The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress avoided sending any congratulatory message to the Communist Party of China (CPC) that marked its centennial foundation day on Thursday, but the Left parties sent their greetings.
Following last year's violent clashes between Indian and Chinese troops at Galwan Valley, political relations between the two national parties and the CPC have taken a hit.
While the BJP had sent its greetings to the Vietnamese Communist Party on its 13th party Congress this February, it didn’t do so for the centenary celebrations of the Communist Party of China.
Senior Congress leaders too maintained that the “current political atmosphere do not allow political pleasantries between the two parties”.
However, CPI (M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury wrote to Xi Jinping, the Chinese Premier and general secretary of the CPC, in which he said that the history of the last century holds testimony to the manner in which China has evolved its policies, often identifying and correcting its mistakes.
“The CPI(M) continues to underline that Marxism-Leninism is a creative science. It is supremely anti-dogmatic. It can never be reduced to a set of formulae,” Mr. Yechury wrote. Though being a creative science, it strictly adhered to its revolutionary principles and emancipatory objectives while adapting to the concrete conditions, he said, quoting Lenin who said, “concrete analysis of concrete conditions is the living essence of dialectics”.
And China, he said, was an example of how this creative science of Marxism-Leninism was adapted.
He also applauded China for its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic, the CPI(M) leader said, came at a time when the global economy was already slowing down and moving towards recession. “International finance capital led imperialist neoliberal globalisation is showing its total bankruptcy in providing any solution,” Mr. Yechury wrote.
The exemplary manner in which China tackled and contained the COVID-19 pandemic reopened its society and economy, Mr Yechury said. Putting the economy back on track was a lesson for the world establishing the superiority of socialism as a system over capitalism.
“It is because of the initiatives of the Communist Party of China, that the country could eliminate absolute poverty by 2020, reduce unemployment by creating millions of jobs every year, strengthen its health care system and build world class infrastructure and educational institutions,” he wrote.
CPI General Secretary D. Raja also commended Chinese President Xi Jinping for leading China to become a major economic power, to intervene and cooperate on any international development. He also applauded China for its handling of the pandemic and extending help to other countries.
While appreciating all-round development of China, Mr. Raja however sounded a word of caution on the current strained Indo-China relationship.
India and China, the two oldest civilisations of Asia and neighbours, had a history of living side by side peacefully for thousands of years, he said.
The border dispute that had been going on since India’s Independence needed to be solved, Mr. Raja said. “We do believe we have to solve this problem now through peaceful means so that our both countries can play a meaningful role to realise the peace and stability in the region and work together for establishment of an equitable global order in international relations.”
