To Shake Hands or Not? CPI(M)’s Congress Dilemma (Ajoy Ashirwad Mahaprashasta)

(The Wire - 17 September 2016)

By calling the BJP ‘authoritarian’ and not ‘fascist’, Prakash Karat is attempting to assert himself and his group within the party, which is now considered to be firmly under the control of Sitaram Yechury.
The future path that the party must tread is causing schismatic changes. Credit: PTI

Sitharam Yechury, CPI(M) General Secretary and Prakash Karat (right) during a party meeting before the Bengal polls. Credit: PTI.

New Delhi: Not everything is well within the ranks of the Communist Party of India (Marxist). Over the past two years, India’s biggest left-wing party has been debating how best to fight the revitalised onslaught of Hindutva forces, particularly with the Bharatiya Janata Party government at the Centre. However, the question of whether the party should align with the Congress or not in this struggle seems to have divided its rank and file. A few months ago, the party found itself in a rather awkward situation when during the assembly poll in West Bengal it fought the incumbent Trinamool Congress (TMC) in alliance with the Congress even while opposing the latter in the simultaneously-held Kerala election. [. . .]

FULL TEXT: http://thewire.in/66611/shake-hands-not-cpi-ms-congress-dilemma/