Shamrao Parulekar - A Tribute
Ashok Dhawale
(This article on Comrade Shamrao Parulekar is taken in an edited form from the larger article 'Comrade Godavari Parulekar : A Centenary Tribute' that was published in 'The Marxist' in 2007.)
August 3 is the death anniversary of Comrade Shamrao Parulekar. It is also the birth anniversary of Krantisimha Comrade Nana Patil. Both these leaders were towering freedom fighters, outstanding peasant leaders, and excellent Communists.
One was the leader of the historic Warli Adivasi Revolt against landlordism, which was in league with the British, in the then Thane district, now Palghar district. The other was the leader of the equally historic Parallel Government, which overthrew British rule for three and a half years in the then Satara district, now bifurcated into Satara and Sangli. Both were militant leaders of the Samyukta Maharashtra Movement. Both were elected MPs to the Lok Sabha in 1957, one from Thane district, and the other from Satara district, and then again in 1967 from Beed district. Both were outstanding leaders of the All India Kisan Sabha, one the founder of the Maharashtra Rajya Kisan Sabha and its All India Vice President, and the other the President of the All India Kisan Sabha. Both were dedicated and extraordinary leaders of the Communist Party till their last breath.
Here we shall take a quick look at the life and work of Shamrao Parulekar. We shall look at the life and work of Nana Patil sometime later.
*Early Years*
Shamrao Parulekar was born on October 2, 1902, in a landlord family of Bijapur in Karnataka. His father Vishnupant Parulekar was a district judge whose services were requisitioned by the royal family, and he then became the Dewan of Akkalkot. After completing his school and college education in Pune, Shamrao came to Mumbai University for higher studies. Here he passed the Masters degree in philosophy with a first class, which was an extremely rare distinction in those times. His father wanted him to go to England to study law.
But Shamrao had already imbibed the nationalist spirit of the freedom struggle. He refused to go to England, took his law degree in Mumbai instead, and then became a full-time worker at a small wage in the Servants of India Society in the late 1920s. Here he began his work of selfless social service, which also included organizing the working class. This turn of events could not but infuriate his father, the Dewan of Akkalkot. It is said that when his father angrily threatened to disinherit him, the young Shamrao promptly replied that he had already prepared the legal documents renouncing his claims to family lands and property!
*Organising Workers and Peasants*
It was under the aegis of the Servants of India Society that Shamrao began to organize first the working class and then the peasantry. The prominent trade union leader N. M. Joshi was his guide. His activities in the 1930s, even before he joined the Communist Party in 1938-39, revealed his growing class orientation. Independence for him did not simply mean the end of the British Raj. It also meant economic, social and political justice for the toiling millions. And so he plunged into organizing the basic classes. Shamrao first worked among the textile workers and leather workers of Mumbai, and then concentrated on organizing the workers at Ambarnath in Thane district, about sixty kilometers from Mumbai.
The strike struggles of the Ambarnath workers, and especially those of the large Wimco Match Factory, were bitterly fought to victory during 1934-38 under Shamrao’s leadership. They included a six-month long strike at Wimco in 1936, which resulted in severe repression and massive victimization of the workers. But many of the victimized workers, who themselves hailed from peasant families, started organizing the peasantry in the adjoining tehsils of Kalyan, Murbad and Shahapur. During the period of these working class struggles, Shamrao was elected general secretary of the National Trade Union Federation and later joint secretary of the AITUC.
Big struggles were waged by the peasantry from 1937-39 against the oppression of landlords, the most famous of which was the struggle against the false weights and measures used by landlords to loot the peasants through exorbitant rents, which were then paid in in kind. The struggle was successful, and the government was forced to introduce official and accurate weights and measures. With this success, the peasant movement spread, and large conventions of thousands were held in Kalyan and Murbad tehsils, where an organization called the Shetkari Sangh was formed under Shamrao’s leadership.
*Working with Dr. Ambedkar*
In the mid-1930s Shamrao joined the Independent Labour Party founded by Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar, and for a time was also its Secretary. This brought him into the anti-caste struggle and, despite their later political differences, his relations with Dr. Ambedkar remained cordial to the end. In 1937, Shamrao was elected to the Bombay Legislative Assembly (Governor-in-Council) on the Independent Labour Party ticket from Ratnagiri district in Konkan. He distinguished himself in the Assembly by his incisive speeches in defence of the workers, peasants, dalits and the downtrodden.
