Yechury — pragmatic leader

Tribune News Service

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Hyderabad, April 22

A strong ideological grounding coupled with a flexible and pragmatic approach to alliance building have been the hallmark of the political career of Sitaram Yechury who was re-elected as the CPM general secretary for a second term on Sunday.

Despite rebelling against the majority view in the party on the political-tactical line, Yechury’s re-election to the top post reflects triumph of pragmatism over dogmatism.

After successfully convincing the party to amend the draft political resolution to keep the doors open for tactical understanding with the Congress, the Marxist leader will now have greater flexibility while bringing together the Opposition parties to take on the BJP-led NDA in the next General Election.

Suave and articulate, Yechury, 65, has been the most recognisable face of the party having good rapport with leaders across political spectrum, unlike his dogmatic predecessor Prakash Karat.

However, a plethora of challenges confronts Yechury as he embarks on a second term. He needs to revitalise the party in the wake of steady erosion of the support base and loss of power in its strongholds, including the recent drubbing in Tripura. The CPM is now in power only in Kerala, a state known for rotational transfer of power between the LDF and UDF.

He has an unenviable task of establishing an enduring connect with the aspirational middle class, a section which is perceived to be out of the ambit of the Left influence so far. It is a major challenge to attract the post-liberalisation generation into a party whose main agenda has been to fight neo-liberal economic policies.

Unlike several of his dogmatic and orthodox party colleagues, Yechury, who was inducted into the Polit Bureau in 1992, is regarded as a more flexible and liberal Marxist willing to re-orient political strategies in tune with the changing times. He is widely seen as a leader in the mould of late Harkishan Singh Surjeet, known for his negotiating skills.

An alumnus of St Stephens College and Jawaharlal Nehru University, Yechury had played a key role during the UPA-I regime, which was supported by Left parties and served as a bridge between the Congress and the Left.

However, from the position of a kingmaker in 2004 to a marginal player now, the CPM’s decline has been dramatic. Its tally in the Lok Sabha had plummeted to nine from a peak of 60 seats in the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, while it lost power twice in a row in its traditional stronghold West Bengal. And, the idea of Third Front remained a non-starter, further diminishing the role of Left parties in national politics.

Born on August 12, 1952, in a Telugu-speaking family in Chennai, Yechury did his schooling in Hyderabad before moving to Delhi. After BA (Hons) in Economics from St Stephen’s College and MA in Economics from JNU, he joined the Student Federation of India (SFI) in 1975 and went on to become its president.

In 1985, he was elected to CPM’s Central Committee and was made a member of Polit Bureau in 1992. He was first elected to the Rajya Sabha from West Bengal in July 2005 and completed two terms. He heads the party’s international department and has been the editor of its weekly People’s Democracy for a long time.

Yechury is the author of several books, including “Left Hand Drive”, “What is this Hindu Rashtra”, “Socialism in 21st Century” and “Communalism vs Secularism”.