CPI(M)’s Rehearsal of Surrender: The PM SHRI Capitulation

In the left—so called, in political terrain of Kerala, the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) led by the Communist party of India (Marxist) (here onwards CPI(M)) had often presented itself as the bulwark against Hindu nationalism and the BJP-led NDA government’s fascist policies: yet the recent turn of events around the PM SHRI (Pradhan Mantri Schools for Rising India) scheme reveals that the crimson mask of secularism now bares saffron fangs of betrayal and surrender. On one hand the CPI(M) rhetorically chided the National Educational Policy (NEP 2020) and links it to the RSS / Hindu nationalism agenda; on the other hand, it clandestinely signs up the very scheme that advances NEP’s national consolidation. This is not merely opportunism – it is the betrayal of left, secular and anti–caste principles.

For those who are the honest observers of the CPI (M), this moment, of ushering in RSS’s education policy into Kerala, is not unexpected. The CPI (M) had for decades remained in tacit and open alliance with the RSS (its political masks including the Jan Sangh and the BJP), and during the height of “Mandal commission report vs Babri demolition movement”, the CPI (M) stalwart EMS Namoothirpad campaigned with L. K. Advani, who was the architect of mosque demolition.

CPI (M)’s Rehearsal of Surrender

On April 13, 2025, a report noted that the CPI (M) in Kerala remained determined to join the PM SHRI scheme despite strong opposition from the main LDF Partner, the Communist Party of India (CPI). The CPI (M) cited a potential loss 1,186 crore in central funding, if Kerala did not sign the MOU.¹

It is reported that the State Government signed the MOU with the Union Govt. in New Delhi, on 16 October 2025 to join PM Shri, while keeping CPI and other LDF member parties in total darkness. The signing was preceded by a meeting between the Kerala Chief Minister, Pinarayi Vijayan and the Prime Minister Modi in New Delhi on 10 October, 2025.² The Kerala State Minister of Education admitted that the move was forced by the withholding of `1500 crore in central aid to educational programmes.³ The CPI has charged that, “joining PMSHRI = paving the way for NEP” and that the CPI (M) had trampled coalition discipline.⁴

In short, a purported ‘left’ government refuses to uphold its stated opposition to NEP or to saffronisation of education, but capitulates under the pretext of securing central funds. The CPI (M) has no qualms about kneeling before the RSS-BJP’s educational agendas, as it continues rachet up Islamophobic rhetoric.

The open Islamophobia of the CPI (M) should be seen for what it is—to align the party and cadre with RSS for the long term—and only then can the recent events in Kerala politics make sense. This proximity between CPI (M) and the RSS has been noted by several observers in recent times. I must present three of these remarks here to establish the coming danger to Kerala society,

1. “Worried that it may lose the only state that it currently rules, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) in Kerala is experimenting with a dangerous political strategy that runs the risk of normalising political Hinduism and even Islamophobia. Although this strategy is not entirely new, it is now being implemented without qualms or compunction. – (“Dangers Ahead as CPI(M) Navigates Religious Politics in Kerala” by Shajahan Madampat 30 September 2025, The Wire, https://thewire.in/politics/dangers-ahead-as-cpim-navigates-religious-politics-in-kerala)
2. “Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPI(M), chief minister of the state described the Muslim-majority district of Malappuram as a hot spot for these crimes. He claimed that these offenses are most prevalent in this district — and that illegal money is brought into Kerala for “anti-national” activities. The label “anti-national,” which is often applied, if not limited to, Indian Muslims, is not the chief minister’s own coinage but rather a term borrowed from the lexicon of Hindu nationalist forces. Strategically deployed by Hindutva organizations to ostracize and demonize Muslims in India, the term takes on a more powerful meaning by labeling them as “traitors” to the motherland.” (“Indian Communists’ Muslim Dilemma”, BY SHADMAN ALI KHAN, 16 December 2024, Jacobin Magazine, https://jacobin.com/2024/12/indian-communists-marxist-anti-muslim)
3. ‘Kerala has erupted in heated debate following Communist Party of India (Marxist) Politburo member A Vijayaraghavan’s controversial remarks accusing Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra of winning Lok Sabha elections in Wayanad due to a “communal Muslim alliance.”’ (“CPI(M) Politburo member A Vijayaraghavan’s Islamophobic statement sparks outrage in Kerala”, Sahid Faris, 23 December 2024, Maktoob Media, https://maktoobmedia.com/india/cpim-politburo-member-a-vijayaraghavans-islamophobic-statement-sparks-outrage-in-kerala )

CPI (M)’s Double – speak

CPI (M) opined in the past that NEP is a vehicle – for ‘saffronisation’ of education, curriculum and text books of schools, and embedding the Hindu-Brahminical culture. For instance, an article flagged that, “condition one (of PM SHRI MOU): State must implement all provisions of NEP 2020 in entirety…. condition two: schools must carry the ‘PMSHRI’ brand name”⁵

