INTRODUCTION

• Most strands of Indian political thought in the early 20th century grew out of the historical conflict with colonialism.

• M.N. Roy (Narendranath Bhattacharya), born in 1887 in the village of Arbelia, was India’s first communist theorist.

• Roy attempted to apply Marxism for liberation from foreign rule.

• During his youth, Bengal and the rest of India were witnessing an anti-colonial struggle and an agitation against the partition of Bengal in 1911.

• The politics of representation and constitutional agitation were being questioned, and militant nationalism inspired many young activists.

• Influenced by militant nationalism, Narendranath Roy was involved in bomb making and dacoity to secure funds for revolutionary activities.

• Narendranath Roy and some other activists were convicted in the Howrah Sibpur conspiracy case in 1910 and spent about 9 months in solitary confinement.

• After his release, Roy rose to a high position and was sent as a representative to negotiate an arms deal with the Germans.

• His search for arms took him to the USA, where he came into contact with American radicals, socialists, anarchists, and syndicalists.

• In Mexico, after meeting M. Borodhin of the Soviet Communist Party, Roy became committed to the idea of a social revolution for the freedom of the people of India.

• Roy reassessed his earlier life as “narrow visioned” and decided to travel to Moscow to attend the second congress of the newly formed Comintern.

• In Moscow, Roy offered critical comments on Lenin’s Draft Thesis on the National and Colonial Question.

• Roy led a delegation of the Comintern to China, but the mission was a failure.

• Differences arose between the Comintern and M.N. Roy, leading to his expulsion from the party.

• Roy returned to India around 1930 and began working as a critical Marxist.

• After serving six years in jail, Roy joined the Indian National Congress to influence its program but was unsuccessful.

• On 21st December 1943, Roy founded the Radical Democratic Party.

• When the party failed to make an impact, he dissolved it and founded a new cultural-political movement called New Humanism.

COMINTERN AND THE COLONIAL QUESTION

• The national and colonial question was a persistent issue for the Soviet Communist Party and the Comintern, which were unable to resolve it satisfactorily.

• The question revolved around the strategy and tactics to be followed by communist parties in their countries, while being directed by the Comintern.

• The strategy differed by country based on objective conditions and the relations of forces, but these were often perceived differently by the communist parties and the Comintern.

• Communist parties in countries like India and China analyzed their societies using concepts from Marxist theory, but the objective conditions were different, raising new questions.

• In India, communists faced issues outside classical Marxism, due to a backward capitalist economy and the dominance of colonialism and external capital.

• The economy was distorted, and class conflict took different forms compared to western capitalist societies.

• Lacking a specific analysis of their own societies, Indian communists depended on the Comintern for broad policy guidelines, which often proved inadequate due to lack of local knowledge.

• Political movements in colonial societies questioned the Eurocentric philosophy of history upheld by the Comintern and sought an independent course of action.

• In Marxism, there is a model of classic bourgeois revolutions where the bourgeoisie leads the revolution, as well as a model where the bourgeoisie lacks hegemony over the revolutionary coalition.

• The debate among Indian communists centered on whether the bourgeoisie lacked hegemony in the Indian revolutionary context.

• At the Second Congress in Moscow, Lenin developed a theoretical framework for colonial societies.

• Lenin argued that the colonial bourgeoisie in India was historically capable of leading the revolution and that backward colonial capitalism did not make the bourgeoisie as reactionary as in Europe.

• The Comintern should temporarily ally with bourgeoisie democracy in colonial and backward countries, but not merge with it.

• Lenin also anticipated the crucial role of the peasantry in colonial societies’ anti-colonial struggle.

• M.N. Roy proposed a different argument, stating that the Comintern should not support national liberation struggles but focus on building communist parties and workers’ and peasants’ organizations.

• Contrary to Lenin, Roy believed that in India, backward capitalism produced a weak bourgeoisie and a correspondingly stronger proletariat, which he thought would be the leading force in the anti-colonial struggle.

• Roy downplayed the role of the national bourgeoisie and was skeptical about the revolutionary potential of the peasantry.

• His view implied that the working class in India should achieve freedom from foreign rule independently.

• After an intense debate, Roy’s supplementary thesis was adopted by the Indian National Congress.

• Roy’s independent nature made it difficult for him to continue as an enthusiastic member of the Comintern, especially as discipline increased under Stalin‘s leadership.

• As the prospects of a World Revolution dimmed, the Comintern began to operate more as an organ of the CPSU.

• The rift between Roy and the Comintern widened during the Sixth Congress of the Comintern in 1928.

• The Comintern abandoned its united front policy with all classes and the policy of collaboration with the national bourgeoisie, shifting to a policy of class confrontation led by the proletariat.

• At the Sixth Congress, Roy was attacked for his decolonization theory, which argued that imperialism was no longer an obstacle to industrial development in India and marked the changing nature of imperialism.

• After his expulsion from the party, Roy returned to India and was imprisoned in the Kanpur Conspiracy case from July 21, 1931 to November 20, 1936.