December 18, the death anniversary of Comrade Vinod Mishra, was observed as Sankalp Divas (Pledge-taking Day) by Party units all over the country. This year, the December 18 programmes also launched the fund collection drive for the party’s forthcoming Ninth Congress.
In Delhi, a cadre convention was held at the party’s central office, in which the December 18 call was read out by Comrade VKS Gautam. Comrade Kavita then discussed some of the key tasks outlined by the Call in the context of party work in Delhi, and Comrade Ravi presented a brief paper on the political perspective and organizational principles that underlie the ongoing task of membership renewal, recruitment, transformation of candidate members into party members, branch functioning and party organs. Several district and branch secretaries and party activists introspected on the ongoing work and the tasks ahead. CCM Comrade Rajendra Pratholi also addressed the Convention. Delhi State Secretary Comrade Sanjay Sharma concluded the discussion, calling on comrades to intensify the movement of Delhi’s working class and urban poor, and strengthen the party in Delhi.
The Sankalp Divas at Patna was observed with a Cadre Convention by the Patna City Committee, addressed by the Bihar State Secretary Comrade Nand Kishore Prasad, AICCTU General Secretary Swapan Mukherjee and Lokyuddh editor Comrade BB Pandey, Patna City Secretary Comrade Saroj Chaubey, and was attended by a large number of leading activists. Conventions were also held at 12 blocks in Patna rural as well as Badh. A district level convention was held at Jehanabad addressed by PBM Comrade Ramjatan Sharma and Darbhanga, addressed by CCM Comrade Dhirendra Jha, as well as at Buxar, Purnea, Arwal, Muzaffarpur, Begusarai and W Champaran. Block level Sankalp Sabhas were held at Bhojpur, Siwan and Gaya, as well as Samastipur, Aurangabad, Kaimur. The fund collection drive was launched with great enthusiasm at all places.
A state-level cadre convention was held at Saria (Giridih) in Jharkhand. The conventon began with floral tributes to Comrade VM as well as Comrades Mahendra Singh and Ibn-ul Hasan Basru. Cadres held a motorcycle march in Bagodar preceding the convention. The Convention was conducted by Jharkhand State Secretary Comrade Janardan Prasad. SCM and the party’s MLA in the state Assembly Comrade Vinod Singh presented the December 18 Call for discussion. 16 leaders then discussed their work in various districts and fronts. Comrade Dipankar Bhattacharya addressed the Convention in conclusion. PBM Comrade D P Buxi, and CCMs Comrades Manoj Bhakt, Shubhendu Sen as well as SCMs were present. In the Convention, workers’ leader from Bokaro Comrade JN Singh was greeted with enthusiastic applause when he contributed the amount of Rs 15,000 received as a ‘best worker’ award from SAIL to the party’s Ninth Congress fund. Contributions received at the Giridih district convention and the state convention amounted to Rs 4700. The Convention resolved to conduct a campaign against corruption and corporate loot, the first phase of which would culminate in Comrade Mahendra Singh’s martyrdom day on 16 January. On that date, a big rally will be held at Bagodar, and mass meeting in other districts. Another decision was to launch a campaign against the state government’s betrayal of the people, in which four teams will march in four Assembly constituencies in Giridih from 25 December onwards. From 16 January to 23 March, a second phase of political-organisational campaign will be conducted, concluding with a rally on 23 March and the State Conference of the party on 23-25 March at Koderma. From 18 December, women comrades will take up the task of full scale preparations for the AIPWA National Conference. A memorial meeting for Comrade VM was also held at Garhwa.
In Uttar Pradesh, Sankalp Sabhas were organized in many districts. The programmes included a rally to district HQs at Devaria, with the slogan ‘People’s Power Against Money Power’, attended by about 2000 people including ASHA, anganwadi and mid-day meal women workers in addition to party members. Block level GBMs of party members were held at Ballia, Gorakhpur, Ghazipur, Chandauli, Allahabad, Sonebhadra, Lakhimpur Kheri. At Mirzapur, Varanasi, Azamgarh, Gonda, Lucknow, Kanpur, Jalaun, Sitapur and Pilibhit, pledge-taking GBMs were held at district HQs.
