The Only Fatherland by Arun Shourie

Arun Shourie, one the of the leading intellectuals of the country and a member of the Hindu right wing political party, BJP, goes into the history of the CPI during the Independence movement. Communist Party of India, who we only know from their inordinately long regimes in the states of West Bengal, Tripura and Kerala have a sordid and secret history which the author has tried to expose.

Shourie brings irrefutable proof to the table that the communists were brainwashed by their overarching theory and sabotaged the Quit India movement, they colluded with the British Government in disrupting the Quit India movement and were especially vitriolic in their charge of supporting Imperialism and fascism against the Congress and SC Bose. Communists vacillate from an anti British stand to ardent support for the British government. Communists are driven not by their good intentions for the motherland, but by their sycophancy towards the only Fatherland.



Communists keep the anti British stand and fight alongside Congress for the Independence of the country from the British Raj, Britain, of course is fiercely Anti communist and sees Russia as a existential threat. As the Wehrmacht and the British forces fought for the domination of Europe the communists termed it as a fight between two colonial powers, but as soon as Hitler commanded the Wehrmacht to invade Russia, the Imperialistic war became a people's war. Russia and Britain allied against the common enemy, the Third Reich. The Communists Parties loyalty was of course with the mass murderer Stalin and the communist government in Russia. When word got out that the Russians are now allies of the British, the communists changed their stance and provided unconditional support for the British Raj. CPI General Secretary, PC Joshi send various overtures to high ranking British officials to use the communist party as a tool to blunt the Quit India movement and stop Netaji Subash Chandra Bose.

The Communists went all out on their attack on the Congress and Netaji, even terming Netaji as a stooge of the Imperial Japanese forces. Various cartoons and articles were published condemning Congress and Netaji for opposing the British Raj during the time they were fighting a People's war.

As far as the book is concerned it's a good history lesson, the author manages to do what he set out to do that is malign the CPI. I will never look at the Communist party the same way I'm surprised they were not banned post Independence, some might even term them as traitors. Arun Shourie is an erudite in every sense of the word, his command over politics, history and the English language is unmatched but the book is very dry, Shourie is very repetitive, boring and keeps harping on the same thing again and again, and goes deep into historic documents. This book was <200 pages else I would have given up. A history less albeit a boring one.

2.5 Stars out of 5.