Soviet Military Intervention in Czechoslovakia and Revisionism

CZECHOSLOVAK INCIDENT AND REVISIONISM 317

Soviet Military Intervention inCzechoslovakia and Revisionism

The commotion over the Soviet militaryintervention in Czechoslovakia in 1968 hadbrought in its wake open controversies withinthe communist parties in different countries,while the imperialists did not fail to utilize theissue to whip up their tirade againstcommunism. Confusion had swamped therank and file communists in our country andelsewhere, too. Comrade Ghosh, in thisdiscussion, answered all the questions raisedby comrades and also pointed out all otherfactors at work behind the outbreak of thisdangerous phenomenon of revisionism.

Comrades,

I have for long been listening to many a question thathave come up at this meeting of the party workers convenedto discuss the issue of the Soviet military intervention inCzechoslovakia. So, it may be that while I discuss, someimportant questions are left out inadvertently. If thathappens, please do point it out.

I want to emphasize a point at the very outset. Whileexamining the Soviet intervention in Czechoslovakia if wedo not keep in mind the analysis and the stand of our party onthe communist movement in the present internationalsituation, especially the party’s analysis in its totalityregarding the problems and complexities arising in thecommunist movement at present as also the danger of modernrevisionism, somehow or other, we are apt to commit

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mistakes. That means, even if the content of our views are inthe main correct, yet while determining the point of emphasiswhen analysing the issue or criticizing some aspects, thepossibility remains of our committing some mistakes. I think,in one sense, the issue has come up in a quite simple andstraightforward way. There is not much complexity involved,although a world-wide furore has been raised. If you notecritically, you would realize that this commotion has beencreated largely in the capitalist-imperialist world. Also, thisissue as an important question has created a considerable stiramong those who are called revisionists in the communistmovement, whom we, too, consider revisionists. TheCommunist Party of China, the Albanian Party of Labour, andI think those who are still guarding the bastion of the basicrevolutionary theory of Marxism-Leninism in differentcountries and have been upholding the basic revolutionaryfervour and tuning — whatever be their shortcomings andlimitations — to them the issue has not been a matter of greatconcern, nor does it appear as a very surprising developmentso as to cause a tremendous stir.

Soviet revisionism basically responsibleIn fact, it is essential to understand clearly that the

revisionist outlook of the present Soviet leadership is thebasic problem or the basic factor behind the Czechoslovakincident. All of you present here have heard our party’s standmany a time, and yourselves know that the present Sovietleadership has been treading the revisionist path. What do wemean by this ? We mean that, by disregarding the law ofsocialist economic development in their bid to anyhowincrease production, they are virtually fostering the capitalisttrend and tendency. What is more, they have opened the doorfor rejuvenation of that internal social force which promptsthe restoration of capitalism, and though that force had notdied out totally, it had been very much cornered and almostbrought to the point of extinction. Clearly, thereby they have


stepped into the trap set up by these forces. How far alignmentor conscious agreement with the imperialists outside or theirmachinations have been operative or active in this regard —our party has never shown any interest in it. Our party has,however, shown that so long as correct implementation of thelaw of socialist economic development had not caused anyimpairment of the fundamental revolutionary role of theSoviet Union, despite some mistakes and shortcomings hereand there, the political structure, the character of the Sovietstate and of the party, its basic international revolutionary role,everything stood on a firm footing; but now, this economicoutlook and approach which is unscientific and has comeabout disregarding the law of socialist economicdevelopment, has in effect struck at the very roots. It is thecapitalist tendency which has made inroads in the economicsphere that provides the basis for the theory which hasappeared today at the political level in the Soviet Union.

Root of tendency of capitalist restorationWhy has this come about ? The seeds of capitalism

which had lost effectiveness and were dying — how did theseget revived and sprout up ? Not only have these sprouted upat present and appeared as a tendency, may not be a dominanttendency, but all this reflects a powerful trend tarnishing theimage of the whole party and socialism itself. In fact, in thepolitical analysis of the world situation, economic conditionand economic relations by the Soviet leadership, this verything has happened to some extent. They are denigratingMarxism, and the thinking they are reflecting in the name ofMarxism is wrong. Our party had come to a conclusion aboutthe root cause of these mistakes. We had observed that therole of the present immature political leadership there wasacting as a cause behind all this and had brought about allthis. This economic force did not grow and develop just byits own law. This tendency, which I call the capitalisttendency, had been suppressed and was almost on the verge

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of elimination in the Soviet Union, but still it was there. Forinstance, the system of collective farming is there and alsoproduction of commodities and commodity circulation andthe existence of individual property like houses, money, bankdeposits, etc. The law of value is operative there. All thisshows that the seeds of private property have not beendestroyed there. And so long as these seeds remain, thetendency of capitalist restoration in the economy would alsobe there. But the present Soviet leadership does not acceptthis. They think that since the state ownership over industrystill holds sway, the capitalistic tendency cannot come backin any way. But all those acquainted with the theory ofscientific socialism and its economic principles know thatthis is nothing but hollow logic. On this, Lenin has repeatedlycautioned that even after the socialist revolution andestablishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat, so long assmall production is not totally eliminated, so long as privateproperty exists in any form without complete transformationinto social ownership, and commodity production andcirculation are also there, the seeds of capitalism remainembedded within society. And as long as these remain, thetendency of restoration of capitalism remains. But the morethe consolidation and victories of socialism, the more thistendency loses its strength, the more cornered it becomes inthe economic sphere and loses its power to attack, resist andbring about counter-revolution, although the class strugglebecomes more intense and acute and assumes a more subtleform in the superstructure, that is, in the ideological andcultural spheres. The significance of Lenin’s observation thatthe attacks of the bourgeoisie increase tenfold after they arethrown out of power lies precisely here. People all over theworld and we, too, believe that the counter-revolutionaryforces were almost totally routed in the economic sphere inthe Soviet Union. Even those criticizing socialism todaybelieve this. The political strength on the side of revolution,the strength of human endeavour, the strength of organization


and ideology — through all this the socialist society was builtup on the basis of the correct realization of the economic lawsduring Stalin’s time so that although the seeds of capitalismstill remained embedded in the economic relationship, theirpower of resistance was rendered practically ineffective. Atime had come when the Soviet Union was contemplatingattainment of a classless society, at least economically, in theinternal sphere by completing the process of establishingsocial ownership over the whole economy and by totallyeliminating the system of commodity production anddistribution. That is, plans were being contemplated in orderthat the Soviet Union could be taken along to what Stalintermed ‘the first stage of communism’. At such a time, justbecause of a loophole, the tiny seed of capitalism which wasthe negative aspect in the economic sphere, which existedwith contradiction not fully resolved — what a calamity cameabout through it !

Collective farming is not social ownershipI want to emphasize another point here. Many comrades

bear a notion that collective farming denotes perhaps socialownership. In some earlier discussions, although I did nothave the occasion to discuss with all comrades, I found evenmany leading comrades suffering from this confusion. No,collective farming is not social ownership. The collectivefarm represents an admixture of two types of ownership inthe transitional phase before attaining total social ownership— an admixture where there is socialist ownership to someextent but there is also some continuity of and hangover fromthe erstwhile private ownership. State farming denotes totaltransformation into social ownership. The process of thistransformation in agriculture is to pass from individualfarming to co-operative farming, from co-operative farmingto collective farming and then from collective farming to statefarming. The characteristic feature of collective farming isthat the peasants are not owners of the land, nor do they own

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the implements and machineries, the fertilizers and seedswhich they use to grow crops or increase the yield but theyown the crops produced. Besides, there are other propertiesowned by some collective farms — poultry, livestock andsuch like — which are their own properties. Hence, collectivefarming is not social ownership. So, collective farming wasthere in the Soviet Union and even co-operative farming hadnot been totally abolished in all the republics there. That iswhy, in the historic booklet Economic Problems of Socialismin the USSR which Stalin wrote before his death and on theeve of the 19th Congress of the CPSU, he discussed indetail about setting in motion an economic process to bringup the co-operative farms totally to the stage of collectivefarms and then to transform the collective farms totally to thestage of state farms.

This document was being viewed as the guideline forthe period of transition from socialism to the first stage ofcommunism, that is, as charting the path to attaincommunism. In this, by explaining lucidly and elaboratelyfrom the theoretical standpoint, Stalin showed the theneconomic problems in the Soviet Union, the inherentcontradictions in the Soviet economy, the socialist productionrelation that had been established there at the outset and how,where and in which condition it was now acting as a breakupon subsequent development and advancement of thesocialist economic production. The main point is not whetherthere are slight errors here and there or whether inadequaciesare there in the terminology of this document. We havesupported this document, praised it wholeheartedly andhailed it as a brilliant and magnificent piece of analysis ofthe economic system of the then Soviet society.

Revisionism came just because tiny seeds of capitalismwere present — such an analysis is one-sidedNow, if anybody thinks from this that revisionism came

about in the Soviet Union all of a sudden just because the


seeds of capitalism, however insignificant, were there, thenthat would be a one-sided analysis, that would be subscribingto sheer economic determinism. Much harm has been doneby such analysis in the name of Marxism and the same willcontinue if this approach persists. It is true that in terms ofpriority, the economic base reflects the objective reality. Butwhat needs to be always kept in mind is the phenomenon ofcontinuous contradiction going on between the economicsystem and its social superstructure, that is, the realm ofthinking and ideas of society. While proceeding to analyse,we consider the material condition prior and so consider theeconomic system as the base. But it is not that the economicbase alone and automatically shapes everything. The Marxistconception is not like this. As the quality of the socialistproductive system and production relation keep on changingor progressing further, as the productive forces go on growingand the distribution system improves, as people’s livingstandard improves and the disparity of income between thehigh income and low income groups of people diminishes, itis not that along with this process of advancement the mentalsphere and culture of people get elevated automatically. Hadit been so, then at this advanced stage of socialism, the levelof consciousness of the Soviet leadership and the party rankand file, that is, of the whole party, would have risenautomatically. So, the Marxist theory is not that theintellectual faculty automatically changes with theadvancement of the economic system and with the change inthe material conditions. The material condition constitutes thebase – the meaning of this is that in regard to the emergenceof an idea it is the material condition which is prior; so unlessthe material condition changes, or in the absence of therequisite material condition, a particular intellectual facultydoes not make its appearance. But it should be borne in mindthat the intellectual faculty also has a role to play in changingthe objective situation, because the intellectual facultyinfluences the material condition as well. This is why, as the

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material condition changes, the struggle to advance theintellectual faculty in conformity with the changing conditionis to be conducted. Otherwise, a total reversal may take place,as we witness in the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union whichwas to have passed on from the socialist economy to the firststage of the communist economy, that is, to have adopted theprogramme of completing the socialist phase oftransformation, has gone back today and introduced thecapitalist incentive system, has opened the door of capitalisttendency and speculation, expanded the orbit of privateproperty and commodity circulation and enhanced theinfluence of private ownership even more. Had it been thatthe intellectual faculty automatically grows in conformitywith the material conditions then how could such ideologicaldegeneration, retrogression and low standard of conscious-ness, which we have marked from another angle as the rootcause of revisionism, have come about even after suchadvancement of the socialist economy there ? It has happenedbecause thought or idea is playing a role here and this reactson the material condition. It is not that ideas are changingautomatically along with changes in the economic base. Ifideas remain at a low standard then that low standard ofthought must react dialectically with its base. As a result, italso twists the material condition and pulls it down to a lowerlevel, and this is what is happening in the Soviet Union.

Role of low level of consciousnessin bringing on revisionism

It should also be borne in mind that this revisionismcould appear because the economic ingredients conducive tobreeding of revisionism were there. Had there been no sucheconomic elements in the society, this phenomenon could nothave appeared. But just the economic ingredients bythemselves could not have brought it about automatically.These did not possess the strength there to bring onrevisionism. It is the low level of consciousness that added


strength to this tendency. But despite such low level ofconsciousness this deviation did not occur earlier in theSoviet Union; yet simply because of the absence of aparticular leadership such a great disaster happened. Thoughthere have been many a mistake even in Stalin’s time due tothe low level of consciousness, these could not strike at theroot of the Soviet socialist politics and economy. But in theabsence of that particular leadership, however, because of thelow level of consciousness, it struck at that very root, andrevisionist politics went on gaining in strength gradually andculminating in such a situation. Even the fact that it wasincreasing was not recognized due, again, to that low levelof consciousness. You see, with the gradual decline of thelevel of consciousness another grave phenomenon alsoappears: it is that the danger is assuming larger proportionand that too is not being felt until it manifests itself in a sucha gross, ugly manner.

What do I want to indicate by ‘gross’ ? It is thatindividualism, by its slogans and activities, is not revealingitself in such a manner that those who understand revolutionand revolutionary theories in terms of the old Marxistvocabulary can detect it. Therefore, so long as its ugly formhas not been revealed in such a manner that it can be easilyrecognized as revisionism, even the communists the worldover could not detect its character. We are talking of it somuch today, but how far had we ourselves been able todetect it ? We must admit that we, too, could not detect it,although we had earlier observed the low ideologicalstandard. But to realize correctly the mental make-uppervading the CPSU, even at the level of its CentralCommittee, was beyond our comprehension too.

And so long as Khrushchev did not come out in theopen with his dark deeds and in all his manifestations, wecould not realize it. It was very difficult for us to understandit before that. We could sense nothing in fact. But it is nottrue that our party, while projecting Stalin as a great leader,

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did not refer to his mistakes and shortcomings even amidstthe great victories of socialism during his time and the shoutsof hurrah and eulogy by others. By referring to the prevailingmechanical process of thinking and the low standard ofconsciousness in the communist movement, we have beenrepeatedly sounding notes of caution for long. We haveobserved that the communist movement and the socialisteconomy are advancing and so are science, technology andproduction, and the Soviet society is advancing towardssocialism from the economic point of view butsimultaneously with these the ideological and culturalstandard of consciousness is going down instead.

Need to enrich Marxism in conformity withnewer conditions and problems

So we see that all this happens because of the low levelof consciousness and herein lies the root cause of the presentdevelopments in the Soviet Union. In order to prevent this,it was necessary to maintain a high and adequate ideologicaland cultural standard of consciousness by conductingcultural revolution and ideological struggle ceaselesslywithin the party, on the one hand, while, on the other, it wasnecessary to develop and enrich Marxism continually, notonly in the economic and political sphere but also forconfronting the newer and newer problems arising in thechanged condition in human life. The Marxist theories wereonce developed on the basis of the understanding of the thenproblems. But many new phenomena have been coming upafter the revolution, which were unknown earlier. Althoughthese could be grasped through logic of probability, the exactmanifestation, the form and character of these had not beenknown earlier. So, there comes the question of knowing allthese correctly. Nobody can understand the character ofproblems for all time to come. After the revolution, socialistcountries, the communist movement and its ideologicalstruggle were confronted with a number of new and complex


situations centring round the social problems, problems inhuman life, economic problems and the like. If answers aresought only from quotations and views of the old leadershipdanger arises. This is one of the reasons behind thedisconcerting developments in the Soviet Union although itis not the only reason. This is the nature of the pedants, ofthe quotation-mongers who cannot see anything beyond this.They judge the new situation on the basis of old statementsand old quotations. They forget that despite being testedthrough movements for long, the understanding of aquotation formulated in the context of the concrete analysisof a concrete situation of the past cannot remain as it wasearlier. So, its understanding may undergo lots of change.Therefore, in order to evolve a generalized concept aboutthis quotation even, Marxism needs to be enriched further,and the theoretical understanding needs to be heightened too.Otherwise, this danger is bound to arise, and it cannot be leftto the personal ability of an individual, that is, to how heargued or how he understood it through his subjectivereasoning. The Marxist philosophy is not such a system oflogic in which someone adduces logic and lays down thingsas he feels, because it is often found that a reasoning or modeof reasoning, although apparently sounding very logical,does not in reality reflect the truth. But search for truth is thevery basis of Marxism. So the Marxist reasoning is adialectical one which examines every phenomenon in themidst of contradictions following the dialectical laws. Noconclusion arrived at through reasoning, nor themethodology of reasoning, can run counter to these lawsalthough there may be a contradiction between the generaltruth and the particular truth arising out of a particularconcrete situation. Such contradiction is mutually conduciveand never assumes an antagonistic character. If we guidereasoning through this process, our conception is bound toadvance continually. So, we have to judge matter or anyphenomenon not in isolation but in the midst of

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contradictions, that is unity and struggle or twists and turnsthrough which all events are taking place, because existenceof any entity means it exists in contradiction.

