Pakistan: Winter Marxist School 2018 – A Great Success

By Revolutionary Students Front (RSF)

Revolutionary Students Front (RSF) and The Struggle organized Three Days Winter Marxist School on 2^nd,3^rd, 4^th February 2018 at Faisalabad. The school was dedicated to the great Revolutionary Marxist ‘Bhagat Singh’ who belongs to Banga village in the district of Lyallpur (now Faisalabad). Bhagat Singh was a fervent torchbearer of the proletarian struggle. He rejected the prejudices of caste, creed, nationality, race, gender, and religion. Bhagat was deeply influenced by the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and he diligently studied the works of Marx, Lenin and Trotsky. Faisalabad is also a city that became the hub of revolutionary movement during the mass uprising of 1968-69.

Despite heavy financial odds, difficult transportation and deteriorating living conditions, over 200 comrades attended the school with a large number of women. It was one of the historic school ever both, qualitatively and quantitatively. The school had five sessions including World and Pakistan Perspectives, Transformation of Money into Capital, State and Revolution, The Class Character of Chinese Regime and Youth Work and Strategy.

First Session

On the morning of 2^nd February, The School formerly opened by Umer Rasheed from the host region, he welcomed all the participants. The first session on World and Pakistan Perspective was chaired by Sangeen Bacha from Peshawar and Rameez Misrani from Dadu led the discussion. Misrani explained the organic crisis of Capitalism, the overall situation of US imperialism, China’s economic crisis with its imperialist interests, the eruption of movements and situation in Britain and Europe, the intensification of proxy wars in the Middle East and the crisis of Gulf States. Other than that he briefly discussed the overall situation of India, Afghanistan and South Asia. He discussed the contradictory interests of Pakistani ruling elite, the intervention of imperialist powers in changing the current political setup, economic crisis, the consciousness of working class and perspective for the movement. The leadoff followed by questions and contributions. Qarni from Center, Arshad from Lahore, Muqaddas from Jampur, Ijaz Bhagio from Dadu, Abrar Latif from Kashmir, Omer and Asif Rasheed from North Punjab, Shakeela and Hassan Jan from Balochistan intervened in the discussion. Rameez Misrani answered all the question and summed up the discussion.

Second Session

After the Lunch break, The Second session ‘Das Kapital; Transformation of Money into Capital’ was conducted. A whiteboard was specially arranged to make the discussion easy. The session was chaired by Omer from North Punjab while Saifee from Central Punjab led the discussion. Saifee elaborated that how money is transformed into capital. He shed light on the general formula of capital and explained the basics of Marxian economics, he also explained the basic terminologies i.e. use value, exchange value, surplus value, commodity, money and capital. With that, he explained the inherited contradictions of capitalism and put forward that socialist planned economy is the only option. The leadoff followed by questions and contributions. Majid from Karachi, Raheem from Jampur, and Qarni from Center and Altamsh from Kashmir intervened in the discussion. Imran Kamyana from Center answered the questions and summed up the discussion.

Third Session

The second day of school, 3rd February, begins with reciting of revolutionary poems and songs from different comrades. The third session of the school was based on the masterpiece of V. I. Lenin, ‘‘State and Revolution’’. The session was chaired by Shakeela from Baluchistan and the discussion was led by Wajid Khan from Kashmir. Wajid explained that the question of the State in capitalist society is very important for Marxists. He explained the class contradiction and historical development of state and its institutions. In capitalism, the state protects the class interests of Bourgeoisie while exploits the working class. It is necessary for working class to crush the apparatus of the state to transform the society into a worker’s state. The state has emerged when the society became able to produce more than its immediate needs. This later on led to the development of a class-based society and to protect one class’s interests against the other class. which made the emergence of a state inevitable. In the primitive communism, there was no state. The leadoff followed by questions and contributions. Imran Kamyana from Center, Bushra Aziz from Kashmir, Ahsan from Central Punjab, Eesa from Dadu, Hatim from Karachi, Zafar from North Punjab, and Sangeen Bacha from North KPK intervened in the discussion. Wajid answered the questions and summed up the discussion.