However, soon the CPI (M)-led government became persuaded that, “we cannot forfeit the funds”, “we must be pragmatic”, and so proceeds to join the scheme without any discussion either in the cabinet or among the LDF partners.⁶

CPI (M)’s rhetoric has now become exposed. “We oppose these conditions, yet signs”. “We reject NEP’s ideological orientation, yet accepts the scheme whose objective is to develop “exemplar schools” aligned with NEP 2020.⁷

Thus, the CPI (M) is hopelessly trying to play both sides, a strategy enabled by the elite metropolitan ‘friends of the party’ by turning a blind eye to the truth of the party. The ‘friends of the party’ often pretend to be the critics of Hindu nationalism’s education policy nationally (which is often celebrated in the Savarna liberal media). The very same ‘friends’ and Savarna liberal media turn a blind eye when the CPI (M) is collaborating locally with the RSS, including in the implementation of upper caste reservation (EWS scheme), Islamophobia, and now the NEP. This is not just political cunning: it is ideological capitulation.

CPI (M)’s Surrender to What?

What lies behind PM SHRI and NEP is not simply an education reform but a re-engineering of the habitus of young minds in alignment with a Hindu Brahminical Casteist worldview. The NEP’s vision paper declares that, Indian education must be rooted in Indian ethos… transform India sustainably into a vibrant knowledge society… instill among learners a deep-rooted pride in being Indian, not only in thought but also in spirit, intellect and deeds.⁸ NEP emphasizes the ‘values of Sathya (truth), Dharma, Ahimsa, drawn from Indian cultural heritage’.⁹

In effect, NEP replaces modern universal values based on reason, critique and secularism with caste-oriented thinking and the caste system’s rootedness in the ancient Chatur-varna culture. The culture and heritage foregrounded is the ancient Brahminical caste order—hierarchical and inegalitarian culture based on the dehumanization of the lower castes majority and women in order to keep them in slavery. Divya Dwivedi explains the conceptual underpinnings of this strategy through the concepts of “Aryan doctrine”, which uses denigration of the other based on their birth, in order to dominate them, which is the “denigrate-dominate function”. (See “The Evasive Racism of Caste – and the Homological Power of the “Aryan” Doctrine”. Journal of Critical Philosophy of Race. 11 (1): 209–245. doi:10.5325/critphilrace.11.1.0209 )

The aim of any rational educational policy – critical thinking, reflexivity, dissent, and pursuit of human freedom which are being systematically undermined through RSS education policy. What we can delineate in the NEP is not reason, but a relic of the pre-modern caste – dharma ethos, now repackaged as “holistic education”.

NEP as a Brahminical brainwashing project.

One can read the NEP and thus PM SHRI as a structural mechanism for reproducing and perpetuating upper caste domination and preventing the emergence of critical and emancipatory thought. NEP explicitly evokes the “ancient Indian” tradition. “The rich heritage of ancient and eternal Indian knowledge and thought has been a guiding light for the policy”.¹⁰ This is hardly neutral, “eternal Indian Knowledge” is a code for the “ancient practice of the denial of education to the lower caste majority”. The policy instills ‘pride’ and upper caste supremacism rather than de-traditionalization and freedom.

The NEP is aimed at elevating the ancient Brahminic caste-racist culture as the only one and legitimate and homogeneous pan-Indian culture. NEP gives greater emphasis to traditional values and (im)morality than to scientific knowledge and radical interrogation of tradition. The language of “holistic well-founded individuals” substitutes for critical thought and modern values of freedom and equality.

Subordination of reason to ethos.

While NEP mentions “scientific temper… creative imagination”, it frames them within the Indian hierarchical cultural values, rather than grounded in scientific reason. The NEP’s moral architecture thus becomes the vehicle for assimilating children into the dominant caste-racist culture rather than empowering them to challenge it.

If new education is to draw from “Indian ethos” and includes “righteous conduct” and “pride in being Indian”, whose India is being built and privileged? The texts of Vedas, Upanishads, Ramayana, Mahabharatha, Smrithis, Puranas have long justified caste hierarchy and inequality as ‘natural’, ‘righteous’ and ‘eternal’. The NEP itself does not require critical engagement with those traditions. Instead it invites “cultural participation” and “pride” – enabling reproduction of dominant culture. The NEP is nothing but a camouflage for the normalization of the “Aryan Doctrine” in the 21^st Century.

The Kerala tragedy: When left becomes duped.

