The CPI(M)-led Opposition lDF in Kerala, currently facing a huge crisis in the context of the terrible defeat in the recent Assembly election and the rapid growth of the BJP in the State, is divided over the proposal to drop its image of being the protector of minorities and play the Hindu card as a strategy to ensure survival.
A section in the Kerala left is convinced that its version of secularism, which is tilted in favour of minorities, would only expedite the process of alienation of Hindus from it as had become evident in the outcome of the Assembly by-poll in Aruvikkara where a large number of Hindus who had traditionally been supporters of the lDF had voted for the BJP candidate.
The leader of those who advocate shunning of pro-minority secularism is Kanam Rajendran, State secretary of the CPI, who last weekend equated the leftist version of secularism to minority appeasement. “We can’t afford to ignore the social realities while taking decisions in the future,” says Kanam.
According to the CPI leader, it is high time the left parties positioned themselves as supporters of the majority community considering the fact that minorities in the State have already become majority. “It is not that we have lost our hopes on the minorities. But we should protect our (real) vote-bank,” he told a Malayalam TV channel.
Pointing out that Hindus, who had constituted 56 percent of Kerala’s population as per the 2001 census, had been reduced to a minority with just 48 percent in 2011, though the results of that census are yet to be announced officially, Kanam says, “The left parties have the responsibility to analyze the situation in the light of this social reality.”
Kanam says that the ideological barrier between the left and Hindutwa forces had thinned leading to a situation where the Hindus, who had been traditional supporters of the left, have started migrating to the BJP. The left should examine whether the pro-minority secularism has been leading to social imbalance.
However, the CPI(M), leader of the lDF, is not yet ready to accept Kanam’s call. According to State CPI(M) secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, Kanam’s theory that the left’s secularism is a policy of appeasement of minorities is an RSS propaganda point. “If the left takes up this attitude, it would cause serious setbacks to the left movement itself,” said Kodiyeri.
But several senior leaders of the CPI(M) secretly admit that left’s idea of secularism is riddled with ambiguities. “It is an undisputable fact that majority of the party’s workers and supports are from the majority community but the party as such has a carefully constructed image of being the protector of the minorities,” said a district-level CPI(M) leader in Thrissur.
“This political hypocrisy is not going to help us when the BJP is there as the wholesale protectors of the Hindus,” he said. According to this leader, party’s aversion to the theory put forward by Kanam is caused by confusion rather than ideological clarity.
“There is a section in our party which still wants to bring the Muslim league and (Church-backed) Kerala Congress-M (allies of the Congress) into the lDF. But Kanam is putting forward a proposal which is directly against this,” he said. Kanam has already said that the CPI is against the plan to rope in the Muslim league and a section of the KC(M) into the lDF.
Supporters of Kanam’s theory say adopting a pro-majority stand is the only long-term measure to ensure the lDF’s survival and to counter the BJP’s political offensive. “The RSS is using the support of Hindus to establish fascism. It is the duty of the left to counter this even if it has to project itself as a pro-Hindu force, at least as a political tactic,” said a former CPI(M) theorist.