Compared to Stalin’s positive qualitieshis negative aspects were insignificant

But while analysing we often lose sight of this aspect.Incidentally, I want to draw your attention to another point.Probably many of you know that we have our analysis on theStalin period in the Soviet Union. First, those who arevociferous about the misdeeds during Stalin’s time, and speakof the mistakes committed, and even those who are opposedto revisionism, while loudly speaking about Stalin’sshortcomings they have put the cart before the horse. That is,without going into the very cause for which his mistakesoccurred, they have set upon judging the mistakes. Or else,they are judging mistakes through fanciful arguments. Evenafter lots of discussion on this, I have noticed this in bits andsnatches of talks of our comrades. They, too, have some hazy,ambiguous ideas regarding either cult of personality or thephenomenon of blind submission, or something or other,whatever — and personal ideas about what is good or badwhich reflects a tendency of fanciful subjective thinking ontheir part. The manner they label a particular act of Stalin asbad and lay great stress on it at a particular moment is themanifestation of this tendency. But they forget that his meritsfar outweigh his faults and because of the great preponderanceof his good qualities over the negative aspects, on the wholehe was truly great. Our party has shown that his shortcomingswere practically negligible compared to his overall excellence.

So, there is no question of maligning Stalin. Hisposition in the world communist movement is still that of agiant, powerful and exemplary communist character. He isstill our teacher and leader. Yes, he had certain negativeaspects. We, the dialectical materialists, know that man isendowed with both good and bad, positives and negatives.


Therefore, we judge a person taking into account the relativedisposition of his good qualities and bad, i.e. negativeaspects. If we call a person faultless, we thereby denydialectical materialism itself. We, the dialectical materialists,do not consider any human being faultless. But by this, somemay think that a revolutionary, too, has negative aspects. No;the matter cannot be understood in this way, because in arevolutionary the good qualities completely pattern even thenegative aspects, as a result of which his negative aspectscannot come to the fore. When the demerits overshadow themerits and come to the fore, then there is a problem and therevolutionary starts degenerating.

Start from one’s merits, not from demeritsSo, there are merits as well as demerits even in a

revolutionary. But the revolutionary, by dint of his goodqualities and through ceaseless struggle to further developthese seeks to pattern his negative aspects and thereby bringabout the necessary changes. Another thing to be borne inmind in this context is that any two persons, each with hisown merits and demerits, constitute two different entities.They are never one and the same in toto and what may be adrawback or demerit in a great person, in a comparativesense, may turn out to be a merit in a person of lower level.Conversely, what may be a positive quality in a person ofcomparatively lower level may be considered a negativeaspect in a great person. Be that as it may, within the overallstructure of a person with his good and bad sides, we assesshis qualities by examining the contradiction of good and badin him on the basis of the good ones; thus we evaluate himon the basis of his good qualities and act on this basis toultimately eradicate the bad in him. That is, we analyse indetail his character by accepting his merits, but at the sametime we do not disregard the aspect of his demerits. Because,if we are to examine the positive qualities, we cannot do soproperly unless we examine the same in the context of their

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contradiction with the negative aspects. So, if we want todiscuss the good qualities, the question of the demeritscomes in automatically. Therefore, there is no need to findout the demerits separately. That is why dialecticalmaterialists should proceed from the aspect of merits.Otherwise, it serves no purpose and becomes useless. Butwhen the majority of comrades assess others, I find that theirmain tendency is to discuss the shortcomings of others. Wedo not usually see the aspect of good qualities. If we do notkeep in view the good aspect, then while discussing thenegative aspect we should at once remember that ourdiscussion will become purposeless. In that case, we have noright to criticize others. Those who gossip, get satisfactionin criticizing others in aimless discussions, take pleasure inslighting others, show off their own credit by pointing outthe faults of others and indirectly seek to show themselvesto be a little superior — it is only they who judge a personby his faults alone and discuss only his demerits. What is theuse of a discussion based on the bad aspect only ? Do wewant to take pleasure by showing what fools the others are ?Or do we want to establish how wise we are ? Then why dowe discuss the negative aspects of others ? If the object ofour discussion is to rectify the shortcomings of others, thenwe should remember that it is not possible to eradicate theshortcomings by harping on the faults unless we start fromthe merits. We can remove the faults of someone only bytrying to help him flourish his good qualities. So, we shouldalways lay stress on the qualities of a person and not startfrom his faults. If we do so, no purpose is served bydiscussing his faults with him.

I elaborated this point a bit because this tendency isoften found among the comrades when they talk amongthemselves. Whenever a comrade has some difference withanother comrade or detects a fault in him in some respect,he cannot maintain balance regarding whether theshortcomings of the other comrade, howsoever serious these


may seem, constitute his major aspect or his good qualitiesoutweigh his shortcomings; that is, how much is his goodaspect and how much the negative — should not this senseof proportion be there while judging him ? While judgingsomeone’s shortcomings, even as we may stress these, wemust take into account his good qualities; otherwise, ourdiscussion loses all purpose, no matter whether theshortcoming is minor or major. So, unless we keep thepurpose in view and base our analysis on the dialecticalrelation between the positive and negative qualities insomeone we shall never be able to understand thingscorrectly. You will see the significance of this point later inthis discussion. What the CPC has been saying about theSoviet role and what I shall say in this discussion — I thinkthey are, in the main, the same. But there will be a differencein the manner of how we place our viewpoints. Thisdifference stems from this specific point, this particularapproach — from nothing else. That is, a tendency is therein the CPC’s criticism, for which, even if there is a bit ofgood aspect of the Soviet leadership, it is escaping theirattention entirely. As for us, we are taking note of that goodaspect also. May be, we are viewing the matter wrongly. Ifanybody points to any error in our thinking, we shallexamine the same. But I feel that there is some positiveaspect and it would be a mistake not to take note of it. Butto take note, it is necessary to remain free from this tendency.Otherwise, the very purpose of our discussion would bedefeated, the discussion would be fruitless.

Now, it is not possible to enter here into a criticalevaluation of the economic policies adopted by Khrushchevin the Soviet Union after Stalin’s death. But I have pointedout earlier that the capitalist relation or the private propertywas there in the Soviet economy as remnants, not as thedominant feature of the economy. These remnants did nothave the power to resist or to come to the forefront as a majorforce by organizing its own political strength. Economically,

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the Soviet Union had come to the threshold of transformationinto total social ownership, that is, the private ownership andthe collective farming still existing to an extent, had almostreached a point awaiting their transformation into socialownership. The country which had advanced to this stage gotbogged down in revisionism like this. Otherwise, they wouldhave been able to examine properly the great success as wellas some shortcomings and mistakes during Stalin’s time andcorrectly evaluate these. Taking advantage of their failure todo so revisionism raised its head. They reduced the policy ofpeaceful co-existence to one of peaceful capitulation, turningthe approach on war and peace, which is an invincibleweapon of struggle for the Marxists in this era, into abourgeois humanist utopian dream; it became an illusoryideology, a utopia deceiving the common masses, drawingapplause from the not-so-conscious majority of people in thecapitalist world to the delight of the reactionaries. Because,the reactionaries are very conscious about their class interest.They notice and correctly assess the dividends they can reapfrom this Soviet policy. So the reactionaries, too, are adoptingvarious stratagems from behind to make sure that the SovietUnion continues to pursue this policy. The common people— those who are not conscious — cannot grasp thecomplexities and subtleties of revolution. They aspire forrevolution in a general way, but various ideas like liberalism,democracy, individual freedom and individual emancipationjumble up their thinking; in so many ways are they victimsof the bourgeois-petty bourgeois so-called liberal thinkingand concepts. They do not have the ability to grasp thesecomplex matters. What to say of others, even many in therevolutionary movement have themselves fallen victim toindividualism and egocentricism.

Even a revolutionary may fall victim to individualismYou should know that it is always possible, in fact is

happening so often that a revolutionary worker in fields and


factories, among peasants and workers himself becomes atotal victim of egocentricism, liberalism and ultra-democraticconcepts. There is no reason, therefore, to think that one isfully free from the influence of the bourgeois ideology justbecause one believes in revolution, or is in the midst ofworking class movement and is a member of the communistparty. You would often come across comrades amongst us,too, who may be good comrades but are in the habit ofmaking comparisons between one comrade and another, oneleader and another, and all that. They advance arguments,too, that they do not do this for establishing their ownsuperiority or for belittling others; that they do not want toslight or puff up anybody, but these are necessary for acorrect evaluation. On analysis, however, it would be foundthat these tall talks or so-called progressive talks are just acover. What mentality do they reflect really by this ? Theydo not consciously know the nature of competition incapitalism, the desire of each for survival and for goingahead of others; that is, a latent individualism and ego-ecentricism take them to this course. But they put a coatingof progressivism on that mentality. So even when they praiseothers under the influence of the overall party environment,they do so mechanically. Or else, by invokingprogressiveness and democracy and in the name of collectiveleadership, they even go to the extent of denying thenecessity of giving proper recognition to the role of theindividual; they pay no heed to it even. What does all thisprove ? It proves how subtly a person becomes victim of thebourgeois-petty bourgeois liberal ideology even after he haslearnt the revolutionary theory, even as he dreams ofrevolution and stays honest.

I can cite a lot of instances in this connection. But wedon’t have the scope here for a detailed discussion on it. Takejust a single instance. You would find many leaders who talkbig but have not been able to give up many things personal.When asked, they say that they have not given these up since

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the party has not asked them to. There is no reason to supposethat there is none among us who wants to be a leader but doesnot think like this. I am very much against concealinganything. I simply fail to understand why the party wouldhave to ask them to give up. If they consider it unethical, anundue privilege, something unfair, if they feel what theypractise is not in keeping with what they profess, then whyshould they wait for others to ask them to give up ? On theirown they should give up voluntarily. They should retain theseonly if the party instructs them to. Why have they not givenup on their own ? When asked this question, they say thatthey are willing to give up and will do so as soon as the partyasks them to. Maybe, they would give up, but it would beseen then they would be after others elsewhere and harassthem if those others had not similarly given up their personalthings. They would not tolerate even the slightest advantagethose others may be enjoying. What does it prove ? It provesthat the influence of bourgeois individualism andegocentricism persists even after they have accepted thecommunist ideology and are in the midst of the revolutionarymovement; and what is more is that it persists in a very subtlemanner even amongst comrades who are placed at a higherlevel of the party, but does it ipso facto prove that they haveceased to be revolutionaries ? Or is it the point that if theyare revolutionaries then why they are victims of thisindividualism ? Yes, these are their shortcomings. But are weto view these shortcomings only ? No, we are also to takenote of the good qualities in them; so long as there is hopethat they are revolutionaries and will play their roles asrevolutionaries, although we cannot totally eradicate theshortcomings, we keep the struggle alive to overcome thedefects, encourage and stress the good aspect and judge themon this basis. But when we stress the good aspect, are we notat the same time keeping ourselves posted with theirshortcomings ? It follows that we do so, no doubt. If at acertain time it is found that someone’s demerits have become


dominant, spoiling the good qualities, then there would beno other way and we would have to take some steps againsthim. But we are to remember that this problem is there.

Cause of infiltration of bourgeois-petty bourgeoisliberal ideas in communist movement

So, we see that many fall victim to the bourgeoisideology, even remaining in the midst of the revolutionarymovement. With the general lowering of the level ofconsciousness in the communist movement at present, thisinfluence of diverse bourgeois, petty bourgeois liberal ideashas assumed a serious dimension in the revolutionarymovement. Naturally, when the Soviet leadership resorted tothe revisionist course, adopted a revisionist theory on thequestion of war and peace and in effect reduced the policyof peaceful co-existence to a policy of peaceful capitulation,many revolutionaries in the capitalist and socialist countries,also, who really believe in revolution, accepted it as arevolutionary theory. It is not that all of them have supportedit from some dishonest motive. If it were so, then in thosecommunist parties where the leaderships have becomebureaucratic and turned leadership into a privilege — inthose communist or revisionist parties can it be presumedthat there are no students and youth, no ordinary comradeswho are working selflessly day and night for revolution? Butthen how is it that they accept this revisionist line asrevolutionary ? Why do they fail to detect revisionism ? Allwill argue that this is because of the low level of theirtheoretical understanding. Right, but what is the reason forthis low level of theoretical understanding ? If somebodythinks that they cannot grasp the phenomenon as they havenot memorized quotations from Lenin and Stalin, then that,too, would be a mistake. Because the CPC is upholding thevery same teachings before them quite emphatically, and we,too. But still, these teachings do not attract them very muchbecause they carry in them some superficial attraction for

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many bourgeois-petty bourgeois liberal ideas due to their lowlevel of consciousness. As for example, while many havehailed much of what has happened in Czechoslovakia fromdevilish mentality, but many democrats and common people,too, have supported it. It is not that all welcomed it from anulterior motive. Such an analysis is wrong. Many of themhave accepted it as correct that there should not beinfringement of individual liberty. If just this is ensured, thenwhatever skepticism and misgivings are there aboutcommunism among them and among the common peoplewould be dispelled. Many people have hailed thosedevelopments in Czechoslovakia from this angle, becausethey do not have the ability or the level of consciousness toanalyse the class aspiration at work behind the questionsthrown up over this incident, their true essence and whatthese reflect. That is why they are viewing the issue in thisway.

‘Socialism comes from without’What do we learn then ? It is not enough to be in the

revolutionary movement, the working class movement. Oneshould have a clear understanding about the aims andobjectives of these movements. We are organizingmovements, struggling and raising political slogans. Whatfor all this ? The purpose is to uphold the politics of theproletariat, but if we just anyhow conduct economic anddemocratic movements, will the proletarian politics emergeautomatically ? It is true that everything develops fromstruggle but that does not mean that all kinds of thingsdevelop from the same type of struggle. For this reason, aparticular type of struggle is needed for giving birth to thepolitics of the proletariat too. This does not emergeautomatically out of the day-to-day democratic movements.That is why Lenin said: “Socialism comes from without”.‘Without’ here does not mean ‘without anything’ or ‘out ofnothing’. By this ‘without’ he sought to mean a particular


category of movement, a political-ideological-culturalmovement. Contrasting this with the workers’ movement, thespontaneous movement that develops centring roundeconomic demands, he said that it was a utopia to think thatsocialist consciousness, socialist ideology and the conceptionabout the dictatorship of the proletariat or proletariancentralism would develop automatically among the workersthrough these struggles. This can never happen. Thisconsciousness comes from without and this is a completelydifferent struggle. For example, in science, the struggle todiscover the scientific laws and the struggle to developmachineries using the theory — both are struggles of scienceand both constitute what we call practice. But their field ofapplication is different. In one, theory is developed throughexperiments and researches in the laboratories. What do thescientists research on in the laboratory ? They research onmatter, elements, their properties, etc. The scientists aredirectly in contact with these, in struggle with these. In doingsuch research they are sometimes even risking their lives. Inthe other struggle, various machines are being inventedapplying these theories, and advancement in technology,production and human life is taking place.

