Statue of Vladimir Lenin Vandalised in Tripura Post CPM's Rout: Who Was Lenin And Why the Attempt to Dismantle His Legacy?

It is not even 2 days that the Left Front’s 25 year old rule came to an end in Tripura, a video has surfaced on social media, where alleged right-wing supporters have brought down communist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin’s statue in Belonia town in the state of Tripura. As scenes of the felling of Lenin statue from Tripura surfaces online, some might wonder why is Lenin's statue being demolished and what is the motive behind it. In order to understand this we will first have to know who Lenin was and what he stood for:

1. Vladimir Lenin, also called Vladimir Ilich Lenin's original name Vladimir Ilich Ulyanov. He was born on April 22, 1870 in Simbirsk, Russia and died on January 21, 1924 in Gorki which was later renamed as Gorki Leninskiye, near Moscow.

2. Lenin was the founder of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks), and leader of the Bolshevik Revolution (1917) also known as the Russian Revolution, and the architect, builder, and first head (1917–24) of the Soviet state.

3. He was the founder of the organization known as Comintern (Communist International) and then source of “Leninism”. The "Leninism" philosophy or doctrine was codified and joined with Karl Marx’s works by Lenin’s successors and followers to form Marxism-Leninism, which became the Communist worldview.

4. Lenin’s decision to establish soviet power came from his belief that the proletarian revolution must dismantle the existing state machinery and introduce a “dictatorship of the proletariat”; that is, direct rule by the armed workers and peasants which would eventually “wither away” into a non-coercive, classless, stateless, Communist society.

5. The choice before Russia in early September 1917, as Lenin wrote, was either a soviet republic—a dictatorship of the propertyless majority—or a parliamentary republic—as he saw it, a dictatorship of the propertied minority.

6. Vladimir Lenin was a fanatical revolutionary and managed to organize a relatively small but totally devoted and highly disciplined party bent on seizing power. Convinced that workers by themselves could not progress beyond peaceful trade- unionism, he wanted the party to direct the working class on the revolutionary path.

7. In March 1918, the Bolshevik Party was renamed the Russian Communist Party (Bolshevik) in order to distinguish it from Social Democratic parties in Russia and Europe and to separate the followers of Lenin from those affiliated with the non-revolutionary Socialist International.

So it is clear that Lenin was in many ways the most primary influence on Soviet Russia and the face of revolutionary socialism. It cannot be denied that Lenin was also a supporter of armed revolution and is still the biggest source of inspiration both in terms of vision and theory, for socialist/communists all over the world after Karl Marx. As soon as the BJP came to power in Tripura, some elements pulled down the statue of Lenin in Belonia town. This action is in sync with the slogan of "Communist Mukt" Bharat along with the "Congress Mukt" slogan that some leaders of ruling party in Centre have been pronouncing publicly over past few days.

A photo of the incident was reportedly shared by BJP national general secretary Ram Madhav on Twitter and instead of condemning the act, he voiced his support towards it. However, the tweet was later deleted.

Here is the video where you can see people vandalizing Lenin's Statue -

In a report published in The Hindu, BJP had earlier claimed that their win will mark the end for Communist figures such as Karl Marx and Lenin in Agartala and other parts of the state. With felling of Lenin's statue, the supporters of the newly elected party in Tripura believe that they have achieved the first step towards dismantling the legacy of Lenin-Marx, even if symbolically, which is the foundation for socialist/communist theory and source of communist worldview in India as well as the world.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 06, 2018 11:49 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).