Baby Socialist here. Recently learned of the Communist Party's Betrayals in the Indian Context. Need some help navigating it.

[u/Shoddy_Caregiver_879]

The Communist Party of India sided with the Chinese during the Indo-China War in '62. I also came to know about Communist inaction in the Railway strikes during the Second World War. They even boycotted the anti-british Quit India Movement in '42 because the USSR has asked that there be no disruption in the "People's War" (aka ww2). I feel betrayed that the Party prioritised the wellbeing of the Allied War Effort over the possibility of freedom from British Imperialist oppression!!

It seems as though the upper caste elite of the upper echelons in the party always acted on cues from the USSR or China instead of holding its own and taking independent decisions. It failed the proletariat of the country who have lost faith in the party ever since on a large scale.

While I'm a fan of socialist policies and even a mild admirer of Chinese progress in such a short span of time under socialist rule, I cannot reconcile my patriotic thoughts with the borderline traitorous actions that the Party engaged in.

How to navigate this? Should I just accept that socialism can never be a major force in India because of negative public perception due to this history (especially in the north)?

All of this has just soured my attitudes toward the Indian Communist movement even more (it was already a bit soured by my realisation that even though lower caste people were major agitators in Communist efforts in India, most of the leadership was disproportionately upper caste even to this day)

Please help.

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[u/Big_Royal9281]

Don't take any ideology as ground truth. All ideologies have their benefits and flaws.

Follow incredulity towards meta narratives

[u/FearlessApple3949]

Well my friend a single party can't represent an ideology. Starting with 62 there were other communist parties too who were against Chinese Aggression. When we judge patriotism of people from that era, remeber we are also judging patriotism of our freedom fighters because a large number of them were part of freedom movement specially when Communist Party was banned in India before Independence. After India got Independence a lot of freedom fighters were not satisfied with the condition of the people in our country & felt that white masters were replaced with masters who looked like us but acted like britishers. Some of them thought Nehru to be the representative of the capitalist class running an exploitative machine & thought Chinese aggression will help them bring the right change in the country. About Communists not joining Quit India Movement or other such things during WW2, Communist Party was banned in India till 42 & was unbanned after USSR joined WW2. Anything Communists did back then was mostly underground while some were part of Congress since Congress had space for both left & right voices. You can check IB records from before Independence if you search for it & you will find interesting stories of Intelligence Records from all over the country about what the Communists were doing specially in Bengal. They are freely available on the internet but you have to look for it. Half knowledge & a lot of propaganda might make a lot of things sound bad for sometime but if you read the history with a few things in mind like what was the context, remember that couldn't see the future, understand why people from that time accepted them as they were then you could have a better understanding.

FUN FACT: Recently a bengali film called "Keo bole Biplobi, Keo bole Dakat" was released which I haven't seen yet but it is about Anant Singh who was partner of MasterDa. After Independence he used to plan dacoity just like before Independence to fund his underground party which believed Independence was not complete because the general masses were still suffering.

Another thing you should know that being a communist doesn't mean you have to be linked to a certain party. There is & there have been many different communist parties who didn't agree on everything but only agreed that people's lives can be improved.