But, by struggle, some leaders mean only one type ofstruggle. These leaders who have reduced leadership to aprivilege are encouraging the cadres irrationally in thatparticular type of struggle only, counting on their sincerityand militant temperament. They are found to be exhortingtheir cadres with a slogan regarding the struggle of workersand peasants, and that slogan is being simply delivered fromabove. Yet whether the ideology on which the movementwill develop is correct or not — where is the struggle forrealization of this ? Will it automatically come from thesemovements; or should there not be a struggle to develop thetheory beforehand? Just as theory evolves from struggle, soalso goes on the struggle to apply theory in practice. Again,as experience is gained through the struggle to apply theory,

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so grows and intensifies the struggle to improve or changetheory and in this way the conception of theory becomesmore and more clear. So, whether the fundamental theory iscorrect or not is to be examined first and foremost. This isthe fundamental question. This question of examining theoryis fundamental and has priority over what we understand aspractice, what we may call objective practice or crudepractice to distinguish it from theory. There are teachings ofboth Lenin and Stalin on this expressed in different forms.Lenin said that without a revolutionary theory, there couldnot be a revolutionary party. Again, Stalin observed that“Theory without practice is sterile and practice withouttheory is blind.” That is, if practice is divorced from theory,if it is not founded on revolutionary theory, then it becomesblind practice; again, if the theoretical struggle is divorcedfrom practice, that is, if it is not constantly aimed atapplication, if it is not implemented or if the masses cannotbe enthused by that theory, then that theory becomes sterile.That is, if the struggle to develop or advance the theorybecomes isolated from the struggle to apply that theory inpractice, then that theory itself becomes sterile.

Ideological struggle neglectedI discuss these points because in the Soviet Union, not

only that the same degree of emphasis and same importanceas given to the struggle to increase production in theeconomic field and the struggle for advancement oftechnology, have not been given to the struggle forideological, political and cultural advancement, rather thelatter have actually been neglected. Otherwise, remnants ofcapitalism in the economic field there, which had almostreached the stage of elimination did not have the power ofresistance or the capacity to come to the forefront as a majorforce by organizing its own political strength — explainingwhich I have repeatedly tried to show that behind thedegeneration there the role of the political leadership has


been the major factor. What I wanted to show was that whatcame about in the Soviet Union was not economicdeterminism. Yet those who call themselves Marxists andclaim that they do not subscribe to the theory of economicdeterminism, try to show mechanically even after saying this,that unless the economic base was like that, how could theideological standard fall down ? Here it is important to notethat unless there is a correct analysis of the contradictionbetween the state of economic development and theideological standard and an ideological struggle is releasedconsciously and immediately in conformity with andconducive to the growth, transformation and change incharacter of the economy, it would be tantamount to viewingthe matter as if that ideological struggle would grow of itsown just because production has been patterned anew. No,what is needed for this is effort and initiative. Intellectualfaculty inevitably develops on the base of the materialcondition — the understanding of this postulate of Marx isnot mechanical like this. From such misconception, manypundits have reached the conclusion that Marxism iseconomic determinism. No, Marxism is not economicdeterminism. Since Marxism considers the materialcondition to be prior for emergence of idea, it puts great andthe main stress on the analysis of the economic situation. Butit does not put that emphasis always and in all conditions.Had it done so, then the October Revolution would not havebeen a socialist revolution, Lenin could not have concludedthe stage of Russian revolution to be socialist and deducedthe April Thesis in spite of the economic situation and theagricultural system there being in the stage of bourgeoisdemocratic revolution. No genuine Marxist does approachsuch questions in this way. I dwelt on this aspect becausesuch things do happen.

Had these points been clear, then many comrades couldhave broadly answered in a few words the questions thathave been raised over the Czechoslovak problem. I have

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already said that the issue is not so much puzzling. Only oneaspect is really important, that is the aspect of the differencein approach between our party and the CPC. There are reallyno other important issues involved in this. I have noted thenature of questions many comrades have raised here. Theyshould understand that if we analyse the Czechoslovakincident in isolation, basing ourselves just on the events andinformation there, we would be simply carried away by this.While analysing the issue, we should understand that it hascome about as a consequence of pursuing some definitepolicies, that is, there is a root cause for it. If we understandthe cause leading to the Czechoslovak incident, then theproblem becomes clear and there remains no particular needto rack our brains. One point, however, remains after that,which is important and about which there may still be someconfusion. It is about whether the Soviet intervention hasbeen appropriate or not, whether there was any necessity forthis intervention. But there should not have been anyconfusion in understanding why the incident occurred andthe questions should not have been raised in this manner.The questions have come because the comrades have notbeen able to properly grasp the different aspects of what gavebirth to the Soviet revisionism or what were its underlyingcauses. They say that revisionism appeared, but they do notproperly understand why it has happened so.

So, the seeds of capitalism were there in the social,mental make-up and in the economic sphere, too, in theSoviet Union. But as I have already said, it is not thatrevisionism came about just because the ingredients ofcapitalism existed in the economy. You ought to rememberthat revisionism appeared there through a party with a greathistory, a party that had worked with a powerful leader likeStalin as the concretized expression of the collectiveleadership. What a catastrophe befell it in spite of havingsuch a powerful leadership within the party! The emergenceof an individual leader like Lenin, Stalin or Mao Zedong in


the collective leadership as a cementing and unifyingpersonality, coordinating all the particular knowledges, doesnot happen always. But in the Soviet Union, even after thedemise of Lenin, one more such leader had emerged.Although many people have misgiving about Stalin, we havenone of that. But we find that during the leadership of Stalinhimself, some mistakes and shortcomings began to occur, anddue to failure to conduct the struggle for up-gradation ofstandard of consciousness in accordance with necessity, thisstandard began to slide down gradually. And as the level ofconsciousness begins to go down, the seeds of capitalism stillsurviving in the economy get the opportunity to grow and asa result in the superstructure, too, the seeds of capitalism thatstill prevail hidden in social life and even among communistsin the sphere of culture and in their psyche, begin to growand gather momentum. These cannot be detected from theoverall socialist construction and programme, support torevolution, strengthening the anti-imperialist struggle,holding aloft the peace policy, condemning war, advocatingclass struggle, and phrase-mongering against the bourgeoisie.But where the private ownership has not been totallyeliminated, many a complication would be generated in themental make-up if the consciousness is at a low level. Theinfluence of individualism would go on increasingsurreptitiously. This influence of individualism, theindividualistic mentality which grows in a socialistenvironment, although not exactly of the same nature as therank egocentricism of the bourgeois society, nonetheless; itis definitely the phenomenon of individualism. The hangoverof individualism from the old society still persists within thesocialist society. It has certain differences in form andcharacter with the bourgeois individualism, but it isindividualism, a continuation of the old one. In adjusting tothe new environment, it has merely changed its outer shell,expression, phraseology and mode of existence.

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On theory and practiceSo, Marxism is not economic determinism. It is due to

the mechanical way in which theory and practice have beenunderstood that such a catastrophe as this has come about.Generalization of experiences of such a vast socialistconstruction and advancement as in the Soviet Union cannotbe achieved without an all-out struggle for theoreticaladvancement which “comes from without”, a struggle of adifferent type, not just an economic one. By combining thesetwo, that is theory and practice, we get the total humanpractice, and also the struggle of a communist party. This hasbeen neglected in the Soviet Union. Although nobody deniesits necessity, no stress was given on this. Why not ? Thattheory and practice are inextricably linked up with eachother, theory without practice is sterile and practice withouttheory is blind practice — all these are teachings of Stalin.But although so much was known about theory and practiceand such a lucid expression by Stalin was there, theunderstanding was not clear in the Soviet Union that themutual relationship of theory and practice is such that thesetwo are dependent on each other — one cannot do withoutthe other. The correct realization of this is that these two aretwo aspects of the same human practice, two aspects ofcontradictions — contradictions which are conducive to eachother. If the contradictions become antagonistic instead ofbeing mutually conducive, then practice would become blindand the theory sterile — they would not help each other. So,we see that these two aspects of human practice are incontradiction with each other, influencing each other andconducive to each other. But a prior condition, that is, aprecondition for practice has been laid down. What is it ? Itis the advent of consciousness that has been put as prior topractice. And this consciousness which is reflected in thetheory, is to be judged by the yardstick of practice. This iswhat is called criterion of practice. But this practice is not


crude practice. It has been viewed as total human practice,comprising both the subjective and the objective practices.Now, while explaining the role of the subject many peoplesink into subjectivism. Because they sink into subjectivismor subjective reasoning, they fail to find out the role of theobject. But after appearance of consciousness, that is, afterinter-dialectical contradiction between mind and matterbegins, the role of the subject in influencing the objectcannot be denied. Once this mutual contradiction betweenthe object and the subject has arisen, there is no way the roleof the subject can be denied. Not only is the materialcondition shaping the subject, but the subject, too, is actingupon the material condition and changing it.

It is essential, therefore, to acquire the correctunderstanding of the mutual relationship between theory andpractice, and develop and enrich Marxism with the changingsituation and further raise the level of understanding of thosetheories of Marxism which are still valid. For instance, thetheory of the dictatorship of the proletariat, that is, theinevitability of establishment of dictatorship of the proletariatas the culmination of class struggle and its role as the mainbulwark till the total transformation into classless society ;the principle of communist party organization and the theoryof democratic centralism, the methodology of evaluating thedemocratic revolutions in different countries in the era ofimperialism and proletarian revolution, that is, how these areto be viewed while applying the general principles ofMarxism — the elaboration, development and enrichment ofMarxism that Lenin made on these are all still valid. But ifthe understanding and mode of expression in case of eachone of these remain the same today as before, then thatwould be ineffective and create problems. If that same oldmode of expression is used even today – what does itsignify? It means that the old understanding of that theoryremains unchanged today. And if the same understandingpersists the numerous contradictions that have cropped up

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while applying the theory during all these days, cannot beresolved. That means while approaching the situation on thebasis of that theory, it is not possible to correctly understandthe nature of the contradictions continually arising, and as aresult it is not possible either to resolve these at every step;nor is it possible, therefore, to correctly grasp and apply thatvery theory itself. This is why the mode of expression isimportant here. By mode of expression I do not mean theindividual styles of expression of different persons. What Iintend to bring home when using the term ‘mode ofexpression’ is class expression, the standard of the categoryof ideological understanding. So, please do not take the word‘expression’ literally, as what is understood as the individualstyle of speaking or writing of a person. ‘Expression’ here isto be understood as what we mean by the overall oneness inapproach, that is, generalized expression of essentialunderstanding. So, this expression is liable to change. Butdoes this mean that the theories change too ? No, theunderstanding of the theory today is of a more advancedlevel than what it was earlier when those who applied thetheory did so on the basis of the then understanding, and itis continually getting clearer and clearer. This is because ithas had to resolve newer and newer contradictionsconfronting it and its knowledge has become enriched fromsuch experiences. Otherwise, theory gets reduced to meredogmatic proposition.

Analysis by CPCAt present, when the two sides, the Soviet leadership

and the Chinese leadership, are criticizing each other asdogmatist and revisionist respectively, we notice one thingcommon in both of them. When either of them places theirviewpoints, arguing that the situation has changed, theyquote Lenin and quote such portions and in such a manneras would be advantageous to them.

But we observed a dangerous thing in the case of the


Soviet revisionist leadership. They seldom quote Leninverbatim. Actually, what they are doing is paraphrasing Leninin their own way in the name of quoting Lenin. As a result,what happens is, they have no onus to prove whether Leninactually said so, or if he did, he did under whatcircumstances. In most of their writings, they put the nameof Lenin but do not quote him verbatim. Again, from theother side, China — they either quote Lenin verbatim or elsequote Mao Zedong out of context, completely unrelated withthe particular context in which those observations were made.In applying to the new context what had been observedearlier in a different context, although the observation maystill be valid as regards the fundamental principle, they arereiterating the old quotation verbatim as the truth andexhorting for its application without referring at all to thenew contradictions that have cropped up and what should bethe difference in application in the face of these, or whataddition, changes or developments of the old observationsshould be there. These practices are legacies from the past.We find that the CPC which is fighting against revisionismtoday and which, in our party’s opinion, has been, in themain, holding aloft the banner of revolution — even they toohave not been able to get rid of this old habit. Their approach,as we understand it, does not reflect the developedunderstanding derived from the correct dialectical method ofapplying the theory; that is, they could not develop it to thatlevel from where it becomes possible to apply it correctly.They are engaged in struggle, no doubt, but there is still thehangover from the old style and habit in them. Since theirmode of expression is of the old type, it appears that theirunderstanding has remained as of old. It means, it is not thatadequate. Understanding of Marxism at such old level doesnot help. Lenin upheld at times the old Marxists, observingthat often the old Marxists were better than the new. Thisdoes not mean, however, that those old Marxists are betterbecause they are holding on to old ideas. Old Marxists

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acquire a lot of experience and so they possess better capacityto grasp many problems. And the new, since they areinexperienced, may show a tendency to swallow the oldverbiage and reduce Marxism to a dogma. Lenin spoke aboutthe old communists in this sense, not simply because theywere old. So, if the old conception persists, it would be of nouse.

Struggle to develop ideological uniformity in the party,and to involve and unite the party and the masses

indispensable even in socialist systemSo, these are happening because of the low level of

consciousness and herein lies the root cause of the presentdevelopment in the Soviet Union as well. What is the wayout then ? The only course is to maintain high level ofconsciousness in ideological and cultural spheres byceaselessly waging ideological struggle within the party.Secondly, the problems centring round the study of whichthe theories of Marxism once developed, have not remainedstatic. Many new things were cropping up after revolutionwhich had been unknown earlier. Although these could begrasped somewhat with the help of logic of probability, thecorrect nature and character of these had not been knownexactly, whereas there was need for this. Nobody has cometo know the character of the problems for all time to come.So, there is necessity of continuously enriching Marxism inconsonance with ever new problems cropping up in thechanged situation, not only in the economic and politicalspheres, but covering all aspects of human life as well intotality. Thirdly, the sense of values in social, economic,cultural, ethical and philosophical spheres and thefundamental principles of Leninism that have till now guidedthe communist movement — it is to be determined which ofthese are still valid and which have lost validity. And on itsbasis, centring round those principles which are still valid anintense revolutionary struggle is to be launched in the


ideological and cultural sphere, first within the party andthen involving the party and the masses in order to achievecomplete ideological uniformity. Unless this struggle to bringabout ideological uniformity and oneness in approachdevelops within the party and involving the party and themasses, then the seeds of individualism existing in variousforms even in the socialist system centring round the privateproperty, commodity production and commodity distributionwould inevitably lead to a situation in which the citizens ofthe socialist society would enjoy the advancement ofsocialist economy as a privilege and this in turn would givebirth to an opportunist individualism. Consequently, thedanger remains of misconceptions about bourgeoisdemocracy and freedom arising in a new cloak with a newvocabulary. For instance, what is being said inCzechoslovakia about individual liberty is nothing but this.

Wrong analysis by revisionist Soviet leadershipThe revisionist theory and practice of the Soviet

leadership are basically responsible for what is nowhappening in Czechoslovakia. The Soviet leadership, forexample, is saying that the era of dictatorship of theproletariat is over. But we know that the proletariat hasappeared in the history of development of human society asthe last revolutionary class, which by eliminating the forcesopposing it, will pave the way for its own eliminationfollowing the process of ‘negation of the negation’. That is,having abolished the dictatorship of the proletariat, it willlead the society towards a classless, a stateless society. Thisis the basic Marxist tenet of withering away of the state andthe classes. By what theory, material or scientific analysishave they proved this basic Marxist tenet to be wrong?Nobody is interested in their fanciful subjective arguments.They will have to show by analysing social science andhistory on the basis of facts and by applying the dialecticalmethod of analysis to development of class struggle, that the

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proletariat is not the last class in history. And, according toMarxism, what is meant by abolition of classes? Whenvarious strata, sections and categories among the peopledenote merely the difference in their respective work orprofession and do not reflect economic strata or category, wecan say that the classes have been abolished. But if theseform the superstructure on the base of economic categoriesthen it is to be understood that classes continue to exist. Ifthe law of value operates or private ownership exists, itmeans that classes exist. These are teachings of Marxism.What has the present Soviet leadership got to say on these?But without as much as discussing these points, the Sovietleadership has declared that they have attained classlesssociety. They are saying that the Soviet society is classless,there are no classes there. Here, they have really followedan old mistake of Stalin. This fault resulted from putting abit too much emphasis on a point, which Stalin did in hisReport to the Eighteenth Congress of the CPSU. Withoutnaming Stalin, they have made his mistake their capital. Forthis theory of theirs they should have shown gratitude toStalin and remain obliged to his mistake! If Stalin had notcommitted this mistake, they could not have invented itthemselves. They have distorted many a thing, but to benoted is that the theories have all been Lenin’s or Stalin’s.To start with, there have been wrong applications of thesetheories because of their low level of consciousness.Continuing the mistakes, they have piled ego, individualismand national chauvinism on top of the mistakes and havenow brought the mistakes to such a complicated levelthrough this mix-up that they no longer admit these to bemistakes. They do not admit even if the mistakes are pointedout. They would carry on as they are doing today. At themost, if they feel uneasy under pressure of reasoning, theyrationalize a bit and show by counter-argument that theyhave not meant to say it in this manner; but in that manner,as if in both ways the meaning is really the same. But they


would continue doing what they are doing. This hashappened in their case because the level of theirconsciousness is not that high. As a result, they have notbeen able to grasp the main point. Because of this low levelof consciousness, they could go to the extent of saying thatthe Soviet Union is no longer a state of the working class; itis a state of the whole people. Before concluding thus, theyought to have adduced proof to show that in the era of thedictatorship of the proletariat, in the Soviet Union it has fullyplayed its role and its necessity has been exhausted there.

