Communist Party of India (Maoist) expels Kobad Ghandy

Kobad Ghandy (centre) being produced before the district court in Karimnagar, a file photograph.

Kobad Ghandy (74), communist ideologue and a senior member of the underground Communist Party of India (Maoist), has been expelled from the party.

Abhay, CPI (Maoist) national spokesperson, said that the central committee of the banned outfit was removing its politburo member and senior-most leader Ghandy from the primary membership of the party because of his alleged anti-party activities. The CPI (Maoist) has also been angered by Ghandy’s book Fractured Freedom: A Prison Memoir (2021). The book was penned by the Doon School and London educated ideologue after his release from jail in 2019.

In a statement released to the media, Abhay accused Ghandy of abandoning the “dialectical and historical materialism, principles of Marxism and class struggle” and “for selecting the way of getting happiness through mysticism”.

In the statement, Abhay accused Ghandy of wrongly explaining and commenting on Marxism-Leninism-Maoism and said: “He [Kobad Ghandy] also stated that these three aspects of life that have to be woven into any project for change did not reflect in his 40-year revolutionary life, so put this as goal post before going to change the world. He is also saying that the essence should be grasped from bourgeoisie moral stories. In this way, by selecting the idealist path he is dishonestly saying that there is no happiness and freedom in the Marxist way of practice that is why Marxism is failed in reaching its target.” Ghandy has been accused of rejecting revolutionary politics and “stepping into the mire of bourgeoisie idealism”.

Added Abhay: “Kobad’s mysticism is only related to the feudal and bourgeoisie ideology, but it has no relation to Marxism which is more scientific in philosophical aspect.”

“Kobad followed Naxalbari politics for more than 40 years and continued as a Central Committee member of the CPI(Marxist-Leninist) Peoples’ War Group (PWG) and acted as Maharashtra State Committee member and later continued as the politburo member of CPI (Maoist) until his arrest in 2019. He had lost integrity and tried to satisfy the ruling classes. After releasing from jail he did not contact the party, without discussing the party and violating the party constitution, democratic centralism and ideological principles, he wrote and released the book,” said Abhay. According to him, this was a display of anarchist tendencies in Kobad Ghandy and through the book he was attempting to “inculcate pessimism in the revolutionary camp and [making] false allegations against the Maoist party”.

Stating that the Narendra Modi government was trying hard to root out the revolutionary movement by intensifying the government’s Samadhan-Prahar military campaign, Abhay said that Ghandy had released his book to serve “the ruling class”. Said the central committee spokesperson: “[Ghandy] explained in the book that he had a good companion within the criminal world and [among] jail authorities and had a comfortable life in prison. Without shame, he openly praised the criminal gangs and jail authorities. He falsely alleged that the Maoists had close links with the mafia and often led them in jail.”

Abhay said that Ghandy was influenced by the Naxalbari movement and ultimately joined in the revolutionary movement and emerged as one of the leading members of the Maharashtra movement. But, Ghandy, though he had studied Marxism-Leninism – Marxism, had “failed in applying the theory to concrete conditions,” he said.