In Kerala, the CPI (M)’s rhetoric versus its practice exposes disturbing alignments. A left government that once battled privatization, and the shrinkage of public education now argues: “we must get the funds”. It gives up its own rhetoric for central grants. It signs a scheme that works by branding, by slogans, by central control over states. It hereby helps the regime it claims to oppose.

The CPI (M)’s Shameful surrender weakens the democratic and secular parties of the INDIA coalition. When CPI (M) normalizes co-operating with a Hindu nationalism– driven scheme, it undermines the future struggles for secular and scientific temper and anti-caste emancipatory movements.

What the CPI (M) must answer?

How does CPI (M) reconcile its earlier public posture of rejecting NEP/PM SHRI with the MOU signing? What internal coalition discipline and mandate was followed? Why was CPI’s objection ignored?

On what basis did CPI (M) justify branding of schools as “PM SHRI” and full implementation of NEP, despite previous claims that they would not sign unless conditions changed? (see the MOU condition that states must implement all NEP provision if they join”…) What guarantee is there that students will not face Aryan doctrinal subjugation rather than critical education?

Critical Alternatives

If the NEP/PM SHRI route channels education into submission, caste duty, worship of tradition, then the anti-caste democratic alternative demands something different: education, emancipation, reasoning subjects, critique of tradition, vernaculars of the oppressed and subversion of the everyday ritual-caste habitus. Education must enable children to question the moral purgatory of our society,

1. Why were the lower caste women not allowed to cover their upper bodies until the end of the 19^th century?
2. Why were the lower castes majority prohibited from walking on public roads?
3. Why was the supreme court judgement allowing women of all ages to enter Sabarimala temple not implement by the CPI (M) – led government in 2018?
4. Do the CPI (M) weigh ritual over law and constitution?

The CPI (M) must answer why its government was succumbed to the upper caste minority, who still wants to perpetuate their domination? In the light of this, CPI (M)’s surrender to the BJP government cannot be seen as a mere tactical compromise, it is a strategic betrayal of democratic forces, who are determined to fight the Hindu – fascist forces.

In stark contrast, governments of Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Delhi (before the BJP won the elections), Karnataka, Telangana, Himachal Pradesh have courageously refused to bend to the agenda of saffronising education hidden behind PM SHRI. Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Delhi state Governments have even approached the Supreme Court to safeguard their constitutional rights over education, defending both federal autonomy and intellectual freedom. These actions reaffirm that opposition to PM SHRI is not mere rhetoric but grounded in principled opposition to saffronisation of education.

Though politically part of the INDIA nationally, by signing the MOU of PM SHRI, Kerala CPI (M) has become exposed and isolated. While all other anti-BJP Governments fight for constitutional autonomy, the Kerala CPI (M) has obediently signed the MOU. The CPI (M)’s apparently ‘quiet obedience’ is no innocent administrative compliance; it reveals the latent Hindu – upper caste stream within Kerala CPI (M) – a concealed continuity with Brahminical social order it displays disavowal as spectacle but quietly reproduces and lives its orthodoxy in power and practice.

The CPI (M)’s drift toward the RSS is not a new phenomenon. Even before the emergency was declared by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in June 1975, the CPI (M) had a surreptitious understanding with the RSS. In 1967 Elections, the congress party lost its monopoly in many states, since the transfer of power in 1947. In many states, “United Front” or “Samyukta Vidhayak Dal” (SVD) Coalitions were formed – alliances of the Hindu fascist Jana Sangh to socialist and CPI(M) and CPI. As RSS / BJP recently declared that their aim is to create a “Congress free India”, main slogan of SVD in 1967 was “Remove Congress”.¹¹

After the 1967 States Elections, an anti-congress coalition government was formed under Akali Dal leader Justice Gurnam Singh in Punjab. The anti-Congress coalition included Akali Dal, Jana Sangh, CPI(M), CPI, Republican Party. Cooperation with the Jan Sangh leading to the resignation of party General Secretary P. Sundarayya in 1975 might be justified in the later context of resisting the Emergency, but what justification existed in 1967 for aligning with Jana Sangh. There was not even a remote indication of Emergency at that time. It should also not be forgotten that those were the years when Indira Gandhi initiated progressive measures such as Nationalization of Banks and the Abolition of Privy Purse. Despite this clearly socialist oriented progressive policies, what prompted CPI (M) to align with Jana Sangh to “remove congress”. A Deeper look into the History of CPI (M) reveals an enduring Hindu – upper caste ideological stream – a concealed current flowing beneath its proclaimed Marxism.