History of development ofconcept of individual liberty

If the necessity of the dictatorship of the proletariat hasbecome exhausted, then what for is the state there? Whydoes the state at all exist there? Khrushchev and his campfollowers have not answered these questions. They haveopened the door wide to liberalism under cover of theMarxist verbiage. As for Czechoslovakia, it has even gonea few more steps ahead. The Czechoslovak leadership istrying to make parliamentary democracy quite acceptable inthe name of liberalism ! Under cover of socialism,revolutionary jargon and liberalism, they are trying to revivethe parliamentary democracy about which even the people inthe parliamentary democratic countries are fast gettingdisillusioned and fed up. What they are saying boils downto this : The state, the government and other institutions willhave an independent role. What does it mean? It means,the party will have no control over the state. In other words,they think that the state is a self-contained autonomousentity. This sounds nice and appears very democratic. Thetechnocrats would, of course, opine like this. This was thedeclared principle of the bourgeois democrats, the essence ofbourgeois democracy. The bourgeois democrats hold thatthere should be separation of power between the executive,the legislature and the judiciary — and the party, of course,

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is separate. The party should have no control over the stateor the other institutions. The party would direct and the statewould act accordingly — this cannot be allowed! They say,the party should implement its policy through the majorityin Parliament or National Assembly, taking due cognizanceof the opinion of the minority and in co-operation with it.They say, the right of freedom of the individual isfundamental, on no account can it be interfered with. JohnStuart Mill was a bourgeois humanist. He said : “If allmankind minus one were of one opinion, and only oneperson were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be nomore justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he hadthe power, would be justified in silencing mankind.” So, asper this, no one, whoever he is, has the right to suppress theopinion of the minority as in that case, the fundamental right,the freedom ceases to exist. This would be sheervulgarization of the meaning of freedom, would be ultraprivilege of liberty in the name of freedom. Such is thebourgeois concept of individual liberty. This happens in thecase of the bourgeoisie because of their non-recognition ofthe fact that individual liberty and the struggle for itsdevelopment in the history of mankind, too, are governed bydefinite laws.

During the heyday of bourgeois democracy, in theperiod of laissez faire economy, that is, free competition ofcapital or competitive capitalism, Mill held aloft in hisinimitable style the basic spirit of bourgeois democracy inthe interest of uninterrupted development of individualfreedom so that the voice of the minority was not gaggedmaking the plea of the majority. The real significance ofMill’s observation was that the thought and the opinion ofthe minority, even if it be a single person, should be givendue respect and recognition. But if we try to understand itjust like that in the present era of most reactionary, decadentcapitalism, it would have serious consequences.


The same bourgeoisie that once fought againstabsolutism has made private property absoluteWe should remember that the struggle for individual

liberty and freedom has not suddenly descended from heavennor is the fact such that a man called Mill had a sudden brainwave on this issue. Or that Mill was a great man, who on hisown trumpeted the glory of man’s freedom and individualliberty and none of the great men before him was a geniusof his standing and so could not think out these ! Nobodywould accept such talks. Actually, this conception offreedom of the bourgeoisie is a reflection of the idea ofabsolute freedom that was inherent in the capitalistrevolution. This very concept of the bourgeoisie broughtabout revolutionary transformation of production, ofproduction relation and of the whole society in course of itsfight against feudalism. All this came about on the basis ofthe right to private property. But the very bourgeoisie whobrought about this revolution, fighting against monarchy andabsolutism themselves made this right to private propertyabsolute in the name of democracy through legal andconstitutional sanction, and sought to make it absolute,sacrosanct and divine. They made absolute the concepts ofindividual freedom and individuality and the concept ofindividual right which had developed in the era of bourgeoisdemocratic revolution. But today in the era of all-out crisisof capitalism, private ownership has become the stumblingblock on the path of development of production andproductive forces; of all-round advancement of society. Thebourgeois concepts about individual freedom and right of theindividual have been reduced to utter egocentricism andselfishness, making the individual more and more indifferentto society. Today, all-round development of socialproduction, knowledge, science, culture and civilization canbe ensured only through establishing social ownership inplace of private ownership.

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The revisionists, being under the influence of bourgeoisliberalism and lacking correct understanding of Marxism,have totally failed to realize that under these circumstancesthe only way to acquire real freedom and emancipation of theindividual lies in freeing oneself from the bourgeois conceptof right of the individual and sense of self-interest; and it isthe struggle to identify oneself with social interest that is thetrue struggle to achieve emancipation today. And because theyhave failed to realize this, they are raising the slogan of ultrasense of freedom in the name of individual liberty and areattempting to make parliamentary democracy more and moreacceptable. This is what the intelligentsia of Czechoslovakiaare after in the name of socialism. They are aspiring forbourgeois parliamentary democracy disguising themselvesunder the cloak of socialism. So those who work for the sakeof their own property, in their personal interest — the veryconcept which brought on the capitalist revolution — if thoseindividuals, the intellectuals, the technocrats and thebureaucrats have no social consciousness, then the bourgeoisdemocrats and the counter-revolutionaries could not ask foranything better ! Because, it is through these spineless bloatedintellectuals, bureaucrats and technocrats that the counter-revolutionaries infiltrate into the political sphere and the statestructure. Who would infiltrate through workers and manuallabourers ? They may utilize them to an extent as agents. Butthey infiltrate through these types of educated persons whoare in the higher echelons of administration, politics and otherspheres. They infiltrate through them and them only.

How to win emancipation of individualSo, at a glance, the programme and developments in

Czechoslovakia prove that they are actually cultivatingliberalism through all this. For them, the slogan of socialismwas a mere cover for disguising themselves. This covercould work solely because a large section of patrioticcommon people, who cannot be said to be agents of


imperialism but who felt resentment against the revisionistrulers there, hailed this liberalism, mistaking it for socialism.What is more, even many persons belonging to theCommunist Party of Czechoslovakia, too, hailed thisliberalism because of their low level of communistconsciousness. Because of liberalization, they took bourgeoisdemocracy, individual liberty and bourgeois sense of equalityto be synonymous with communism. Whatever jargons maybe used by the apostles of bourgeois individual liberty, thecommon people think they are entitled to that individualliberty. They consider this to be the essence, the main featureof communism. They do not know that this concept ofindividual liberty and right to equality that is in vogue is aparticular phenomenon, a by-product, a temporary thing andits role has already been exhausted, it has been reduced to aprivilege, has become reactionary in character. Today, thestruggle for individual liberty is very much linked up withending the last remnants of social coercion arising from thecontradiction between the individual interest and the socialinterest in the socialist economy and system. Thiscontradiction has got to be resolved. To resolve this, theantagonistic character of the contradiction between the socialinterest and the individual interest would have to be turnedinto a non-antagonistic one so that they be conducive to eachother. That means, the struggle for identification of theindividual interest with the social interest would have to bestarted. Emancipation of the individual from social conflictand coercion lies in this struggle. The means of achievingemancipation from the coercion imposed by man upon manwhich led to the emergence of the state, lies in the processof withering away of the state through revolution followingthe inexorable law of social development.

Material and spiritual productionAs Marxists they should know that what they call

freedom of thinking — this freedom, too, does not connote

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freedom in the absolute sense, or freedom from anycondition. Elsewhere, I have shown that the materialcondition precedes the emergence of thought and howevergreat a thinker someone may be, he cannot supersede a givencategory of material condition. Thought changes along withchange in the material condition; and again this thought isacting on the material condition and helps to change it. Inthis way, both material condition and thought are changingcontinually. So, no thought, be it religious thought, bourgeoishumanist thought, or the bourgeois concept of individualliberty or the rights of an individual, is absolute andunchangeable. Although a particular thought or idea mayplay a progressive role for the development of production ina given material condition, that very thought becomesreactionary judged in the context of the newer need ofdevelopment of production in a changed condition. Then anew thought is born in the new material condition. So, nothought or concept of right is absolute. We should rememberthat thought develops as a product of the struggle going onevery day between man and nature and between the differentclasses in society. It is also a kind of production and in theMarxist vocabulary it is called the spiritual production. Whatman produces through his toils and efforts by strugglingagainst nature is both spiritual and material production.These two together constitute the total human production.So, one aspect of human production is the materialproduction while the other is the spiritual production, theidea, which is nothing but a particular function of the brainwhich itself is constituted of matter. These two again areinter-dialectically influencing each other. Sometimes matteror the material condition, by taking the predominant role,gains the leading part in forming idea — not that itbecomes absolute — while at some other time, the idea orthe subject assumes the dominant role in developing theobjective condition by twisting and turning it. The dominantrole is thus being continually reversed from one to another.


This is another characteristic feature of dialectics, anotherpoint which should be borne in mind.

When will the state wither awayThus, it is evident that they could not grasp all these.

Due to the low level of consciousness, it was not possiblefor them to develop the necessary ideological-culturalmovement and inspire, under its impact, the mentality ofabjuring everything personal and merging the individualinterest with the social interest. They could not grasp thatmerger of the individual interest with the collective interestis in no way a curb on individual liberty; rather, the trueemancipation of the individual lies in merging the individualinterest with the collective interest. Without this anindividual can never wholly free himself from socialcoercion, because so long as the antagonistic contradictionbetween the individual and the social interest remains, thestate has to exist as the instrument of coercion, and as aresult the social repression of the individual also remains. Inthis situation, the antagonistic contradiction between theindividual interest and the social interest can be put an endto only through totally merging the individual interest withthe social interest and only in such a condition would thestate cease to exist as an instrument of social coercion; thestate would wither away then and then only. This process ofstruggle is the real struggle of an individual under socialismfor his emancipation. Such is its historical destiny, law-governed as this struggle is. Without doing this an individualcan never be free from social coercion. To aspire forindividual liberty disregarding this process is to virtuallycripple the individual. You will find that it is people guidedby such misconceptions about individual liberty who takeadvantage over others at one place, while at another theybehave as if they are slaves of others just for ensuring theireconomic interest and advantages and bow down whenfrowned at, just as the bureaucrats do. There are bureaucrats

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who browbeat their subordinates very much, considerthemselves very powerful vis-a-vis others; they think thatthere is nobody more powerful than they are. On the otherhand, they rub their hands before their superior officerssubmissively. This is because as human beings they arecrippled. They are thus standing on the sense of power of thepost they hold, the economic advantages they enjoy, falsesense of power, false sense of ego and false sense ofindividualism.

Sense of national humiliation workseven among communists

Besides, in the countries of East Europe, especially inCzechoslovakia, although the communists came to powerthrough defeat of fascism in the Second World War, theinfluence of proletarian internationalism was never firmlyestablished. This particularly struck my mind after the Titoepisode. Tito was trained in Moscow and was a very loyaland trusted follower of Stalin and his internationalcommunist brigade. He was, so to say, a creation of Stalin. Ido not know whether looking at such deviation of his owncreation, Stalin turned deep attention to the real problem —there were no means of our knowing. But we observed thathe was trying to grasp, and did grasp certain things. It is this:even among the communists in the East European socialistcountries, the sense of national humiliation of the Balkanswas mingled with big talks of communism. Even duringanti-fascist national revolution there, which was basicallybourgeois democratic revolution, it was not detected. Butthis latent feeling of national humiliation of the Balkans isdefinitely hidden under cover of all their progressiveverbiage. Only through proletarian internationalism whichcan strike at its very roots, can this narrow nationalist mentalmake-up be shattered. To do this, it would have to beestablished beyond question, in the same manner in whichonce Marxism theoretically established its superiority over


all bourgeois ideologies, that true patriotism and proletarianinternationalism develop side by side conducive to eachother. If this can be done, it would create an impact on theintellectuals because of their power of intellect; it wouldhave an influence on the common people and because of itsinfluence upon the intellectuals, too, it would release a socialmovement. Only when it turns into a social movement, therecomes the opportunity of a cultural revolution andregeneration in the true sense, the opportunity of awidespread mass movement. Stalin had begun this, but,having made some advancement, he died.

Rank populist conduct of KhrushchevComing to power, Khrushchev freed those ‘champions’

of liberalism whom Stalin had put in jail before taking upthis task in hand. Stalin had arrested them because this taskcould not be undertaken keeping them at large. They enjoyeda kind of cheap popularity and the populist talks, behaviourand conduct such as theirs always work in the fertile soil oflow level of consciousness — the reason why Khrushchevbecame so popular in no time. Of course, he became popularamong the worthless persons. He was found to be huggingsomeone all on a sudden, calling him brother or clasping anight club girl to dance with her and seeing all this, manybegan to say : look how simple he is, he is not at allconceited, he has no vanity. Politics of such cheap stunts isthe stock-in-trade of such people. Actually, these reflect egoof the worst form under cover of cheap popularity whichcannot but be detected ultimately through critical analysis. Aperson who is free from egocentrism has no need to takerecourse to such populist postures. The behaviour andconduct of such a person are simple and straightforward. Hedoes not have to indulge in such type of petty and out andout reprehensible type of acts and behaviour. His each actionis not calculated to earn popularity or make people believethat there is none else like him. Thoughts and considerations

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as these do not exist in him at all — he is of different stuff.So while, on the one hand, he makes friends, moulds people,inspires others, shows the correct path and builds upcharacter of people, on the other hand, some peoplemisunderstand and go against him and the reactionariesoppose him. But he does not become everything to everyone,it never happens that he becomes very popular in everythingand everybody considers him to be very good. ButKhrushchev is a man of such populist gestures and postures,behaviour and conduct.

Khrushchev has brought about a serious deviation in theeconomy of the Soviet Union. He has been able to do thisbecause the philosophical understanding of Marxism had notbeen developing continually in the Soviet Union duringStalin’s time, resulting in a low level of consciousness in therealms of ideology and theory there; or even if it haddeveloped and been enriched somewhat through collectionof the technical materials in bits and pieces, theunderstanding was not adequate vis-a-vis the newer andnewer problems which kept on continually confronting thesocialist economy and the people’s life, the newer and newerproblems continually appearing before the internationalcommunist movement, the world situation and the massmovements. This is because the level of consciousness doesnot remain static. As the communist movement advancesand the economy gets modernized, on the one hand, and onthe other, the theoretical standard gets lowered, after makingsome advancement there develops a situation where as aresult of the falling standard of consciousness different typesof deviations begin to crop up in the spheres of socialisteconomy and ideology. When the presence of a leadershiplike that of Stalin, which fundamentally protected Marxismin the political, economic, ethical-cultural and philosophicalspheres in spite of the lowering of consciousness, was nolonger there, no further hindrance remained for all-outdeviations to develop.


