The Communist Party of India (Marxist), the most prominent of the Left parties in the country, effected a change of leadership by electing several new members to its all-important Central Committee at its Madurai Congress. This was interpreted by observers as a ‘generational change’ and witnessed the election of septuagenarian MA Baby as the new general secretary.
The affable and soft-spoken Baby, with a bent of mind towards the fine arts, comes to the helm at a time when the CPI (M) is facing an extremely challenging environment and an existential crisis. A former student leader, two-term MP, and minister in Kerala, Baby now heads a party that advocates the broadest national alliance against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
However, compared to his three immediate predecessors—Harkishen Singh Surjeet, Prakash Karat, and Sitaram Yechury—all of whom were seasoned national-level leaders, Baby has had limited exposure to national politics. He is seen as a theorist. Karat remains an ideologue, while both Surjeet and Yechury exhibited pragmatic instincts that gambolled dogma with political realities.
As general secretary, Baby will need to explore the contours of collaboration with the Indian National Congress and other parties whose ideologies differ from that of the BJP. He will have to marshal support both within and beyond the Left in pursuit of the party line.
Baby also begins with a clean slate in building equations with a new generation of leaders such as Rahul Gandhi, Akhilesh Yadav, and Tejashwi Yadav—a task that Yechury managed with ease, partly because of his rapport with their seniors. Baby will not enjoy the comfort that his predecessors did in working with leaders like Sonia Gandhi, Mulayam Singh Yadav, and Lalu Prasad Yadav.
Supporters argue that Baby learned the ropes of national politics in Delhi during his Rajya Sabha tenure from 1996 to 1998. Yet it is well known that the young leader preferred to invest his energies in state politics and later served in the VS Achuthanandan Cabinet. While he had a ringside view of coalition politics, the national landscape has altered drastically since then.
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Fight to survive—from Kerala to Bengal
The challenges before the opposition in general, and the CPI(M) in particular, fall into two distinct streams—and how the party navigates each will be critical. The CPI(M) has acknowledged the imperative of forming a coalition against the B JP, even as it promises to independently confront ‘neo-fascist forces’ and strengthen its own organisation.
In this context, the CPI (M) will have to carefully negotiate its relationship with the Congress—its principal opponent in Kerala, the only state where it leads a government as part of the Left Democratic Front. Meanwhile, the BJP is emerging as a formidable third force in the state. According to 2024 Lok Sabha election data, the BJP-led NDA garnered 19.23 per cent of the vote share in Kerala. When translated into Assembly segments, it led in 11 seats and was runner-up in nine others out of the state’s 140 constituencies—polling significantly in several dozen more. This growth was bolstered by support from OBCs, particularly Ezhavas, and segments of the Christian community, notably in Thrissur, tilting towards the BJP. The rising influence of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), especially in southern Kerala, is an additional factor the CPI(M) must contend with.
Between now and next summer, the BJP will press the pedal on multiple issues to corner the Pinarayi Vijayan government, which has been in the saddle for nine years. Controversies like those surrounding the movie Empuraan or the newly enacted UMEED (read: Waqf Amendment) Act are already being used as flashpoints.
Holding on to Kerala will remain high on the agenda for the CPI(M), followed by efforts to reclaim ground in West Bengal—a state with a storied past for the Left. The party and its cadres have less than a year to prepare for Assembly elections in a state where the Left Front, led by the CPI(M), enjoyed an uninterrupted 34-year run.
That winning streak—seven consecutive terms beginning in 1977—was broken by Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress (TMC) in 2011. The TMC is now hoping to secure a fourth straight term in an electoral landscape where the BJP has emerged as its principal challenger.
Ironically, the Congress-CPI(M) seat adjustment in the last elections did little to energise either party’s workers or the electorate. Yet, despite this dilemma, all three—the TMC, Congress, and CPI(M)—are increasingly anxious about the BJP’s steady rise and ability to capture ground vacated by by the Congress and the Left Front.
After contesting Kerala and West Bengal, the CPI(M) under Baby will face another key test in Tripura—the last of the traditional Left bastions, which the BJP wrested away in 2018 after two decades of Left rule. The electoral outcomes in Kerala and West Bengal will either confirm a global rightward shift or underscore the optimism of the CPI(M) leadership about the continued relevance of the Left in a changing world order.
K V Prasad is a Delhi-based senior political journalist. He tweets @kveprasad. Views are personal.
(Edited by Prashant)