CPI(M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury has reiterated that he will not flout party norms that bar a member from being elected to the Upper House for a third time.

The party’s Central Committee, which began its two-day meeting here, may not challenge Yechury’s decision not to contest the Rajya Sabha seat from West Bengal as he has already completed two terms in the post.

“From Day 1, Yechury has been maintaining that there is no question of a third term for him,” a senior party leader said, rubbishing reports that the General Secretary and the CPI(M) West Bengal unit are keen on a third term.

Agrarian crisis

The main agenda of the meeting is to discuss the preparations for the 22nd party Congress, which is scheduled to be held in April, 2018, and likely to be held in Hyderabad.

The party leadership is also discussing the agrarian crisis in the country. At a recent speech made in Thrissur, Kerala, Yechury had said that the alternative against the Narendra Modi government has been coming up in the form of protests by farmers. He said any change towards a better society is based on the intensity and intensification of the class struggle.

“That can only happen if we are able to unite the most exploited classes in our society into a formidable political force that can challenge the class rule of the present bourgeois-land lord classes,” he said, and added that the working class, and under its leadership, the agricultural labourer and the poor peasantry, will lead that struggle. “These three classes constitute the most socially oppressed sections of India,” he said. “It is this unity that has to be made stronger in order to achieve the social change,” he added.

The meeting will also decide a clear strategy to be adopted against the BJP government. Documents on agrarian distress and on communal politics are expected to be released during the party congress. An outline for such documents is likely to be prepared in the Central Committee meeting on Tuesday.

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