Concept of equalityWe know that we can pass on from the stage of ‘to each

acording to his ability’ to the stage of ‘to each according tohis needs’ by putting an end to the role of money as themedium of exchange as well as of the system of commodityproduction and distribution and through building up properorganization of production and distribution. But is it possibleto achieve this by mere subjective planning ? What is thedifference between utopian socialism and scientificsocialism ? It is that the utopian socialists sought to keep allmen in the society at the same level whereas communismnever thought like this. Rather communism has thoughtabout freeing mankind from social coercion and suppression.Each man’s struggle is to flourish through individualinitiative but since each has a separate entity, no two personscan be equal. But they would be free from social coercion,economic exploitation and moral depravity. They are freeonly in a relative sense, they are free only socially and in thesocial environment, they are free in the context of thecontradiction between production and distribution — thereis no perpetration of injustice on them; the factorsengendering unfairness and injustice in the society have beeneliminated. But their struggle against nature is there, it wouldcontinue to be there. Society and civilization would beprogressing through continual victories over nature. So,‘socialism means abundance in production’ — these wordsdo not mean that the abolition of commodity production anddistribution system, the abolition of money and privateproperty and the withering away of the state would comeabout automatically. But on coming to power, Khrushchevreduced the meaning of socialism to just abundance inproduction. By socialism he has meant classless society —because the writings he quoted from were in the classicallanguage of the early stages. At that time, an idea wasprevalent that socialism meant a classless society — I think

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Trotsky’s confusion stemmed from this. Trotsky thought thatsocialism meant a classless society, and since it wasclassless, how could socialism be established in a singlecountry ? There had been a lot of confusion andmisunderstanding over this. Again Khrushchev, too, camewith the idea that socialism means abundance in production.So, he started saying that if there was no abundance inproduction in the Soviet Union, what did socialism standfor ? If there was still a rationing system and if food couldnot be distributed to the people free of cost then these werefailures of socialism. This idea took him towards economicdecentralization, labour incentive schemes and all that.

Labour incentive — a cover for ruthless exploitationI want to make a point here about this labour incentive.

Look at the Naxalites, the CPI and the CPI(M) — all of themare demanding incentives in the labour movement undercover of revolutionary verbiage. I find that even the tradeunion leaders belonging to our party also raise this demandof ‘incentive’. My question is : why should wedemand incentive based production system? It is one thingwhen it becomes an exigency in the interest of struggle. Thatis, since incentive is coming anyway, why should not theworkers gain a little more advantage and improve the termsand conditions through struggles for that purpose. But alongwith this, the heinous political and economic design of thebourgeoisie behind the incentive schemes would have to beunmasked. It would have to be pointed out clearly that thevery same bourgeoisie who talk of incentives at one place,close down factories elsewhere. Trade union leaders, too,place these points citing statistics. But unless the basicpolitical and economic causes behind this can be grasped, itis no use putting the thing in terms of statistics only. Whydo we need statistics ? We need it for unraveling the truth,for understanding the theory thoroughly. If the trade unionleaders cannot realize the truth in the real sense with the help


of theory, if their understanding would remain at the level ofthe common people then I would like to ask what is the useof dealing with statistics, what is the need of taking thetrouble simply to strain themselves? By this, they wouldcontinue to plunge the workers’ movement in the quagmireof opportunism, as they have done. Unless they can guide theworking class movement on the correct course by exposingthe bourgeois conspiracy behind these incentive schemes,they would not be able to lead these movements through tothe logical culmination of emancipation from exploitation.

You should remember that not only is the capitalistexploitation becoming more and more ruthless throughlabour incentives, it is becoming utmost filthy and heinous.By this, the owners are shifting the entire responsibility ofdeclining production on the shoulders of the workers. Butthe real reason for fall in production is the contradictionbetween production relation and productive forces in thecapitalist system. On scientific analysis it would be foundthat the surplus value being created in the capitalist systemis being misappropriated by the private owners and it isbecause of this that the unemployment problem is there inthe capitalist countries, capitalism cannot today carry outland reform in the true sense and the relative stability is nolonger there in the world capitalist market. This is why thereis the pressure of intense recession on the economy of thecapitalist countries today — there is intense crisis in thewhole production system. Taking advantage of the fact thatthe working class movement has, in effect, becomeideologically disarmed, crisis ridden capitalism is confusingthe workers and shifting the entire burden of its crisis on totheir shoulders.

They are trying to show that the fall in production isthere because the workers do not want to work. You shouldremember that even when the workers lose the spirit andwillingness to do work in the capitalist countries and becomediscouraged, it is the capitalist exploitation, social injustice

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of capitalism that is responsible for all this. But they areputting the onus for the fall in production on the workers.On the one hand, they are increasing the workload on theworkers, while on the other, from their bank balancesinflated with the money robbed from the workers theydonate a little in the name of charity, of compassion, and areshowing how noble they are, how they care for the countryand how keen they are to increase production ! They aretrying to show that it is from this desire to increaseproduction that they have introduced the incentive schemesto break the idleness of the workers.

Do you know what sort of thing it is ? The worker ishelpless, starving, ignorant and lacks consciousness; he doesnot know why is his plight of starvation, but since hunger isunrelenting he wants to work more for earning a little bitmore. It is these workers that they want to burden with morework holding up the lure of money. To increase productionby making the worker work overtime or by putting in morerigorous labour, whether with or without use of machines,ultimately means increasing the workload. This increasing ofworkload on the workers in the name of giving them somemonetary benefit is what is called the labour incentive. Bythis, they want to ‘prove’ that production is falling becausethe worker is callous, selfish and irresponsible. So give himsome incentive and he will work more. That is, show himthe lure of money so that he would work more. The workeron his part desires to avail of the incentive, wants to gainmonetarily because he cannot do without this. My point isthat you tell the workers to accept incentive, but side by sideyou should also raise the demand for improving the workingcondition. And also explain the character of labour incentive,and impress upon them that it is a bourgeois conspiracyagainst the workers, an extremely cruel and heinous form ofexploitation and also humiliating to them. None of the otherparties in our country who speak of Marxism and claim tobe fighting for the workers have brought up these


fundamental issues. Only our party is trying to make theworkers conscious of it. We are thinking deeply over theseand trying to focus these points to some extent in someplaces. The party cadres who are trying to bring these hometo the workers are raising these points as per their ability,intelligence and level of consciousness. Regarding all this,efforts are made within the party; even if a single comradehas a confusion in his mind on this issue, attempts are thereto dispel it ; these points are being impressed upon thoseconnected with the trade union movement, so that they arebeing educated on the significance of the labour incentive.By this I am not saying that there are no weaknesses orlimitations in this effort of ours. But we keep on trying.

Danger of anyhow augmenting production in socialismSo the labour incentive is another dangerous

phenomenon which Khrushchev introduced in the socialisteconomy, against which there is necessity of conductingstruggle with utmost stress on the basis of revolutionaryworking class ideology in the capitalist countries themselves.Labour incentive, increase in production, abundance inproduction — all this is being talked about without correctlyunderstanding the scientific laws of development ofproduction. Production would have to be augmented withinthe framework of the socialist production relation inconformity with the scientific laws of production in thesocialist system, that is, by pursuing correctly andscientifically the laws of development of production whilekeeping unchanged the programme of gradual transformationinto socialist ownership, by combining and consolidating thestrength of the whole people, by drawing together all thesources of production — social, political, economic, materialand natural resources, everything, and along with it bypatterning technological development of science as far aspossible. Since Lenin observed that there cannot be socialismwithout abundance in production, therefore production

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would have to be increased anyhow — the matter is not sosimple. Khrushchev’s contention is: since the Soviet Unionis still lagging behind the USA in production, what sort ofsocialism is this ? But he could not understand at all that theappeal with which the communists won over the wholeworld to the side of socialism even while lagging behind theUSA in production and in volume of production, lieselsewhere. He could not grasp the basic point that thisdeviation in thought occurred because of their low level ofconsciousness.

Just as low standard of ideological consciousness givesbirth to adventurism, it gives birth to revisionism as well. Itis this low level of consciousness that has given rise tomodern revisionism. It is because of this that liberalizationstarted in that very Soviet Union. As a plea they are sayingthat a ruthless regimented rule prevailed during Stalin’s time;as a result of which the individual talent of people did notfind any scope to flourish. Such was their contention at thebeginning. They said that the Soviet citizens did not have theopportunity to freely express their opinion; internaldemocracy was non-existent. Whether these are facts or not,we need not go into that discussion here. Also because I amto shorten my discussion as much as possible. Whileintroducing the policy of liberalization, they started with theargument that they were fighting against the cult ofpersonality, against this negative aspect of Stalin’s time. Butultimately it was found that it was the personal image ofStalin that they were fighting against. They could not graspthe fundamental point that lies at its root which needs to beaddressed in order to fight the cult of personality. For, thecult of individual stems from the backward and low level ofconsciousness — from the antagonistic contradiction thatdevelops centring round the changes in the mode ofproduction and failure to develop cultural revolutionconducive and in conformity with these changes. They failedto realize these factors and conduct struggle accordingly.


That is why they could not grasp that blind allegiance toleadership, be it an individual, a committee or the partyitself, would inevitably lead to the cult of individual in someway or other. And to declare with fanfare that they are notblind and are beating the drum of democracy is not themethod of eradicating this cult of personality. Today, fascismis appearing in the capitalist countries of the world throughdrumbeating of this very brand of democracy. According tous and many others such talks of theirs prove that they havegone against the basic tenets of Marxism which are stillvalid.

Soviet liberalism, father of Czechoslovak revisionismSo, clearly all these talks and activities under

Khrushchev’s leadership, in fact, provided an opportunity tothe individualism which so long was not getting the backingor protection of the state or the government, but remained insociety in a repressed state, to raise its head in the post-Stalinperiod. By these developments in the Soviet Union,individualism in Czechoslovakia got a further boosting toraise its head. And it also got the support of internationalcapital. Quite naturally, because of such revisionist theoriesof the Soviet leadership, the international alignment of theSoviet Union, too, took a different turn. As a result,Czechoslovakia became subject to pressure from variousquarters — bourgeois-leaning intellectuals in other countriesand the international capitalist class as well. This, too, is aforce to reckon with, fomenting the growth of individualisttendency. As a result, individualism which had already beenreduced to a privilege among them, that rotten individualismappeared in its ugly form. Taking the cue from the Sovietverbiage, they brought about further lowering of culture andideology and took to the course of decentralization ofpolitical and economic power, that is, they sank into the cultof rotten type of aimless petty bourgeois individualism. Thisled to discomfiture of the Soviet leaders. So, they took

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recourse to suppressing it with force, because the SovietUnion still had the fundamental socialist characteristics. See,what a peculiar situation ! On the one hand, they are openingthe floodgates to the forces of liberalism which are in realityforces of counter-revolution in the name of freedom,democracy and all that, while on the other, they aresuppressing these forcibly for maintaining their ownexistence. This maintenance of existence may mean keepingsocialism intact internally or protecting the socialist state orjust ensuring that they remain in power — any one of these.What really was the Soviet purpose, I shall discussafterwards. But by all this they have pushed the wholecommunist movement into an extremely perilous situation.

They are clearly failing to distinguish the very basicdifference between the communist ideology and thebourgeois liberal humanist thinking regarding equality andfreedom, and in that way they are confusing the whole issue.By doing so, they are destroying the force of communistideology, the strength of its reasoning, and are disarming theworking class and its revolutionary movement. As a result,the individualism which lies latent not only within theconfused masses but even among the good revolutionariestries to rear its head taking advantage of these bad effects.And when this is happening the Soviet leaders are seekingto suppress it through use of force. So, that again is invitinga counter-reaction.

From sometime after the Soviet Union opened the doorsto liberalization, one particular point has been striking me.This is what I think — I would ask you to ponder this pointwith deep concentration. Khrushchev had to leave shortlyafter he had come into the leadership. But why ? He had toleave because he could not reflect the high sense of dignity,the high standard of communist ethics and morality in hispersonal conduct, behaviour and activities. His inconsistentand whimsical behaviour denigrated him in public eyes. Hehad come up fighting against Stalin’s image. In this fight,


what very much charmed people with low level ofconsciousness, and to some extent influenced the CentralCommittee, was his explanation that democratic centralismmeans to simply take party decisions together. Any violationof this process meant violation of democratic centralism andcollective leadership. Yes, it is true that the democratic formof collective leadership is like this and the guarantee forcollective leadership lies in struggling relentlessly throughthis process. But at particular times, say in some adversecircumstances or when it is not possible to work accordingto the established norms, this process does not work. Do wehold then that at such times no collective leadership operatesin a genuine Marxist party ? No, the collective leadershipoperates even then. But it is difficult to preserve it then andthere is the danger that it may be polluted. So, since thedemocratic norms were not operative, therefore, there was nocollective leadership — to conclude like that would be sheeroversimplification. Conversely, just because the procedure isthere, so the collective leadership exists — this also is not acorrect concept. By that, the concept of collective leadershipis simply reduced to just formal democratic leadership. Hadcollective leadership meant only this procedure, then itwould have to be admitted that the bourgeois parties whichhold conferences every year, pass resolutions and adoptprogrammes, have all grown on the basis of the principle ofdemocratic centralism and have collective leadership. No,there cannot be collective leadership in any bourgeois orpetty bourgeois party: it is simply impossible. It is notpossible even if they try for it ; for them the word ‘collective’would mean something else. It would be a cloak, a confusingslogan, whereas the reality would be different.

Slogan against personality culta cover for denigrating Stalin

So, you see, Khrushchev came to the forefront bysaying that Stalin had shattered the collective leadership.

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That is why, Khrushchev argued, Stalin’s personal negativeaspects had prevailed so much that there had been no meansof preventing what he had done. And others could not doanything as there was no democracy in the party. But whatwas found is that after coming to power Khrushchev himselfacted in the same manner for which he brought this chargeagainst Stalin. When he used to address meetings, he paid noheed to the fundamental principles and decisions of the party.If the party had not yet taken a decision on a point he wasdiscussing, he would not say that the party had not yetdecided on it, that he was saying something as his personalopinion and not imposing his opinion on others, that he wasplacing the point as a matter of discussion to be thought overby everybody and that the party’s stand would follow. Suchwas never his practice. Even while discussing an opinion ofthe party, he would contradict it and stray away to whereverhe liked. Afterwards, it used to be a task for the CentralCommittee and the Polit Bureau to support his stand, torecast arguments for the purpose and to marshal facts andfigures anew to show that Khrushchev was right, because hewas the leader of the party. This put the Soviet leadershipinto a very awkward position vis-a-vis the intellectuals of thecommunist parties of different countries and createdcomplications in the bilateral relationship with thecommunist parties of other countries. The bitterness that wascreated in the relations with China — perhaps the Sovietleadership did not want it like this, and have feltKhrushchev’s personal conduct to be largely responsible forit. Actually, the reason for worsening of relations with Chinalies elsewhere, but those with low level of consciousnessthink that this bitterness has come about because his personalbehaviour and conduct has been such. Some in the Sovietleadership also thought like this. The present leadership hasremoved Khrushchev because of all such conduct.

Khrushchev’s slogan against the personality cult wasactually to malign Stalin as an individual. But Stalin was a


man of great personality, integrity and firmness, his everystep was well thought out. And Khrushchev is a buffoon, anout and out political joker. Mao Zedong has used this word‘buffoon’ about him, and I, too, am using it. I, too, have feltvery bad about it. Many comrades in our party have also feltbad about his conduct, gestures and postures totallyincompatible with the long standing communist sense ofvalues, ethics and culture. That man turned popular.Afterwards, the present Soviet leadership removed him dueto some difficulties. At that time being hit by practicalexperience, certain things struck their minds. They could seethe serious consequences their activities were having,although they could not realize the exact cause behind it,they could see that these were bad indeed. On the one hand,Khrushchev was saying that he was a liberal and would notimpose rigorous controls, but when the artists andintellectuals started functioning at will, he sought to imposecentralism upon them. Actually, he even failed to understandthat recognition of rights and democracy, putting an end tostrict and rigorous control or coming out from the Stalin era,could not mean denial or denigration of authority orcentralism. At one time, they had even ceased to use the termcentralism. Recently they have started using it again, becauseLenin used to do so.