Fourth Session

After the Lunch break, the fourth session was conducted on “The Class Character of Chinese Regime”. The session was chaired by Raheem from Jampur and Awais Qarni from Center led the discussion. In his leadoff, Qarni elaborated historical China, its dynasties and also the revolutions that erupted and transformed the prevailing setup. Many kings and their dynasties ruled China for the centuries but in the 20th century we had seen three great revolutions of 1911, 1925-27 and 1945-49, he said. He mainly stressed upon the second revolution of 1925-27 as a proletarian revolution. He also discussed that the Great Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 had its impact in almost every movement of the globe. The 1945-49 revolution was, indeed, the second greatest event in the known history of mankind after Bolshevik Revolution but from it’s very beginning it was based upon the degenerated model of Stalinist Russia, he said. He then elaborated the history and degeneration of the of an already degenerated state towards the open market in 1978. He also explained the contradiction in today’s China and it’s economy by elaborating the private sector, the SOE’s and the non-wholly state-funded limited liability corporations (LLCs). He said Chinese economic setup is not at all a Socialist, but there are many commanding economic sectors are state owned and controlled. The character of the regime is also not a socialist or pro-proletariat. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had billionaires in its Central Committee and Politburo and also in its standing committee. The main threat to CCP capitalist and billionaire leadership is the 3rd layer of Local committee’s leadership. Xi Jinping’s attack on corruption is again selective, Xi’s many corrupt friends are free and exercising their powers. He also shed light on the imperialist character of Chinese capital and the ‘Belt and Road Project’. There is high unemployment and low wages in China. There are more than 920 million people in China who live below 5$ per day. There is only one way for the emancipation of the working class of China and the whole world and that is Socialism, and with socialist characteristics only. Even the Xi’s mixed Chinese characteristic socialism could not transform the working condition of Chinese proletariats, he said. After the detailed leadoff, Fozia from North Punjab, Saeed Khaskheli from Dadu, Suresh from Hyderabad and Rashid Sheikh from Kashmir intervened and enriched in the discussion. The session was summed up by Qarni in the light of questions.

Fifth Session

On the morning of 4^th February, the Fifth and last session of the School was chaired by the Central Youth Organizer Awais Qarni and Nadir Gopang from Multan opened the discussion on “Youth Work and Strategy”. Nadir shed light on the past of students’ politics and discussed strategy in present objective conditions. He discussed the recent movements of the Qaid-e-Azam University of Islamabad, Peshawar University, Karachi University, Jamshoro University and others. He also spoke on the role of youth in the building of a revolutionary party and the strategy and tactics to attract the youth to Marxist ideas. He strongly stressed upon the work for the development of the student organization, the “Revolutionary Students Front” (RSF).  The leadoff was followed by regional youth reports and targets, which includes the city and district conventions of RSF, new study circles and branches in universities, colleges and schools.

Ashraf Khokher from Faisalabad, Ghufran Ahad from North KPK, Hamza Saleem from Faisalabad and Misbah from Jampur took part in the session of Open Debate. Ismat Perveen presented Finance report of the School. Dr Lal Khan made the closing remarks. He emphasized the true essence of Bolshevik School and its importance for cadre building of comrades.

The school was historically marvelous. A book stall was also managed. During and after the sessions many comrades recited revolutionary poetry and songs. The environment, especially the evenings were full of enthusiasm, energy and the revolutionary spirit. Many new comrades from all over the country met each other and shared their experiences. The School was concluded with the Workers’ Internationale anthem.

Workers’ Internationale

Visit at Bhagat Singh’s House

After the conclusion comrades visited ‘Banga’ Village to pay tribute to the revolutionary struggle of “Bhagat Singh”. The local community was astonished to see such huge gathering marching towards Bhagat’s house. Comrades were marching and chanting slogan “Long Live Bhagat Singh!”, “Long Live Revolution!”. At the lawn of Bhagat’s house comrades sang “Sarfroshi Ki Tamana Ab Hamarey Dil Mein Hay” in the memory of Bhagat Singh. The comrades left Faisalabad with hapiness and great spirit to speard the revolution internationally.

 

Comrades Singing “Sarfroshi Ki Tamana Ab Hamarey Dil Mein Hay”