The Tamilnadu state committee organized a state cadre meeting to observe the ‘Pledge Taking’ day. 83 leaders and cadres of the party participated in the meeting. At the meeting, the December 18 Call was read and discussed, with Com S Kumarasamy, PBM, explaining various key aspects of the call and the key tasks before the party, and calling on comrades to implement the CC call with full vigor and determination. The cadre meeting earnestly embarked on the challenge of turning the Tamil party organ, ‘Theepori’ into a fortnightly from January 1, 2012. District secretaries, in-charges and other comrades shared their experiences of ‘Theepori’ subscriptions promotional campaign in a very lively manner. A total of 1,900 subscriptions (Rs 1,90,000 collected in these 15 day campaign presented to Com G. Radhakrishnan, Manager of ‘Theepori’). Chennai committee crossed 600, Coimbatore achieved 500 and Kanyakumari, 350. The meeting overwhelmingly endorsed the target of 5000 to achieve before the party’s state conference to be held in end March. The meeting pledged to strengthen the party organ, a key tool in party building and political advance.
Party State Secretary, Balasundaram, announced decisions taken in the 2-day state committee meeting that concluded a day before the Pledge-taking Day. The meeting resolved to take up vigorous mass political campaign against the anti-people Jayalalitha Government which will culminate in a party rally and state conference of the party to be held on March 30, 31 and April 1 at Coiambatore. Responding to the CC’s call the cadre meet contributed Rs 17000 towards 9th Party Congress fund. This was presented to PBM, Com S Kumarasamy.
In Andhra Pradesh, the pledge-taking day was observed at East Godavari, Jaggampeta, Yeleswaram, Prathipadu, Krishna, and Khammam. In W Bengal, Sankalp Sabhas were held at branch and area level in most districts, while district-level cadre meetings were held at Nadia and Jalpaiguri on 18 December. The cadre meeting at Jalpaiguri was addressed by PBM Comrade Kartick Pal. On 19 December, a Sankalp Sabha was held at Darjeeling. In Uttarakhand, party activists gathered for a Sankalp Sabha at Bindukhatta, addressed by Uttarakhand In-charge Comrade Raja Bahuguna. On the same day, the Almora District Conference of the party was held at Deghat preceded by a procession and mass meeting. The Sankalp Divas was also observed at Pithoragarh.
The party units in five districts – Udaipur, Pratapgarh, Ajmer, Jhunjhunu and Jaipur – of Rajasthan celebrated Sankalp Divas with cadre meeting. At Chhattisgarh, a meeting of party cadres was held at the party office in Bhilai, and at Lal Khadan in Bilaspur. A meeting was held in Raipur on 19 December. A cadre convention was organized at Ahmedabad (Gujarat), addressed by the party’s Gujarat in-charge Comrade Ranjan Ganguly, as well as party leaders Lakshmanbhai Patanwaria and RYA leader Amit Patanwaria.
All India Kisan Sabha and CPI(ML) Haryana held a Sankalp Sabha at Sonipat in which many peasant organization leaders participated. The peasant leaders protested against the government’s policies of corporatizing agriculture. Peasant leader Om Prakash Arya, Hansraj Rana, AICCTU leader Satbir Shramik, CPI(ML) CCM Prabhat Kumar and AIKS Vice President Prem Singh Gehlawat addressed the meeting, and a cultural team presented a revolutionary Ragini (folk music of Haryana). At Odisha, Sankalp Divas was observed at Bhubaneswar, Puri, Rayagada, and Gajapati. Sankalp Divas was also observed at Tripura and Karnataka.
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“As a worker in the Bokaro Steel Plant, I have been selected for a National Award amounting to Rs 15,000, and an appreciation letter from SAIL. I have decided to contribute the amount to the Ninth Party Congress Fund.
Ours is a team of five workers in the continuous casting shop of the Steel Melting Shop, and we made some special innovations in our work, for which we have been awarded. The Labour Minister presented the award at a ceremony in Vigyan Bhavan. Our team was among the A-grade awardees. There were 6 contract workers who worked on our project; we gave them also a gift in recognition of their role.
On 30 November 2011, the SAIL Chairman organized a felicitation ceremony for us. It’s ironic, because on several occasions in the past, SAIL and the steel plant management have given me warning letters, strong warning letters and charge sheets, in the context of workers’ struggles! Innovations and modifications in the course of our work are nothing new for us, mostly they go unnoticed.
At the felicitation ceremony, I planned to raise the issues of the abysmal work conditions of contract workers, in my concluding words, but the SAIL Chairman left suddenly.”
JN Singh,
Bokaro Steel City Secretary, CPI(ML)