So we see that not only has their policy remainedunchanged because they could not correctly discern the basiccause, it is also becoming more complicated and distortedunder the influence of their new ‘understanding’. Actually,under pressure of circumstances, they are trying to retract byputting forward some subjective reasonings. But they areunable to find the way out. The course they are adopting forthis purpose is getting more complicated because of theirinability to understand the character of the problem and dueto other vested interests. Their basic outlook being wrong,their reading of the experience is also becoming incorrect.And they are combining this incorrect understanding of

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experience with their main standpoint under the falseimpression of gaining from experience. As a result, theexpositions that they are presenting by combining such‘experiences’ and points with their original revisionistconcept are becoming totally ludicrous. They do not speaknow in the same manner in which they used to. In this, theyhave changed a lot in stages. Khrushchev at first began thisby saying that there would be peaceful revolution in differentcapitalist countries through the parliamentary process.Afterwards, in the face of criticism, he started speakingdifferently. But he did not admit that he had committed amistake. He said that what he had meant was that socialismcould be brought about by transforming Parliament into aninstrument of people’s will and it was necessary to transformParliament into that instrument. Why was it necessary ? Hecould not provide a fitting argument for this. Only trying toprovide a rationale through subjective reasoning, he said thatrelying on the people’s consciousness and backed by militantmass movement, Parliament could be transformed into aninstrument of the people’s will. Communists of the ordinarylevel thought this statement somewhat better than the earlierone and a genuine attempt at improving the standpoint. Butinstead of improving, it is deteriorating further. This ishappening due to low level of consciousness. But some mayargue that had there been no genuine urge for improvement,why did such statements come ?

For example, regarding the law of inevitability of war,Khrushchev first said that it was possible to maintain peaceeven while imperialism existed and Lenin’s thesis about theinevitability of war was no longer valid. Later, he said thatthe theory was still valid but that did not mean that it wasfatalistically inevitable. Yes, the law is still valid, but itsunderstanding is not such that it must happen — that it isfatalistically inevitable. So, peace could be maintained. Hefurther added that when Lenin had termed the present era asthe era of imperialism, war and proletarian revolution, it was


imperialism that played the major role. But now, accordingto him, imperialism was so much weakened that cracks weredeveloping, it was getting isolated; and the process ofdisintegration had also set in. So, Lenin’s era and the presentone stood apart with quite different characteristics. Lenin’sera was the era of imperialism and proletarian revolutionwhereas the present era was that of disintegration ofimperialism and proletarian revolution. So, there was a greatdifference between the present era and the era of Lenin, saidKhrushchev. But what does this ‘great’ difference mean ?Where is it ‘great’ ? The reality is that, even now,imperialism exists with its military might, its policy ofaggression and its conspiracy to bring about counter-revolution, and continues to exist with all its characteristicsas a world system. The main point is whether imperialismstill exists as a world system or not. Otherwise,disintegration of imperialism started with the crisis at thetime of the First World War — the process began then.Afterwards, only its degree had increased. So we see that byadding a word or two to what Lenin had said on the subject,they are trying to retrace steps, trying to analyse afresh.

In their recent writings also I find that they are trying toshift their stand somewhat. Under pressure of difficulties,there is a tendency to improve the expression a bit, to makeit a little more suitable; there is an attempt, a tendencywhether it is possible to retrace and take a position like thatof a real revolutionary. This is what occurs to me; maybe Iam incorrect. That is why I say ‘it occurs to me’ — it islargely an assessment from indicative symptoms. I havenoted these in a number of writings. But what theirstandpoint has become as a result is even worse than theearlier revisionism; it is of a more populist style, even moreconfusing. It is but natural that it should be so, because thisis not where the real problem lies. If they want to retrace theirposition, they would have to do so at one stroke. Or else, itmay happen that, if their level of consciousness and

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understanding come to the correct position, they may retracesteps in a subtle way so that nobody might understand theirearlier mistake; but there is a danger in doing it this way. Toretrace steps in this manner would mean that they would bemoving along with the mistakes and evil effects of the past.The hangover from the bad things of the past would stillpersist. So, whatever the CPSU may now be claiming — say,they are fighting against imperialism etc., etc. — the basicthinking behind their claims remains the same as before. It ispossible to maintain peace even while imperialism is there— they no longer theorize like this. Such talks have beenrelegated to the background. No longer do they discuss nowwhether Leninism is still valid or not. Nowadays withoutmentioning all these talks they are speaking to a certainextent against imperialism in a populist manner and againstChina, too. In their futile bid they are trying to prove in somany ways that whereas China is a national chauvinist, theyare true internationalists. These writings are very mediocreas if penned by school boys. So no purpose is served and theyare plunging into even worse revisionism and confusion.

Counter-revolutionary upsurge— culmination of Soviet-spawned liberalism

Such calamity befell Czechoslovakia because of thisrevisionist policy of the Soviet Union. After the death ofStalin, the Khrushchev leadership, in the name of fightingpersonality cult of Stalin, set the ball of liberalization rollingin the Soviet Union by capitalizing on the mistakes,mechanical outlook and rude behaviour of the leadershipduring Stalin’s time — if indeed these had been there — andby stressing and highlighting these and fomenting grievanceamong the people against these and making use of it, whichagain was possible to some extent due to lack of balance injudgement and the none-too-high level of consciousness ofthe people. Having done so, the Soviet leadership did nothave the capacity to control the situation resulting from this.


What was the situation brought about really ? It actuallyopened the doors for the forces of counter-revolution to reartheir heads. As a result, a situation was created favourablefor the world counter-revolutionary forces. While so far theiropposition to Stalin had been merely in the propagandastage; now, the practice of liberalism, and again throughcultural exchanges with the capitalist countries in the nameof liberalism, the cultural standard going further down – as aconsequence, this opened the doors to the counter-revolutionary forces for infiltration in various spheres, andeven opened up numerous channels to them for infiltrationinto the party and state. That means, a conducive situationwas created for unleashing an all-out attack on the very baseof the party and the state. In reality, it is happening exactlylike that. Under cover of this practice of liberalism, attemptsare afoot to engineer an all-out counter-revolution. That iswhy the reactionaries are so highly publicizing all theseliberal Soviet activities and showering fulsome praise uponthe Soviet Union, for ‘defending communism’ ! Due to suchactivities of the Soviet Union, communism would nowbecome quite palatable to all, even to the counter-revolutionaries. I do not at all understand what is thenecessity of making the communist ideology acceptable tothe counter-revolutionaries. These days even thereactionaries feel that communism is not that bad, seeing asthey do what Dubcek is doing. Observing Dubcek, it strikeseven the PSP in our country that given the necessary effort,the Right Communist (i.e. the CPI — Ed.) in our country,too, might be brought to a similar position. So the PSP haschanged its attitude towards the Right Communists a bit. ThePSP is trying to encourage this trend of liberalism in the CPI.My contention is not that the Right Communists havealready become national communists fully.1 This nationalcommunism is really another name for national socialism —it is nothing else. The so-called Communist Party of ourcountry, too, would become like this in future. Long back,

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in 1957, we had observed that this Communist Party — whatthe party that has split from it is doing and what wouldbecome of it ultimately are altogether different matters — ifit moves towards the two-party democracy, then a Leftwingsocial democratic force like the Labour Party in the UKwould emerge centring round them or through some othersocial democratic forces joining hands with them and, ineffect, a rightist stream would be created as a reactionto it. This future awaits the party. But because of theinfluence small production still has in the economy of ourcountry and because of the importance it still has in therelative sense, such a political trend is yet unable to takeshape. Anyway, that is a different matter.

So, after Khrushchev had opened the doors toliberalism, now they want to keep it arrested at a certainstage. This is the tragedy. What they desire is that thepractice of liberalism should remain confined at the level oftheir own practice. But perhaps they are unaware that whatthey have said is in reality destroying the very living essenceand fervour of Marxism-Leninism and its methodology ofclass struggle. They have opened the doors world-wide forthe flood of liberalism, till now suppressed, and have createda golden opportunity for the counter-revolutionary forceseverywhere to infiltrate into the communist party undercover of liberal outlook and pollute the party. If now this issought to be arrested at one stage, why should it remain so ?When someone shows a path, there is no guarantee that thosewho follow in his footsteps would not surpass him in thenumber of steps taken. They may go ahead by several stepsmore. It is no use then telling the followers: ‘Don’t proceedfurther, stay with me’. It is the Soviet Union that hasencouraged them to go ahead. So, the more one can go aheadin practising liberalism and the more one can make rationalassessment in justification, the greater one is ! How can theynow solve the present problem of Czechoslovakia byfighting shy of this situation of their own creation ?


According to Marxism, we know, the problem of a countryis to be solved by correctly grasping the concrete internalsituation and by relating it to the fundamental principles.What is happening in Czechoslovakia is the manifestation ofa particular type of contradiction. To try to solve this bysidetracking or overriding the fundamental generalcontradiction cannot be regarded as dialectical materialism.It is on the basis of the general fundamental principles thatthe particular contradiction in Czechoslovakia will have tobe resolved. Without doing this, to put special emphasisseparately on an unusual particular feature, is to reduce thegeneral principles to ifs and buts, making them insignificant,thereby clearing the path for revisionism, liberalism andinfiltration of all sorts of perverted reactionary concepts ofbourgeois counter-revolution into the party. This is what therevisionist Soviet leadership has done. They made suchutterances as, ‘The Soviet Union is now a state of the wholepeople, no more a dictatorship of the proletariat’. Thus, thestate is existing without the dictatorship of the proletariat,and that state is the state of the whole people — it is theywho have made such a fantastic analysis and that tooremaining seated in power in the very Soviet Union.Evidently feeling apprehensive today, they are no longerrepeating these. As nowadays even many fathers, seeing theuncouth and unseemly behaviour of their own children onthe streets, hide their faces in shame and walk away, because,if they came face to face with the children they would beconfronted with a fearful situation. Similarly, on seeing thedegenerate appearance and behaviour of its offspring inCzechoslovakia, the Soviet leadership has become verymuch scared today. There may be two reasons for this.

It may be that the Soviet leadership is worried aboutlosing its hold over the area under its influence. That is, theSoviet leadership is worried about losing control andinfluence over the member countries of the bloc led by itunder the Warsaw Pact. So the Soviet leadership does not

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want that others should go any further. WhateverCzechoslovakia may do on issues like individual freedom,etc., — that country is an important associate of the SovietUnion in its political battle against the imperialists. TheSoviet leadership wants at least this position to bemaintained that Czechoslovakia does not go beyond this. Butpursuing the line Czechoslovakia is following, whatguarantee is there that it will not cross that limit ? After all,what basic difference is there between Czechoslovakia andthe Soviet Union in this regard ? The sum and substance ofthe contentions of the two boils down to this: IfCzechoslovakia does not interfere in the internal affairs ofthe Soviet Union and conversely, the Soviet Union in theaffairs of Czechoslovakia, then everything is resolved, as ifthis was the main problem! It is the Soviet leadership whichhas frequently been raising the question of non-interferencein the internal affairs of others. This talk about interferencein the internal affairs of others is very much in the air thesedays. What it concretely means and how the communistsshould view it — I have discussed these elsewhere.

This way of thinking has appeared in the proletarianmovement on the question of defending bourgeois nationalsovereignty against imperialist attack. Its objective is to puta check on activities of the imperialists like blatantlyattacking other countries, interfering in their internal affairs,trying to throw the revolutionary movements of differentcountries into a state of disarray and exporting counter-revolution, etc. This very precept has not been developedwith a view to determining the nature of mutual relationshipbetween communist parties of different countries. The natureof their relationship should be like this : they are mutuallyconsulting one another and through these are enriching theinternationally adopted policies and decisions andimplementing these, and in this way each is advancingtowards a world socialist order through united struggle. Thisis their struggle. Their struggle is not one for protecting its


independence from being aggressed by another. It is true thatthey are maintaining the present separate entities andindependence, but they do so in order to accelerate theprocess of formation of a world federation through themerger of all the socialist countries, by isolating the nationalbourgeois and petty bourgeois elements and forces withineach country so that the forces opposed to socialism,democratic centralism and proletarian internationalism donot get the opportunity to raise their heads. So the slogan andquestion of non-interference in internal affairs is not themajor issue in the mutual relationship between communistparties. This question should never crop up. Again, a bigparty, as the leading party, should not interfere in the affairsof another party. If this is done, it would inevitably give birthto national jingoism in that country as a reaction and createhindrance to developing close mutual relationship becausethe national form of socialist revolution has not yet outliveditself. This is our analysis.

So, after opening the doors to liberalism, when theSoviet leadership desired to arrest it at a certain stage, it wasunable to do so. What actually happened in Czechoslovakia ?Why did it happen like this ? Czechoslovakia is anindustrially advanced country, not a backward one. Bypolluting its administrative setup and the party and by givingbirth to different class parties in this manner, the bourgeoisconcept of freedom was brought into operation there in thename of individual freedom. They separated the state fromthe party. They say that it is the state that has the ultimatepower — so long as the state exists, it wields the ultimatepower and the party, minus the state power, does not haveany power; the party can at best fight for the people. As aresult of these erroneous concepts, as powerful an instrumentas the state could slip into the hands of the bourgeoisie – thisis the situation they have created. By this, the ruling cliquethere actually adopted a line of ultra democracy, ultrafreedom. To advocate this even in a bourgeois system means

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helping to establish surreptitiously worst despotism inthe name of ultra democracy and ultra freedom; it meansinstalling a ruthless and draconian fascist authority under thecloak of ultra democracy and in this way give that dangerousphenomenon deeper roots. The very same points Milldiscussed in his treatise Liberty are now being parroted bythe Czechoslovak leadership. They say that the party shouldhave no control over the state. Should that be so, then whatwould be the class character of the state ? If the dictatorshipof the proletariat is not there, then what will be theconsequences ? Taking advantage of that situation, they willestablish total control over the state structure, introducecapitalism, and again spreading the cloak of revolution overthe party, they will reduce the party to an instrument ofsuppressing the people and obstructing the growth ofrevolutionary thought and consciousness. In other words, inthe name of communism, they will reduce the party to aninstrument for bringing in fascism in Czechoslovakia.

Soviet leadership actuallyundermining dictatorship of proletariat

So, what is happening in Czechoslovakia is in reality acounter-revolutionary upsurge, the path to which has beenopened up by Soviet revisionism in different countries. Theyare reducing the communists to national communistseverywhere. This means that under cover of progressiveverbiage, the communist party is becoming a parlour ofpseudo-democrats, underhand bureaucrats and hypocrites.Having plunged into such a situation, they are evidentlydiluting the basic theory of the leading role of the party; andwhere the party ought to play the leading role they are givingpredominance to the authority of the state. I consider theSoviet leadership’s arguments in this connection simplyhollow talks. They have not taken note of the leading role ofthe party. And supposing they recognized the leading role ofthe party, what tangible gain would come from that ? Would


everything be set right simply by that declaration ? Byplacing the state in the position of real authority in practice,individual freedom in the bourgeois sense has come aboutanyhow. And other parties would get the scope to make theirappearance. In China, besides the CPC, other partiesoperated in the National Consultative Council and theNational Consultative Congress for a long time after the newdemocratic revolution. But they were not placed on a parwith the communist party there.

In their case, the right to make any kind of criticism wasnot conceded; rather their task was to implement theprogrammes of the National Conference or the communistparty. They had to take the pledge that their duty was toassist in implementing the socialist economic programmesadopted in the state enterprises under the leadership of thecommunist party and the programme of the party to usher insocialism. Only after this pledge they earned the right tocriticize.

