The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was a product of the NGO Kabir, and the movement India against Corruption (IAC), both of which were led by Arvind Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia. Like the other NGO Parivartan, Kabir also focused on RTI issues and participatory governance. However, unlike Parivartan, it accepted institutional donations. The IAC came into prominence in the 2012 mass movement for the Jan Lokpal Bill (JLPB) led by Anna Hazare, Kejriwal, Kiran Bedi, etc.
This movement and later AAP boasted to carry on the JLPB movement to its logical conclusion and gave it a ‘slogan‘ – “Political revolution has begun.”
Like any other bourgeois party, it still claims to be continuing a revolution. It is a different matter that earlier too, they had stated in their rallies, statements and processions that the revolutionary era comes once in decades – and the people must not miss the opportunity, failing which they may have to wait for many more years! Now, they are busy in bourgeois politics and in bourgeois propaganda. The latest fallout of this is in the Punjab unit of AAP, where Kejriwal gave a written apology to Majithia, the Shiromani Akali Dal leader, after blaming him for drug trafficking.
Why has the AAP failed? In my opinion, it’s probably because the AAP never had an aim or a vision of any revolution, and it never wanted any Swaraj at the national level. They never worked for the ‘people’s democracy’ (which is different to today’s bourgeois democracy) – even though they were not anti-people or not as corrupt as their counterparts (the Congress, BJP and their various allies in past or present).
I believe that they only wanted to serve capitalism – or to control the capitalists, big or small, at most. Those hopes also evaporated after they expelled Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan! The contrast and contradictions between ‘reformism’ and ‘revolution’ was very clearly visible then.
The present Dalit movement is different than the AAP’s. Yet, there are some similarities between the two. I think both uphold capitalism and the pillars of bourgeois democracy, including the Constitution, which Baba Saheb Ambedkar wanted to burn after five years of its creation. However, the present version of the Constitution has changed qualitatively from its original form, by way of alterations made by successive Congress and BJP governments. This Constitution has often been amended to aid the big capitalists, like Ambani, who seem to be the de facto rulers today. In fact, the AAP had filed an FIR against Reliance Industries Limited (RIL), to which RIL responded by saying that the AAP wasn’t even entitled to do so.
By upholding this Constitution, what are we trying to achieve? Our own bourgeois rights to share money and power? This has only deepened the miseries of the workers – Dalit workers, women workers, workers belonging to the tribal and minority communities, child labourers and all the others, whether in the fields, factories or other services.
‘Dalitism’ is a part of bourgeois politics, just as feminism is, to an extent. Without a proletarian revolution, the emancipation of Dalits or any other exploited and oppressed sections of the society is not possible. At the same time, it is also true that without the participation of Dalits, women, people from tribal communities, a revolution cannot happen in India.
Which Comes First – Class Or Caste?
This debate is eternal, especially among the ‘revolutionaries’, Dalit leaders and the Left ideologues. During the Telangana movement (1945 to 1952), it was seen that the boundaries of caste, religion and region had crumbled. Ignorance and superstition were at their lowest levels among the participants.
A revolution has an all-round effect on the people, on their thinking, ideas, eating and living norms, hygiene, education, their comradeship and spiritualism. The question of whether caste or class comes first is absurd during the time of a revolution – and is probably only valid for the reformists, bourgeois politicians, or say, the social democrats.
A communist or a communist party is supposed to be very sensitive to the causes of all the oppressed and exploited sections of the society. The Dalit question is a big issue for them and the progressive forces, as the attacks on women and people from tribal and minority communities by the RSS and various other groups has increased manifold, in recent times.
Currently, these attacks are being ‘used’ by the middle- and upper-class Dalits, including those in the Congress, BJP and the independents, to build up their own social bases and political mileage, which eventually turns out to be an exercise in sharing power and money in a bourgeois plunder. And they have an opportunity to do so, as the massive loss of the BSP in the UP election earlier had bewildered the Dalits. As far as the Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) of Bihar is concerned, I think they are hand in glove with the exploiters themselves, even though they may be fishing in troubled waters.
Recently though, the outcome of the UP by-election has given a boost to the politics of ‘Dalitism’, after the alliance between the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).
If the aim is clear (a classless society and the freedom of people from all forms of exploitation with the help of others), the path must also be clear. The slogan, “Workers of the world, unite!” is very meaningful and equally simple to understand and follow. It must be implemented if a united struggle to dispossess the exploiters (that is, the ruling class) is to take place.
What Is To Be Done?
Is there any alternative other than raising the class consciousness of the exploited masses, training them, uniting and leading them for a final attack on the exploiters (the capitalist class) – dispossessing them and then establishing the proletarian hegemony?
The old and bourgeois Left are obsolete and have almost been condemned to the dustbin of history. New revolutionary organisations are emerging – and I think a revolution is lurking on the horizon, because millions of workers have now risen up!
Do you see how relevant Bhagat Singh and his party, the Hindustan Socialist Republic Association, are, today?
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Featured image used for representative purposes only.