MANIFESTO RELEASED

Let Young India Rise and Roar Again

(Speech delivered by Dipankar Bhattacharya at Student-Youth Parliament in Patna where he released the CPI(ML)’s Election Manifesto for the 14th Lok Sabha Elections.)

One single spark can raise a prairie fire. One single instance of martyrdom can change the course of history. It can sound the death knell for a mighty empire.

On March 23, 1931 Bhagat Singh went to the gallows at Lahore Central Jail. His martyrdom was a spark that raised a prairie fire and sounded the death knell for the British Empire.

Bhagat Singh wanted to free India not only from the yoke of British colonialism, he wanted to overthrow the nexus between the British imperialists and their Indian collaborators, the parasitic classes of the Indian society. His vision of a free India was that of a socialist India, a people’s India.

Today India is formally free, but the parasites wielding power in India have made the country a happy hunting ground for their American masters. Together they have declared a war on the actual producers and workers of India. While the real producers and workers are being driven to death, the parasites and their masters are having a grand picnic. Bhagat Singh’s inheritors are being killed and jailed, but criminals of different hues are having a field day.

The people of India must therefore wage and win a second war of independence. And this is why we must go back to Bhagat Singh, the biggest people’s hero of our freedom movement in the 20 th Century. We need every inspiration and strength from his legacy, because we have a battle on hand with the disciples of Golwalkar and Savarkar. If Golwalkar and Savarkar had sought British blessings to transform India into a fascist Hindu Rashtra, their disciples today are seeking American protection. Bhagat Singh’s young comrades must get ready to teach these American agents a fitting lesson.

The ensuing elections to the 14 th Lok Sabha mark an important battle in this ongoing war. The ruling classes and their parties have always sought to win elections by using a combination of money, muscle and mass deception. This time round with the help of the corporate media and celebrity circles, they are trying to convert it into a grand spectacle where the people are expected to be just spectators. A lot is being said about India’s young electorate, some crocodile tears are also being shed about the curse of unemployment, but the youth are only being urged to follow the beaten track. Indeed, they want us to cheer and clap even as they reduce us to rightless citizens in our own land.

We on the other hand call upon the people to rise against their enemies and assert their presence as an independent force. The criminals of different hues who are trying to hijack our country and rule us with their weapons of terror and deception must be brought to book.

The CPI(ML)’s manifesto for the 14 th Lok Sabha elections is being released today, on the seventy-third anniversary of Bhagat Singh’s martyrdom. For us, election manifesto is not a litany of lies or a string of empty promises. It is a mirror of truth, a charter of struggle. It is a renewed commitment to intensify the battle for democracy and social transformation, for a genuinely free and progressive new India. Bhagat Singh’s young comrades have a great responsibility to spread this message far and wide and to translate it into action.

Let us dare to fight and dare to win. Let us uphold Bhagat Singh’s glorious legacy and realise his great vision of a truly free India.

Inquilab Zindabad.