If this were done in Czechoslovakia, there would havebeen no problem. But the Chinese situation was different.What was the significance of adopting this process inChina ? At the stage of organizing political revolution, theCPC had to reach an understanding and develop unity withother parties since their role could not be ignored. TheNational Consultative Council and the National ConsultativeCongress were the continuation of the erstwhile United Frontwhich had existed there. So long as the role of such partiescannot be thoroughly exhausted and they cannot be isolatedfrom the masses or be fully absorbed in the communistmovement, that is, be made insignificant as political parties,this feature continues to exist. That is a process ofexhausting the role of other parties. And what is happeningin Czechoslovakia is the objective process of exhausting theleading role of the communist party itself ! And all this isbeing done even while admitting the importance ofleadership and the leading role of the party. Likewise, it is

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happening in the Soviet Union but the Soviet leadership hasnot admitted it as such. But the revisionist Soviet leadershiphas in practice made the leading role of the party secondaryby undermining the dictatorship of the proletariat andreducing the party of the proletariat to the party of the wholepeople, and the state of the proletariat to the state of thewhole people. And along with this, they have opened thedoor to ultra-democratic tendency in the name of practisingliberalism and fighting the cult of personality. Altogether,they have created a situation where the tendency ofliberalism and ultra-democracy is increasing inside thecountry on the one hand, while, on the other, when throughthe unabated growth of this process the very authority of thestate is being virtually denied, the leadership is seeking tostifle and crush that. In consequence, it is becoming harmfulboth ways. On the one hand, the forces of counter-revolutionand liberalism are being propped up through propaganda andpublicity; on the other, brutal repression is going on in thename of safeguarding the interest of communism. Whenthere had been no necessity of applying force, theythemselves created a situation which necessitated continuedapplication of such force and these they are doing on thepretext of safeguarding socialism and revolution. They are infact harming the nobility of communism and thereby causingdamage from both sides. So, the tendency of liberalism andrevisionism that developed in Czechoslovakia, was, in fact,nothing else than an attempt to stage counter-revolution asfast as possible and in a devilish manner under cover ofliberalism by creating confusion among the people of theworld and even among a large section of the communists.That the Soviet leadership, being apprehensive of counter-revolution, has intervened there in such a situation tosafeguard revolution could be said only if it was seen that itwas itself engaged in the struggle to rectify its fundamentaldeviations. Because, these very deviations have given birthto this theory in Czechoslovakia and it can be said that they


have gone a few steps further than the Soviet leadership inthis regard. So, if the Soviet leadership means it seriously,they would have to retrace steps at one stroke. Or else, ifthey try to do so skilfully without letting others understand,that must become apparent through some definite symptomsand signs. But it will not do if these symptoms and signsremain hidden or beyond comprehension or it appears as alikely or ‘may-be-like’ observation which I am making, frompartly psychological and partly methodological analysis. Ifthe observation remains like this, none can come to a definiteconclusion. When I say ‘may be’ – I do not mean to assertthat it is the correct idea, because that would be mysubjective thinking. So, if they retrace steps, there must besome definite signs so that it can be understood clearly. Aconcrete expression in the form of ideological manifestationand some definite steps are needed, indicating that they aregoing to retrace. They can either retract from the presentposition by directly admitting their mistakes, or else, if theyhave some ego, they can retract skillfully and not at onestroke. I do not think that if someone wishes to retrace steps,he must do it with a declaration. Either let him come backtotally free from blemishes, or else, there is no necessity ofhis returning if he comes back with a little ego — the pointis not like this. The most important thing, I would say, is thatthey should retrace the steps. If they can come backstraightaway, free from ego, then that would be a conductbefitting real communists. But even if they take to a zigzagcourse and retract through manoeuvres because of their ego,I would say that let them return, at least let the revolution beprotected. The manoeuvres can be taken care of later on. Stillthen, let them return. If they do return, the communistmovement would be largely saved from peril. Even if thisreturn be secret and surreptitious, I would welcome it fromone angle. At the same time, however, I would criticize thisretracing of steps through manoeuvres. And if it happens thatthey retract by openly and fully admitting their mistakes and

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giving full recognition to whatever lessons they have takenfrom whomsoever then that would signify that these peoplehave been able to hold aloft the communist ethics by freeingthemselves anyhow from ego, false sense of prestige andfeelings of national jingoism.

Soviet intervention not for safeguarding revolutionSo, until the Soviet leadership’s utterances and activities

bear this out, its contention that it has intervened inCzechoslovakia to protect revolution from the clutches of thenew ruling group engaged there in paving the path forcounter-revolution, cannot be accepted. This is the firstpoint. Secondly, unless the Soviet leadership changes its ownpolicies, then the pretext it is giving that it intervened inCzechoslovakia because the ruling group there washobnobbing with the imperialists and getting closer to themhas no leg to stand upon. Because in that case, what couldbe gained by the Soviet intervention there ? Yes, one couldunderstand the logic, if the Soviet leadership had argued thatthe Soviet Union, although revisionist, had not become outand out imperialist like the USA, exporting counter-revolution to different countries. At least the revisionists arenot yet openly playing that role. So, to the revolutionaries theposition of the Soviet Union is definitely relatively betterthan that of the imperialists judged in the context of acomparative analysis – in the context of differentiatingbetween contradictions. If the Soviet leadership’s argumenthad been like this, we would have replied: ‘OK, but eventhat is not enough justification to support your action’.

It is true that alignment with the Soviet Union is lessharmful than that with the USA, and as against the USA theSoviet Union can be supported on this consideration. Eventhen, the fanfare with which the Soviet leadership is claimingthat it is championing and protecting the revolutionary trendcannot be supported any way. To justify its claim, the Sovietleadership would first have to admit openly their mistake and


that the hue and cry they have raised in Czechoslovakia isnot for thwarting counter-revolutionary forces there. As amatter of fact, their activities do not prove this. They aresaying all these only to confuse the world public opinion.Otherwise, why are they conferring with Dubcek andSvoboda there ? It is under the rule of this group that all thishas happened in Czechoslovakia. The Soviet leadership istrying to come to an understanding with this very reactionarygroup. What does it mean ? Does not this very fact indicatethat if this group promised that they would not go beyondthe sphere of Soviet influence, then a compromise could bereached and the Soviet troops could return from there ? Allthat this group has to agree to is that they would no longeruse some of their new terms and phrases, but in practice theycould do what they are doing. That is, in pursuing thecounter-revolutionary line, the new ruling group inCzechoslovakia has overdone it. If they don’t do this, theSoviet leadership has not much to object to. Rather, ifCzechoslovakia retracts and goes over to the side of China2

along the path of revolutionary Marxism, the Soviet leader-ship would be much more infuriated with Czechoslovakia.

If you notice the attitude of the Dubcek group, youwould find that they have been saying from the beginningthat the Soviet intervention would be resisted, but notthrough violent means. They have instructed their army notto take up arms, that is, it is like a quarrel between brothers;they would resolve it mutually. In that case, fighting witharms would further complicate the situation and then theywould perhaps not be able to resolve the matter fraternally.So, they have instructed not to use arms. It is clear from allthese events that the Soviet Union has gone there to protectrevolution from the danger of counter-revolution – this is notthe real character of this incident. The reality is that pressurehas been brought to bear upon the Soviet Union by theconference of the East European countries under Sovietinfluence so as to save themselves from the crisis in their

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countries that must inevitably follow the Czechoslovakhappenings. Otherwise, the Soviet Union would not perhapshave done all this. Secondly, at joint sittings before thisintervention, the Soviet Union did not get the clear-cutassurance from Czechoslovakia or could not understand inits own way that whatever else might happen,Czechoslovakia would not go out of the orbit of the Sovietinfluence or would not commit any excess or at least wouldnot insist on such conditions as would help rapid spread ofthe liberalistic outlook in the East European countries — atleast, would not press for any such term. If Czechoslovakiahad indicated that it would desist from these, then they couldpractise as much liberalism as they liked under cover ofrevolutionary talks — there was no harm in that because theSoviet leadership itself was doing the same in their country.In that case, they would have nothing to worry about. Butthe vocabulary and slogans now being used byCzechoslovakia, the talks and activities it is indulging in, areproving to be disastrous. In order to prevent Czechoslovakiafrom indulging in all these activities, the Soviet Union istrying to reach an understanding with it. So you see, ifCzechoslovakia enters into a pact with the Soviet Union togive this guarantee, and if the Soviet Union understands thatCzechoslovakia would not side with the imperialists andwould no more complicate matters in adjoining EastGermany, Poland and other East European countries, theycould then do whatever they liked internally — the SovietUnion would have no objection to that. If such anunderstanding can be arrived at with Czechoslovakia, then itwould be found that keeping this very ruling group inCzechoslovakia in power, the Soviet Union is ready towithdraw its army and quite satisfied in co-habiting withthem in spite of their counter-revolutionary talks andpostures! So, the fact is not that the Soviet Union hasintervened there to resist counter-revolution. From thatangle, Zhou Enlai’s observation that this conflict between the


Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia is basically a conflictbetween the internal revisionist ruling clique of a countryand an external revisionist ruling clique is correct. But, forthe CPC to go so far on this as to say that the Sovietintervention in Czechoslovakia is comparable to Hitleriteaggression or the US military intervention in Vietnam is, Ithink, too much and an oversimplification of the issue. I amvery much against such statements. But I am of the sameopinion as China that the Soviet conduct has nothing to dowith safeguarding revolution. But I have already said, thereare symptoms that they might retrace steps. The criticismthen should be such that it may create a favourable situationfor them to retrace and that is what should be attempted.Previously, there have been efforts, time and again, to makethem turn round and that attempt can again be made now.Since they could not take to the correct path earlier, theywould not be able to find it this time too — none can predictso beforehand. It is true that the level of consciousness theyreflect indicates that it is more likely that they would not findthe correct path. If someone asks me, I would say thataccording to my estimate the chance of not being able to doso is near about 96 to 97 per cent. In their attempt to retracesteps, they would again muddle up and create complicationsas they did before and create more confusion. But given aconducive environment, there is at least a 4 to 5 per centchance that they would retrace.

Had China not hit out at the Soviet Union but putforward a rich analysis, had they conducted the criticism insuch a way as would have led the internal forces in theSoviet Union to think afresh, they could have helped theSoviet Union to retrace steps, if there had been the slightestpossibility of that. That is to say, if the Chinese criticism hadpointed out to the Soviet leadership: See what is happeningin Czechoslovakia is in pursuance of Khrushchev’s line, it isthe outcome of the Soviet practice of liberalism, of therevisionism whose doors have been opened by the Soviet

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leadership and none else. The only difference lies in thedegree by which they have outstripped the Soviet Union intheir revisionist utterances, pattern of activities andmagnitude of practice of liberalism.

Otherwise, as regards the basic principle,Czechoslovakia has taken to the same course as the SovietUnion had taken. It is the Soviet Union that had opened thedoors. And if the Soviet leadership’s contention that theyhave intervened there militarily to protect communism is tobe accepted, then what they are doing now amounts tosomething like what used to be once branded as Trotskyism:that is, to resort to military intervention or sending themilitary to occupy another country. The communists havenever thought of treading this path for advancement ofrevolution in another country. The communists haveadvocated helping the internal revolutionary forces ofanother country in every way from the seat of state power inone country. They have declared that if need be they wouldsend volunteers — they have thought of sending volunteersto another country in support of revolution. Only if a countryis militarily attacked by a foreign power and the army of asocialist country goes there to resist it for safeguardingrevolution, then it becomes quite a different proposition.That is then needed for protecting the revolution of onecountry from foreign aggression or intervention. But thecommunists have never thought of protecting revolutionthrough military intervention in this way by occupying acountry.

Purpose of criticismI think another important point should be kept in mind

while criticizing. The revisionism which emerged in theSoviet Union was brought in there motivatedly — it can besaid to be the handiwork of a handful of people, but thewhole people and the administration cannot be branded likethis. It might be that some individual leaders were involved


in a conspiracy. I cannot but note that such leaders mightenjoy the trust of the Soviet people, may be due to theirsense of national pride or chauvinism or for whatever reason.

Either because of the heritage existing for long orconfidence or allegiance to the party, they have a soft cornerfor the leaders. It may be an uncritical, blind regard, but it isthere. Whether they are involved in a conspiracy is not amajor issue to me here. When steps against an individualwould be taken, that should be ascertained throughinvestigation. The main task now is to defeat revisionism, thereal basis of which lies in the low level of consciousness ofthe people; this is being revealed clearly by the wrongplanning of the socialist economy, which at present is furtherdeteriorating. Naturally, in such a situation there ought to bepainstaking, patient, concrete and effective struggle andcriticism. But the struggle from the Chinese side has notbeen like this. Rather, the manner in which they havelaunched a counter-attack against the Soviet Union in orderto repulse revisionism has for all practical purpose helpedthe Soviet revisionists to rally the people behind theirleadership by exploiting the ultra-nationalist mentality that isthere among the masses and the comrades because of theirlow level of consciousness, detract the people fromrevolutionary ideas and ultimately make them disinterestedin such ideas.

Besides, the polemics China is conducting againstSoviet revisionism reflect a somewhat low level ofconsciousness, but even then, if the Chinese contentions areproperly grasped, it would be seen that the points beingraised by China regarding the international situation and itscontradictions are in the main correct. This does not meanthat they have been able to correctly grasp all the particularcontradictions in the present-day world and to co-ordinateand integrate each particular contradiction with the generalinternational contradictions. It is not that they have correctlydetermined the stage of revolution in each particular country,

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its strategy and tactics. For instance, the people’s democraticrevolution that they have prescribed for India and all otherrelatively backward capitalist countries irrespective ofspecific conditions is misleading. The particular concept andunderstanding about strategy and tactics of revolution whichthey have gathered from the Chinese experience — thatparticular experience, that model of Chinese revolution theyhave deemed to be universal and are thinking that revolutioneverywhere would have to be patterned after that. It is beingfound that on some such issues there are shortcomings, andtheir greatest shortcoming which is harming the internationalcommunist movement, is their very mechanical, un-psychological approach and aggressive attitude because ofwhich they are not being able to achieve effective result indefeating revisionism in spite of their great contribution inthis regard. Even though their analysis on revisionism is inthe main correct, the approach and manner in which they puttheir analysis suffers from mechanical thinking. In whichsituation and circumstances are they engaged in thepolemics, the level of consciousness of those they arefighting against and also of their supporters the world over— they are not at all taking cognizance of these. Those, too,have to be attracted and drawn to the side of revolutionthrough uplifting the standard of their ideologicalconsciousness, they, too, must be made to grasp the issuethrough this polemics. Otherwise, what purpose does thecriticism serve ? This is our criticism about the Chineseapproach. Their main contention, their analysis aboutrevisionism is in the main correct. But the way in which theygo about it, the manner of placing their arguments, sufferfrom mechanical approach.

For example, when we speak about socialism, we say itin a concrete way for achieving a concrete objective. We donot speak to the sky. Similarly, when we speak onrevisionism, we do so keeping in view the mental make-upof the revisionists in different countries so that it may be


possible to develop the struggle against revisionism in awidespread manner by revealing and pinpointing the truecharacter of revisionism. When I am speaking about Sovietrevisionism in particular, the object of my discussion is toelevate the level of consciousness of the Soviet masses andby that I am either trying to rectify their leadership, orseeking to develop a movement for removal of thisrevisionist leadership from power. My aim, surely, is one ofthese two. Otherwise, what is the purpose of my criticism ?I aim at one more thing too, that is, freeing the communistmovements of different countries, the people’s liberationstruggles, the revolutionary movements and the democraticmass movements from the influence of Soviet revisionism.So, while leveling criticism against the Soviet revisionistleadership, it should be kept in mind that those who are inleadership there enjoy the confidence of the masses. We maylament over why the level of communist consciousness islow the world over, but we all, more or less, are responsiblefor this. We cannot fight against revisionism by totallydisregarding this reality of the situation today. We have toaccept the reality that the Soviet appeal still holds sway overmost people. You will find that most of the learned andeducated people — I cannot consider all of them unwise orunscrupulous — think that it is the dogmatic attitude ofChina which is standing in the way of maintaining unity inthe socialist camp over the issue of the Vietnam liberationstruggle. Even many leaders of the CPI(M) — some of themmay be unscrupulous, but there are experienced veterancomrades who are unanimous on this point at least — whatopinion do they hold on this ? They too hold that thereshould be some kind of unity at least for the sake ofVietnamese liberation movement in order to thwart imperia-lism, and by opposing the Soviet proposal for unitedlyassisting the Vietnamese struggle, China is acting againstunity to the detriment of the Vietnamese struggle itself.

