay back, and Tamluk MP Lakshman Seth who leased out 37 acres of land in the heart of the industrial town of Haldia to the Indian Centre for Advancement of Research and Education (ICARE), an NGO run by him, for as little as one rupee an acre. Basu, when contacted, said, "I am chairman of an NGO which tries to facilitate employment in the telecom sector. Initially, it worked well, but later our business model failed when the CDMA platform was replaced by GSM technology. We are now in the midst of negotiations with the bank on how to resolve the matter." Other NGOs too have come in for opposition ire. They include Suchetana, run by CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharya's daughter, and Pather Panchali, run by transport minister Subhas Chakraborty's wife Romola.

But these accusations are small change when compared to the message delivered last year by the state panchayat polls. It was that the CPI(M) party machine could be breached in its citadel. The people demonstrated that they were no longer prepared—after 32 years of unbroken, absolute rule—to tolerate the corruption, arrogance and poor governance visible at the lowest levels of the panchayat administration. The results also, worryingly, highlighted a growing alienation among Muslims, who account for 27 per cent of the state's population. Since most Bengali Muslims are farmers, the land acquisition issue, symbolised by Nandigram and Singur, hit them hard. In addition, the Sachar report, which confirmed that employment figures for Muslims in the state were abysmal, was used by the Jamait Ulema-e-Hind's Siddiqullah Chowdhury to fuel the discontent. Indeed, in the panchayat elections, the Muslims were at the forefront of the cry for "poriborton" (change) here.

While state CPI(M) leaders say efforts are being made to increase educational facilities for Muslims—an Aligarh Muslim University campus is being planned in Murshidabad, Kolkata Madrassa has been given deemed university status and 400-odd madrassas are being modernised—partymen from outside the state admit there are serious problems. "Leaders in West Bengal are not prepared to accept that barring land reforms, which helped everyone including Muslims (and which was undermined because of Nandigram), there has been discrimination against the community," said one such leader. This curious overlap between community and class "is something we will have to grapple with".

Indeed, today, apart from cases of corruption, big and small, indiscipline and factionalism—all signs of decay—the CPI(M) is also going through a crisis of identity. In West Bengal, the question of Muslim alienation evokes troubling precedents. Community blocs being antipathetic to the party, like the Christians and Nairs in Kerala, has always been a serious issue because the Communists find it difficult to fill the breach. The party may still be congratulating itself that its opposition to reforms in banking, insurance, pension funds—and to full capital account convertibility—helped shield the Indian economy partially from the body blow it might have otherwise suffered. But the fact is that the Left derived its ability to influence policy because of its numbers. If those numbers shrink, it will diminish its capacity to remain relevant. And so in Bihar, the party will be forging an electoral alliance with a party that was once its sworn enemy, the CPI(ML), and across the country, it is looking for friends among former partners of the BJP. Clearly, the CPI(M) needs not just to cleanse itself and retain its strength but also reinvent itself for the 21st century.