During the Emergency, P. Sundarayya, the then General Secretary of the CPI (M), resigned in protest against the politbureau’s majority decision to cooperate with the RSS – Jana Sangh combine. In his resignation letter, Sundarayya had alleged that the party’s drift toward the RSS had a pre-Emergency history. He also warned that such an alliance with the RSS/ Janasangh, even under the pretext of opposing the Emergency, would discredit the party before the masses.¹² All this shows that, despite its rhetoric of Marxism and Socialism, the CPI (M) carries within its belly a deep stream of RSS ideology. What is new, however, is that in Kerala the CPI (M) and the RSS/BJP have now become interchangeable – both in ideology and practice.

Ultimately, this extreme risk of falling into the arms of the RSS and eventually becoming one of its arms is present with most communist parties of India. That is, as long as the communist leaders remain “Savarna Marxists”. In an essay that should be read by anyone who is either conducting research on or is concerned about the heritage of Marxist-Leninist politics in India, it is stated,

“In India, Caste determines capitalism. First, there is the “inseparable connection” that exists between power of wealth and the caste order. That is, there is no Dalit billionaire equivalent of Ambani, Adani, Narayana Murthy […] The actual relation between upper castes and the lower castes had been historically invariant through millennia of the apartheid system of caste […] In this sense, from the point of view of the upper castes, the caste order itself is the heritable capital, to which we erroneously gave the modest name “social capital”. In that sense, Savarna capitalist is first the comptroller of the caste order and only then a manager in the sense of the theory of the firm.” (“April Theses: On Democracy, Anti-caste politics, and Marxisms in India”, by Shaj Mohan and Divya Dwivedi, 28 April 2024, Maktoob Media, https://maktoobmedia.com/india/april-theses-on-democracy-anti-caste-politics-and-marxisms-in-india/ )

Conclusion

The CPI (M) in Kerala has revealed its double-speak of opposing Hindu nationalism’s education policy but accepting its infrastructure and implementation administratively. The NEP is not simply an innocuous educational reform: it is the ideological weapon of Hindu structural fascism. This brazen betrayal by CPI (M) must stand as a warning carved in stone for all left – democratic and secular parties: the CPI (M) cannot be trusted in the long and arduous struggle against Hindu structural fascism. When the stakes are ideological, the CPI (M)’s spine bends. When funds are at play, its slogans fade. It has proven once again that beneath its Marxist mask lies a party willing to barter reason for revenue and surrender the future of education to Brahminic fascism. By signing the MOU, the CPI (M) has driven the last nail into the coffin of its own credibility. This betrayal must echo through every secular and democratic space in India – that CPI (M) is no comrade in the fight against Hindu structural fascism, but a shadow bearer of fascism itself.

References

1. (CPI (M) firm on PM Shri Scheme despite CPI opposition, cites `1,186 cr. in potential funding loss, Anish Nair, April 13, 2025, Manorama online)
2. (Kerala Government signs MOU to join PM SHRI Scheme despite CPI objection. On Manorama Staff, October 23,2025).
3. (Kerala to sign up for PMSHRI Scheme despite CPI objections. On Manorama staff. October 19, 2025)
4. (No discussion within LDF: Violation of front principles: CPI slams CPI (M) over PM SHRI Scheme, Mathurbhumi.com, 24, October 2025)
5. (By joining PM SHRI, has CPI (M) allowed Saffronisation of Kerala education.’ Ayyappan R. 20, October, 2025. On Manorama)
6. (LDF government to go ahead with PM SRI Scheme, despite resistance from CPI, K.S. Sreejith, The New Indian Express, 23 Oct 2025)
7. (Kerala govt. signs MOU to join PM SHRI Scheme despite CPI objection, On Manorama staff, October 24, 2025).
8. (K. Muralidharan, et al. ‘The New Education Policy 2020, Digitalization and Quality of Life in India: Some Reflections’ (education sciences, 21 January, 2022 (Educ. sci. 2022, 12, 75. https://doi.org/10.3390/educscil2020075)
9. (Universal Human values, Holistic Value – Based Education for Realising the Aspirations articulated in NEP 2020. (All India Council for Technical Education.)
10. (New National Educational Policy 2020 of India. Introduction of NEP 2020).
11. Subrata K. Mitra, Politics office State and the politics of the Nation: The formation of the Akali Dal (Sage publishing, New Delhi, 1988)

Bipan Chandra et al, India After independence: 1947-2000 (Penguin, 2000): Mohit Sen, A Traveler and the Road. The Journey of a Indian Communist (Rupa, 2003).  E.M.S. Namboodiripad. How I became a communist and History of the Communist movement in India. Vol. 3, E.M.S. Justified the alliance with Jana Sangh long before Emergency as part of a “broad democratic front”. For him, Jana Sangh, the Political wing of RSS is more democratic, than and congress party.

12. My resignation, P. Sundarayya. (Documents detailing grounds leading to Resignation of the First General Secretary of the CPI(M) form the offices of General Secretary and Polit Bureau Membership (India Publishers & Distributors, New Delhi. 1991).