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<title>Communism: What does it Mean</title>

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<p align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:center; line-height:150%;margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0"><b
style='mso-bidi-font-weight:normal'><font size="4">Communism: What does it <span class=GramE>Mean</span>?</font></b></p>
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<span style='font-size:18.0pt;
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<o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></span></b></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><b><i><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></i></b></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;mso-line-height-alt:11.75pt;
mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>COMMUNISM,
in <st1:country-region><st1:place>India</st1:place></st1:country-region> at
least, has come to mean things which it was not the original or the main
purpose of the word to imply. Communism meant &quot;holding in common&quot;,
that is to say, there is no private property, one can claim nothing as
exclusively one's own-things are distributed, work as well as necessities, and
one receives them, each in his turn, according to his need and desert, as
determined by general planning. Let alone property, there are types of
communism that speak of holding in common women and children even. In any case
whatever one is given one possesses and enjoys only for the moment, there is
nothing like permanent possession. All have equal right to all things. This is
an ideal which I do not think many would care to adopt and follow. In <st1:country-region><st1:place>India</st1:place></st1:country-region>
it appears the word &quot;communism&quot; has been taken in the sense of the régime
of the common man. Not that there is any harm in this devia­tion of the
meaning. If it is a convenient label or a battle-cry for the common man's right
to exist, to have his just lebensraum, well, none can object and all
should <span class=SpellE>sympathise</span> and help towards that end. But the
mischief is that the common man adopted by communism has a restrictive
denotation, it takes in only a section of the common man: it is used mostly, if
not exclusively in connection with wage-earners and that too only of the
category of peasants and workmen. A large section of the common mass, even of
wage earners in a sense, is left out in the communistic scheme, at least not
given the same importance as the other. School teachers, especially primary
school teachers, small office-clerks, for example, are <span class=SpellE>notless</span>
&quot;common&quot; or less unfortunate or worthy of <span class=SpellE>succour</span>.
<span class=GramE>These form</span> a genuine proletariat: only they have not
yet been called upon to take part in the Dictatorship.<b><i><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></i></b></p>

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<span
style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;'>Page – 292</span></span><i><b
style='mso-bidi-font-weight:normal'><span
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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:10.55pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Apart
from this restrictive denotation, communism, in practice, has been given a
restrictive connotation too which is more ominous and unhelpful. The
communistic movement has become dynamic in so far as it is a movement for
redres­sing grievances (although the methods employed at times it is alleged,
are not as they should be, worthy of the civilised human being) in other words,
it has been more or less negative in its work and outlook. The whole stress has
been laid upon two items: (1) less hours of work, and (2) more wages – I do not
mention better housing, medical aid, pension etc., which are auxiliary items.
When workers were considered as no more than slaves under the yoke of the blind
and brutal exploiter, these demands had a meaning: but they have lost much of
their point in the changed circumstances of today.<o:p></o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.75pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Whatever
the immediate necessity of such drastic negative procedures, true and abiding
social welfare depends upon a deeper and wider planning. The aim should not be
merely to look for grievances and deal with them piecemeal, but to create
conditions in which such grievances do not arise at all, or are reduced to a
minimum. For the economic well-being of the society, a just and equitable distribution
of wealth is a sound policy, no doubt, but before that one must have
wealth and enough of it. The stress should therefore be on increased production,
&quot;grow-more-food&quot;. The workers must consider themselves ministers to
the goddess Lakshmi. To bring pros­perity to the commonwealth, to discover and
marshal the resources, increase the output and thus help to raise the standard
of life – that is the true role of loyal workers. But as it is, in the way they
behave and act, at present they are consumers more than producers. To
concentrate all attention and energy upon solely decreasing the hours of work
and in­creasing the wages can have no other meaning. Leisure, rest, recreation
are necessary, but that should not mean laziness, unwillingness to work, dissipation.
One should be decently paid for one's labour, one must not be overworked, yes,
but one must look to the other side also, one must bear in mind the capacity of
the payer and the needs of the others in the society. Necessity is one thing,
greed or selfishness is another. The greed to possess all the golden eggs at
once sometimes leads to a disastrous procedure.<o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

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<span
style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;'>Page – 293<o:p></o:p></span></p>

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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:10.55pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>The
farmer proprietor, the bourgeois, the capitalist in a modern society, whatever
charges of exploitation may be brought against them, are, each in his own way,
precisely centres of production, of wealth increment. They are not merely and
not always blood-suckers, and heartless profiteers. One need not rob, burn,
kill them in a mad rush; they too can be utilised, their services placed at the
disposal of the commonwealth. These are names which we may not like be­cause of
unhappy associations in the past, but the realities, the types of forces they
represent are, many of them, perma­nent features of Nature's economy. They come
up in other forms and names. They have suppressed bourgeois bureaucracy in <st1:country-region><st1:place>Russia</st1:place></st1:country-region>,
but it has reappeared in what is termed nowadays as the &quot;managerial&quot;
system.<o:p></o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:12.0pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Be
that as it may, if one demands a fair share of the riches of the commonwealth,
one must lend one's hand honestly and whole-heartedly to its production. That
is the line of true communism. Above all, one must cultivate the civic sense,
the very primary thing one must have for a harmo­niously prosperous collective
life, <span class=GramE>we</span> have to learn again the first lesson of
civilised living in these days when the brute and the vampire are seated in
human hearts. We must not always clamour for selfish gains, gains for oneself,
for one's class or community, or even for one's country. We must have a global
view of the human society which is a complex and multifoliate organism. Many
interests have to be served, many lines of growth have to be encouraged,
liberty for contraries all in the framework of a wider harmony. The ancient
Rishis in­voked the aid of the gods Mitra and Varuna for the establish­ment of
that wide <span class=GramE>harmony,</span> the builders of the new age too can
do no better.</p>

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<span
style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;'>Page – 294<o:p></o:p></span></p>

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