In Kerala, on the other hand, the CPI(M) and its allies have managed to retain a steady support base but rising factionalism has dented its image and restricted its prospective growth. One of the tasks of Yechury will be to stem the rot of indiscipline among its cadres. The CPI(M) journey, under Yechury’s leadership, to relevance as a major national force will depend on how it manages to overcome the hurdles it faces in its strongholds in Kerala and West Bengal. The Marxist party will have to project itself as a party that relies on fresh blood.

Election of Yechury as the party general secretary was not a smooth affair. Until the last moment, the election to the key office was shrouded in uncertainty. This was because of a strong competing bid by the dominating faction of Kerala unit led by Pinarayi Vijaynan, which complicated matters until the very end. Ten year older than the outgoing general secretary Prakash Karat, S. Ramachandran Pillai (Kerala party men wanted Pillai to succeed Karat) could hardly have been the person to win for the party new recruits among India’s youthful, expanding salaried middle-class, and the move found little support from other states.

Quite unlike in 2005 when Karat was elected general secretary, the change of guard in the party this time does not mark a generational shift. However, the change is no less significant for that reason. Although of same generation, Karat and Yechury have come to represent very different strands of thought in the party. Karat is more ideological in his approach, a theorist reluctant to compromise on core issues even when the party enters into electoral seat adjustment with others. Yechury believes in greater cooperation and coordination with other secular-democratic parties and in building more broad-based front to deal with changing ground realities and the growing threats to secularism. An approach that is more accommodative to other parties, based on the recognition to the CPI(M’)s own weaknesses in many parts of the country, is therefore likely. A shift towards the adoption of a native model of socialism, situated in Indian conditions, is a distinct possibility under Yechury’s leadership.

Yechury takes over the leadership at a time when the party faces an existential crisis even in its strongholds. Its presence in parliament is lowest since its inception in 1964 and party documents indicate membership is falling across the country, barring Kerala. This, even as the opposition space in India has opened up with the decline of the Congress. Parties like Aam Admi Party have benefited from churning, but the Marxist party seems unable or unwilling to leverage the political opportunity. Yechury’s is indeed a formidable challenge.

In 2004 Lok Sabha elections, a year before Karat became the general secretary, the party was at its strongest parliamentary position. The Left parties combined had had more than 60 MPs in Lok Sabha, in power in their strongholds and initially leveraged these positions skillfully to influence policy in welfare directions, as they extended support to the Congress-led UPA. At the centre the Left managed to punch above its weight and even steered a few landmark pieces of legislations such as Forest Rights Act and the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. It is another matter that the party could not utilize these achievements to translate into support, bogged down as it was, by events that had hampered it in its strongholds. It must be said that the tactical blunders—such as withdrawing support to the UPA over the nuclear deal at a wrong juncture—did not help it either.

The last Lok Sabha poll results indicate that the situation is quite grim for the Left parties. The Left performance was poor: It managed to win only 10 seats—all from Kerala, Tripura and West Bengal. While the CPI-M’s national vote share got plummeted to 4.5% after the 2014 parliamentarian election, it still retains about 23% of the popular vote in West Bengal. While depressing, it could still be a decent foundation for the party to pull itself out of political morass.

There seems to be promise in Yechury’s early response to his election that the time has come to go beyond making intellectual statements and passing resolutions on issues of grave importance to the nation. It is time to connect with the people who matter. In his first address to the cadres, the new general secretary described Visakhapatnam party Congress as the “ Congress of future”. In a country like India, the space for a vibrant Left has existed in the past and will undoubtedly be there in the future. (IPA Service)