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Unity and question of leadershipThese comrades are not at all able to grasp that this

proposal for unity by the Soviet leadership was a mereeyewash. By raising this slogan, their very purpose was toput China in an awkward position vis-a-vis those in thecommunist movement who are not so conscious. I have seeneven many stalwarts of revolution seeking to put China inan awkward situation by raising this bogey of forging unitedstruggle. They could not grasp at all that some concretequestions were involved in this issue of united struggle. Theway in which dialectical materialists should understand theissue of unity is that in any unity there is a question ofdominant or leading role. So, in this particular case, whowould have the leading role — China or the Soviet Union ?There can be no real unity bypassing this question. Manythink that since the need for unity is paramount, why shouldthis question have to be dragged to the forefront and decidedfirst ? If this is done, will there at all be unity ? Or wouldnot this further damage whatever unity is there today ?Because of their low level of consciousness, they think : justsee, these two powers, instead of showing interest in fightingin the Vietnamese struggle, are out to solve beforehand whowould have dominance within this unity. They fail tounderstand that this is an objective question and offundamental nature, because if the Soviet Union hasdominance in the united struggle, then it would go in favourof the revisionists. In the name of helping revolution, itwould eventually extend the sphere of influence of therevisionist clique and destroy all possibility of theVietnamese revolution acting as the bulwark of internationalrevolution. This is what the Chinese leadership is saying.One may not agree to this, but the point should be deeplypondered over before criticizing China, going by the catchyslogan raised by the Soviet Union. Secondly, in resolvingthis issue of unity, it should be examined first as to how the


situation that has come about on the question of providingadvanced military hardware and technical assistance by theSoviet Union to Vietnam can be handled. This questionwould not have cropped up if the Soviet Union hadunconditionally handed over the armaments to the Chineseexperts and the leading comrades in the Vietnam war. Butthe Soviet Union has not done that. Is there evidence to showthat the Soviet Union is handing over its missiles andarmaments to the Chinese experts in this struggle against USimperialism in Vietnam and then proposing unity, but theChinese are still objecting ? In that case, I would have agreedthat the continuing objection of China is stemming fromdogmatism: just because the Soviet Union is revisionist,China does not want unity with it and is blind to the urgentnecessity of unity in this particular case.

So, as I said, during this debate China should haveimpressed upon the Soviet Union that as the outcome of therevisionist policy all this is happening in Czechoslovakia –if it continues further, then what solution would be achievedeven if an understanding is eventually reached with theruling group there ? For instance, Novotny, who was asupporter of the Soviet line, was also a revisionist. But evenhe had to go away from the leadership. Those who are in theleadership at present are also supporters of the Sovietleadership. But the possibility cannot be ruled out that justbecause they are revisionists themselves, even more ultra-revisionist cliques would not topple them and take thecountry to even worse position. Rather, all have thisapprehension, especially East Germany; because, EastGermany has a sense of national humiliation which springsfrom a particular kind of German national pride. Does notthe Soviet leadership know it ? Do they not know that evenin spite of so much reconstruction and such superiority of thesocialist system, nobody leaves West Germany to reside inEast Germany ? Rather, people were fleeing from EastGermany to the West and to check this they have sealed the

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border between East and West Berlin from the side of EastBerlin.3

What does it mean ? It means that the people of EastGermany are not yet free from the sense of national pride.They suffer still from a sense of national jingoism. This haspersisted because of the weakness of the ideological struggle.Towards the end of Stalin’s time, a struggle was initiated toget over this weakness in the communist movement. ButStalin could not release this struggle covering all aspects.Even then, the theoretical struggle which Stalin had begunhas been destroyed by the present Soviet leadership in allspheres. So, how would they eliminate this nationaljingoism ? Where are the instruments of struggle ? Wouldpeople be freed from it simply by listening to their talk? Soyou see, these are there and these incidents reaffirm it.

The ways of the Soviet leadership are maligningnobility of communism in the eyes of the peopleIf this continues in Czechoslovakia, it would be difficult

for the East German leaders to hold their country together.The point to be realized is that the unification of Berlinwhich they are seeking to accomplish in another way wouldbe attempted to be brought about through an internalcounter-revolutionary upsurge and again the Soviet Unionwould then have to crush it by sending military forces. Thesame would happen in Poland, too. It has already happenedin Rumania. Naturally, East Germany and Poland are puttingpressure upon the Soviet Union to nip it in the bud. Butwould the matter end there ? The Chinese analysis shouldhave been like this. Either they may not say anything at all;or else, if they do, they would have to say all these,explaining the issue elaborately through articles, etc. Byanalysing the negative aspects of this Soviet intervention, itwould have to be shown that the counter-revolution inCzechoslovakia should not be allowed to gain ground. If itgains ground, such incidents would happen in other East


European countries, in areas under the Soviet influence. Thisis because the liberalism to which they have opened thedoors is all the time giving birth to liberal forces which theSoviet Union cannot control or does not have the power torepulse because it has no ideological centralism and becauseit has destroyed the weapon of proletarian internationalismwhich had guided the world communist movement for a longperiod. In practice, the term proletarian internationalism hastoday become reduced to just a hackneyed jargon. There isno reflection of any emotion or deep realization about it. Insuch a situation, therefore, how can the Soviet Unioneffectively repulse it through military intervention ? Whatthey crush today may again come back tomorrow. But, fromthe opposite side, what reaction is it generating ? Thissuppression is creating a hostile attitude towards communismin general and the Soviet rule in particular, coming as it doesfrom a fear complex and sense of humiliation. By this, it ishelping to malign the nobility of communism in the people’seyes.

So, if this process continues, they would not be able toprotect the Soviet revolution and the Soviet Union cannoteven protect the countries under its influence just throughmilitary intervention. And if the Soviet influence has to becontinually protected through military intervention, what arethey reducing the socialist state to ? What difference remainsthen between an imperialist country and the Soviet Union ?Do they not realize this ? All these are in fact brewing as itsconsequent negative effects. But are all these fatalisticallyinevitable ? No, these are the outcome of the deviation of theSoviet leadership. It would have to be shown by concreteanalysis like this, point by point. Others should be asked totake lesson from these. In that case, it would have clearlyexposed the bluff of what the Soviet leadership has beensaying to mislead the world public opinion. Even if somecommunists are now misguided by the Soviet leadership andare made to believe that the Soviet intervention in

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Czechoslovakia was to protect the revolution, they wouldhave come to realize the truth in no time. Just as theCommunist Party of France, although an ally of the Sovietleadership, has opposed the Soviet intervention inCzechoslovakia. They are not allies of China, but of theSoviet Union. They are revisionists and opposed to China.Does not the Soviet Union understand what a situation it hasbrought about ? Has all this fallen from the sky all of asudden ? At such an advanced stage in the onward march ofthe communist movement when in the post-Second WorldWar situation imperialism was almost cornered and thesuperiority and victory of the socialist system were beingrevealed continually and it was emerging as a world systemof states — what a calamity befell it just at such a time !Wherefrom did capitalism gather this strength to fightagainst communism ? The Soviet leadership surely does notconsider capitalism more progressive than communism ! Ifthey think so, let them declare that openly. Let the people ofthe world hear it. At least their stand can be understood then.No, surely they do not think so. All these are thereforefollowing from their revisionist outlook and activities. In thepresent situation, it was very necessary for the CPCleadership to check the temptation of hitting out in the nameof criticism and put the issue in this manner.

There was such a great opportunity, I think, to initiatethinking and contemplation anew among the Soviet massesand also scope to induce many serious communists, stillunder illusion about the Soviet Union, into thinking afresh,but instead the CPC straightaway bracketed the Sovietintervention in Czechoslovakia with the Hitlerite attack !This is evidently an overstatement of facts. The moment it isput like this, the common people take it as nothing but acanard. Consequently, people who could be made tounderstand and grasp the matter so that it might perhaps havebeen possible to change the revisionist leadership — thatprocess was set at naught. Even if the revisionist leadership


could not be changed through this, there would be no harm,because this struggle would have been twofold. Either theleadership would have rectified itself and returned to therevolutionary course in this way, or else, removal of therevisionist leadership would have been possible by theSoviet people and the communists within — like those inpower in Czechoslovakia now have thrown out the earlierruling group. They rallied the forces of counter-revolution tooverthrow the earlier rulers because the latters’ politics wasconducive to counter-revolution. If we can project therevolutionary politics instead, that politics would help indeveloping the revolutionary forces against the revisionistsand they would one day be able to oust the revisionistleadership from the party. This is possible and this is theprocess we are supposed to adopt. Therefore, we are to startwith a positive approach, from the positive, which I havealready referred to, having observed different incidents. Butwhat China is highlighting is only the negative aspect and theCPC is abusing them as much as possible. This is a very badand dangerous tendency, and we are noting this with muchapprehension because we do not have even an infinitesimalfraction of the capacity to change the world situation andpattern it in favour of revolution which the CPC possesses.But such a big party is not being able to grasp these points— either because of over zealousness or an inclination forone-sided emphasis or being carried away by emotion andbecause of mechanical and somewhat faulty approach, theyare unable to correctly understand the issue.

Besides, while judging, we should keep in mind anotherimportant point. The tendency that Czechoslovakia has beenreflecting is a dangerously counter-revolutionary one. On theother hand, our analysis of the Soviet Union is that in spiteof the Soviet leadership being revisionist, the Soviet socialsystem is still basically socialist and the CPSU a communistparty in essential characteristics, but its leadership is in thehands of the revisionists. As long as this analysis remains

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valid, I consider, that if a situation has developed whereCzechoslovakia, through the counter-revolutionary upsurgehas reached a point of being turned into a bastion ofimperialism in Europe, into their war base, in that case it isbetter, in the relative sense, to remain with the revisionists.4

In this sense, the Soviet intervention cannot be called thatbad and it can be supported from the legal standpoint, and Ithink that should be done, but there can be no moral supportfor this. The Soviet Union would have to turn back from therevisionist path if it is to secure the moral support of thegenuine communists. Otherwise, from the moral point ofview there can be no justification for this — it is anintervention of the worst kind. For keeping under control thevery situation it has brought about itself, the Soviet Unionhas now launched the intervention. Evidently this cannothave any moral justification. So, the character of thisstruggle is not that of one between revolution and counter-revolution. This is really a struggle between two revisionistpowers, both of which are opening the doors to the counter-revolutionary forces to serve some other exigencies.

What should be the object of criticismBut whatever be the reason, we should not speak in the

same vein as the bourgeoisie. One more point should be keptin mind here. Please note, such an incident of unthinkabledimension occurred, but the imperialists who had kicked upa row and had even contemplated counter-intervention in thecase of Hungary have not done so this time. This time,President Johnson has tried to reap some political dividendsthrough tall talks. But from the very beginning they havebrought up this issue in the Security Council of the UNO,knowing well that it would not be discussed there. The ideaprevailed in them that nothing further than this should bedone in the matter. Anything further attempted would be anexcess, and in that case the Soviet Union might perhapsultimately turn towards China and return to the correct


revolutionary line because the Soviet state is still a socialistone. They know that all these are actually happening becauseof the line the Soviet Union is pursuing. That country is stillmainly moving within the orbit of the policy of peacefulcapitulation to imperialism and what the imperialists needmost is that it continues to pursue this policy. Thus theobjective of the imperialists has been just to take advantagethrough propaganda and see how much they can do tomalign communism more, how much more can the practiceof liberalism be enhanced by applying pressure and howmuch more can the influence of liberalism be spread withinthe worldwide communist movement making use of theoccasion. Nothing more than this. From this, too, it followsthat had the Soviet intervention in Czechoslovakia beenbasically for protecting revolution, then the attitude of theUSA would not have been soft like this.

I think it may be that the Czechoslovak incident wouldprompt the Soviet Union to ponder why such signs are beingmanifested in one country after another. It is not that such athing has happened in Czechoslovakia alone. It has happenedin Rumania previously. There was an incident in Poland. Thetendency of the people in East Germany to move abroad,leaving that socialist country proves what extent ofdiscontent is brewing among the masses of these countriesagainst their rulers, irrespective of what happens outwardly.The Soviet leadership should understand these and realizethe matter. So, there is a possibility of rethinking amongthem. I have observed earlier also that they do not exercisetheir brains unless forced to do so in the face of adversity. Itis for helping the process of their retracing steps that weshould criticize in a different manner. Just as it is necessaryto expose their revisionist character, so also their pretencethat they are after protecting revolution through interventionin Czechoslovakia should be criticized. Again, it is to beborne in mind that there is a vast difference in outlookbetween our criticism vis a vis that of the imperialist-

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capitalist countries; that too should be clearly highlighted.The object of our criticism is totally different from that

of the imperialist-capitalist countries. They are actuallyspeaking in support of the counter-revolutionaries and inorder to malign communism. Their motive is very clear.They are denouncing the Soviet intervention inCzechoslovakia. But what is now happening inCzechoslovakia ? The Soviet Union is trying to arrive at asettlement with those who were creating trouble there. Andhow much has been the damage due to the Sovietintervention on such a big scale in Czechoslovakia ? Somuch propaganda of the imperialists could cut no ice in thematter. They do not even have the opportunity of concoctingstories. Yes, the Soviet Union has militarily intervened inCzechoslovakia, but there have been efforts to keep thelosses to the minimum. It has shown the utmost restraint inthis regard. And what are the imperialists themselves doing ?They are brutally suppressing the people’s movement in theirown countries and intervening in other countries, one afteranother. The USA has perpetrated ghastly killings in Vietnamwhich violate all codes of conduct, not to speak of thehumane code of conduct. They have surpassed even thecriminal acts perpetrated during the whole of the SecondWorld War. So what is there for the imperialists to raise suchan outcry against the Soviet intervention when theythemselves are committing even more heinous crimes, oneafter another, all over the world ? So, the imperialists haveno right to criticize the Soviet intervention inCzechoslovakia. But we are not saying that this Sovietintervention is justified since the imperialists are interferingin other countries. We consider that the Soviet Union hascommitted wrong by intervening in Czechoslovakia. But ithad to do this in order to get over the damage caused by itsdeviation and it would have to go on committing mistakeafter mistake like this till it can free itself from revisionismand regain revolutionary orientation. So, until a genuine


communist has finally concluded that there is no possibilityany more of their retracing, he should, instead of eithersupporting their activities totally or continuing just to abusethem from start to finish, endeavour to ensure that theyreturn to the correct course. This is the outlook with whichwe view the incident of Soviet intervention inCzechoslovakia and this is how I think the matter should beapproached.

Speech on August 26, 1968.Published as a booklet in Bengalion October 1, 1986. English versionappeared in Proletarian Era, NovemberRevolution Special Issue, November 15, 1986.

NOTES

1. Afterwards, Comrade Ghosh termed this party an out and outnational communist party.

2. At that time the revisionists had not usurped the party leadership inChina.

3. The former Berlin Wall dividing East and West Germany had beenerected in Khrushchev’s time in 1960.

4. Comrade Shibdas Ghosh cautioned repeatedly, including in hisspeech The Tenth Congress of the Communist Party of China(1973), that if the Soviet Union could not check the revisionisttrend, it would destroy socialism and that the state could not besaved in the long run. When the renegade Gorbachev cliqueintroduced their ‘perestroika’ and ‘glasnost’, the CentralCommittee, based on Comrade Ghosh’s teachings designated theseas ‘blueprints of counter-revolution’, and on 27 March 1990 itcame to the final conclusion that the CPSU was no more acommunist party and that capitalism had been restored in the SovietUnion.

Soviet Military Intervention in Czechoslovakia and Revisionism

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