Answer. Ideas of Marx and Socialist thinkers inspired many groups to come into existence as socialists and communists. These ideas also resulted in the rise of a left wing within the Congress, represented by Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhash Chandra Bose. These young nationalists, inspired by the Soviet Revolution and dissatisfied with Gandhian ideas and political programme, began advocating radical solutions for economic, political and social ills of the country. These younger nationalists :
- were critical of both Swarajists and No-Changers;
- advocated a more consistent anti-imperialist line in the form of a slogan for purna swarajya (complete independence);
- were influenced by an awareness, though still vague, of international currents;
- stressed the need to combine nationalism and anti- imperialism with social justice and simultaneously raised the question of internal class oppression by capitalists and landlords.
The Communist Party of India (CPI) was formed in 1920 in Tashkent (now, the capital of Uzbekistan) by M.N. Roy, Abani Mukherji and others after the second Congress of Commintern. M.N. Roy was also the first to be elected to the leadership of Commintern.
In 1924, many communists—S.A. Dange, Muzaffar Ahmed, Shaukat Usmani, Nalini Gupta—were jailed in the Kanpur Bolshevik Conspiracy Case.
In 1925, the Indian Communist Conference at Kanpur formalised the foundation of the CPI.
In 1929, the government crackdown on communists resulted in the arrest and trial of 31 leading communists, trade unionists and left-wing leaders; they were tried at Meerut in the famous Meerut conspiracy case.
Workers’ and peasants’ parties were organised all over the country and they propagated Marxist and communist ideas.
All these communist groups and workers’ and peasants’ parties remained an integral part of the national movement and worked along with the Congress.