21-07-2025
V.S. Achuthanandan combined class politics with mass politics
V.S Achuthanandan was at the same time a 'rebel' from within and a leader who took his fight forward without breaching the boundaries of discipline set by the the Communist Party of India (Marxist).
It was a rare distinction that many other stalwarts, including M.V. Raghavan, and K.R. Gouri Amma, who were expelled from the party following internal rift, could not achieve. He developed this effective mix through his political shrewdness. He prompted a course correction in the party leadership by bringing people's issues to the public sphere.
Two defeats had initiated a deconstruction process in his political career, from a leader who had strongly pursued the Stalinist principles and methods in the initial phase to a people's leader later. At the 1991 State conference in Kozhikode, he was defeated by E.K. Nayanar in the election for the party's State secretary by a margin of two votes. The electoral defeat in the Mararikulam Assembly constituency in 1996 was another shocking setback.
From then onwards, he combined class politics with mass politics. At a time when the Kerala unit of the CPI(M) was seen aligning with globalisation and market forces under the guise of development, his voice stood apart. He undertook the cause of the landless, Adivasis, Dalits, and those displaced for development projects. He opposed groundwater exploitation by Coca-Cola company in Plachimada, Palakkad, and fought against encroachment on Mathikettan Shola and Munnar.
He had this uncanny ability to think differently as seen in his campaign for open-source software and praise for Richard Stallman, the archangel of the global free software movement. He had the patience to listen to such alternative possibilities. He had used the lessons garnered from such interactions as tools against his fight for justice.
(as told to G. Krishnakumar)
