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‘I won't consider silly and insignificant arguments as serious and significant simply because they are presented in the English language.’These words uttered during a heated discussion held in Govt.Brennen College,Thalassery before 37 years echoed in my ears when I reached the last pages of the book 'The Elephant Paradigm' by Gurucharan Das.(Penguin Books India 2002).And then I was really shocked to see the following compliment of Amartya Sen on the back cover : It is a wonderful book.-a great mixture of memoir,economic analysis,social investigation,political scrutiny and managerial outlook thrown into the understanding of India.

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Yesterday I went kuttikkol, a remote village in Kasaragod district to speak in a literay seminar organised by the Neruda Library with the support of D.C.Books kanhangad.It was a humble function attended by less than hundred villagers.The most impressive feature of the seminar was that more than half of the audience were youngsters.The topic of the seminar was Valarunna Keralam ,Thalarunna Vaayana(Developing Kerala and it's Withering Reading).Presenting the paper for discussion I told them that no one can deny the fact that during the last half a century kerala has made tremendous progress in almost all walks of social life,though in areas of humanrights and awareness there are so many issues remaining unresolved.About the complaint raised from many quarters that our youngsters shun the reading habit in favour of so many other trifle things which help them to pass their time idly,I said that such observations are not alltogther correct.Publishing industry is growing very fast and even in a small town like Kannur there are four or five publishers,two of them well established and it is known from reliable sources that books worth more than one crore is sold every year from this town alone.What we have actually lost is the sociality of literature.In the earlier decades of twentieth century when even one percentage of our people were not literate the works of a poet like Kumaranasan had great social impact in kerala.Now we boast of cent percent literacy but the total effect of a literary work upon our society is far less.I didn't elaborate on this point since I was not in a mood to generate a heated debate.
In Kerala the sociality of literture has faded mainly because the left has lost interest in keeping literary discussions and cultural activities alive.They are interested only in pampering the already established idols.The sociality of literature was strongly felt in kerala when the communists had a vision about the function of Art and Litrature,though it was often dim and focused in wrong directions.Now they have given up that vision and moved far away from their own politics.There are writers and political thinkers who argue in favour of this change.Change is inevitable and a political party should have the wisdom and courage to make necessary changes in it's policies and programmes from time to time.But when the changes obliterate the very ideological fabric of a political party,thngs become hopeless.

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What is to be done?What changes should the CPI(M)make in it's mode of functioning in this critical juncture?Local body election has proven without any doubt that the party's mass base has shaken.Why this?Why the 'enlightened' voters in the state took a clear cut stand against the Party,even when they abstained from raising any sharp criticism against the functioning of the Govt.lead by the Left Democratic Front.I strongly feel that the people of Kerala,I mean the majority of them give support only to a party that can genuinely claim to have a strong political philosophy and vision.Until recently they stood behind the CPI(M)because it had a history of anti imperialist, anti fascist struggles from the very beginning, the spirit of which,they hoped the party would be able to sustain.But things have changed.The party leadership found it unnecessary to conceal their strong inclinatin to the developmental schemes sponsored by multinational capitalism and thus proved their poverty of philosophy and their total disinterestedness in approaching and analysing the effects of globalisation on Indian economy and Indian politics,using the tools of Marxism.They went even beyond that and became totally apolitical in their stand in many areas.They tried in vain to compensate their lack of philosophy with impertinence.Leninist organisational principle and stalinist practice joined hands with neoliberal develpomental politics and there developed a strange combination which aroused in the common mass only aversion to the Party.Now history has given a chance or it has made a demand from the Party to critically examine it's politics and programmes and redefine them not in the light of global economic realities only but by giving due consideration to the material and intellectual needs of our people also.People don't live by bread alone.They should also be able to maintain the feeling that they are part of a great movement with an inspiring past and a respectable vision of the future.Otherwise they will have no hesitation in saying 'goodbye!'to the party.Everybody who thinks that there should be a strong political party and a vibrant Organisational set up to fight the evils of the unbridled invasion of transnational capitalist forces is keenly watching whether the CPI(M) will be able to meet the challenges by being straight forward in admitting that it has to make immediate changes in it's political line,programmaes and day today functioning.