Brinda Karat’s South African safari draws reds’ ire

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There are rumblings within the CPM over senior party leader Brinda Karat’s holidaying in South Africa’s Cape Town.

Karat, the party’s politburo member and wife of CPM general secretary Prakash Karat, has reportedly been holidaying in Cape Town with relatives, sources said.

A section of the CPM central committee members intends to question the “lifestyle” of the party’s “top couple” during the forthcoming party congress in April next year.

Even though “technically the party does not prevent leaders or functionaries from holidaying abroad, questions are asked when a lesser functionary tries do the same thing,” a central committee member said.

The party’s top leadership was accused of being “indifferent” towards the marginalisation of the reds at the national political scenario. “There had been no effort whatsoever by the top leadership to address the crisis,” a central committee member claimed.

It was further alleged that while the party has launched a massive “rectification campaign” to shed “bourgeois and petty bourgeois values”, the top leadership of the party continues to lead a “lavish lifestyle”. The rectification document states:

“The penetration of alien bourgeois and petty bourgeois values is manifested in a lavish lifestyle, building houses which are far above the minimum needs required, spending large amounts on weddings of children, organising festivities on a lavish scale etc. Increasingly, no questions are being asked within the party.”

While questions were being raised over the Karat couple’s “lifestyle”, leaders close to the party general secretary claimed that this was being done by his detractors for a change of guard within the party. It was alleged that efforts are on by a section to “replace Karat as party general secretary during the next party congress”.