In the Bombay Assembly, Dr. Ambedkar moved a Bill demanding the abolition of the khoti system of landlordism that was then widely prevalent in the Konkan region. In support of this Bill, Shamrao organized a large rally of over 10,000 peasants to the Assembly from Ratnagiri district. The remarkable feature of this rally was that the peasants had all come to Mumbai by boat, via the sea route. As a result of later struggles, the khoti system of landlordism was eventually abolished by law.
In July 1938, Shamrao was elected as the Indian workers’ delegate to the international labour conference of the ILO at Geneva, where he made a brilliant speech analyzing the miserable conditions of the working class in India. Parts of this speech have been quoted by Rajani Palme Dutt in his classic, 'India Today' (second edition, pp. 388-89).
*Anti-Imperialist Struggles*
Godavari Gokhale, who was also working in the Servants of India Society, and Shamrao Parulekar were married on May 24, 1939, and this was the beginning of a remarkable political and personal partnership that was to last for more than twenty-five years.
By this time he had already begun his study of Marxism and had started applying it to his own experience of class struggle. Shamrao was himself a serious student of philosophy and he firmly rejected all idealist and bourgeois philosophical currents and consciously accepted Marxist philosophy as his true guide. It was this inexorable process that finally led both of them to join the Communist Party in 1938-39.
On March 3, 1940, the textile workers’ strike for increased dearness allowance began in Mumbai. Within a week, top leaders of the Communist Party, like B.T. Ranadive, S.A. Dange, S.S. Mirajkar and others were put behind bars. The next week, Shamrao and other leaders were also arrested for their anti-war speeches. It was then that Godavari led the textile workers' strike, till she too was detained. Hundreds of leading Communists from all over the country were flung into British jails for over two years, from 1940-42, for their opposition to British war efforts.
*Formation of Maharashtra Rajya Kisan Sabha*
After their release from jail in 1942, Shamrao and Godavari switched over completely to organizing the peasantry, to which they devoted the rest of their lives. The All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) had chosen Shamrao to be its organizer in Maharashtra. The AIKS had been formed at its Lucknow conference on April 11, 1936. But for a few years after that, the AIKS had no movement or organization in Maharashtra.
The Parulekars began this work in right earnest after 1942. For three years, they moved in several districts, gave impetus to peasant struggles and made great efforts to set up the Kisan Sabha. In 1944, the Kisan Sabha was started in the Kalyan, Murbad and Shahapur tehsils of Thane district. In the seventh conference of the AIKS held at Bhakna Kalan in Punjab in April 1943, Shamrao was elected to the Central Kisan Council (CKC). In its eighth conference at Vijayawada in Andhra in March 1944, Shamrao was elected AIKS treasurer. Later, he continued to be in the top AIKS leadership as joint secretary or vice president.
Shamrao and Godavari took the lead to organise the foundation conference of the Maharashtra Rajya Kisan Sabha at Titwala in Thane district on January 7, 1945. Over 7,000 peasants from several districts attended this conference.
*The Glorious Warli Adivasi Revolt*
It was to conduct propaganda for this first state conference of the Kisan Sabha that Shamrao visited the adivasi belt of Thane district for the first time in December 1944. The predominant tribe in this area was known as the Warli tribe. Around 300 adivasis gathered for the meeting and told Shamrao of the medieval exploitation and inhuman atrocities that were being heaped on them by the landlords and moneylenders for years together. Shamrao was appalled at seeing the terrible landlord oppression that the adivasis had been facing for nearly a century. Shamrao called upon them to send representatives to the Titwala conference. They agreed on one condition – that Kisan Sabha workers must come to help them in their struggle. Shamrao agreed. Fifteen tribal delegates from this area attended the Titwala conference. It was these fifteen delegates, together with thousands of their adivasi brethren, who within six months were to begin a revolt that would be written in letters of gold in the history of the peasant movement of India. Inspired by the conference, the adivasis took back with them the red flag, and appealed to Kisan Sabha workers to come and lead their struggles.
In 1947, just when the first phase of the Adivasi Revolt was culminating in a hard-earned victory, Shamrao Parulekar wrote a remarkable book in English titled 'Revolt of the Warlis'. It analyzed the entire struggle from the detached and objective standpoint of a progressive historian, although he was himself one of the key leaders of this struggle. In this book, Shamrao graphically described the first stirrings of the revolt:
“The conference had a magical effect on the Warlis. It inspired and transformed them. One of them, Mahya Dhangda of Zari, who had never spoken more than a few words in all his life, volunteered to speak on the resolution on abolition of forced labour. He trembled while he spoke but he spoke with determination. His pent-up feelings had found an outlet and they burst out in torrents. He held the conference spellbound by his pathetic narration. In conclusion he solemnly declared that the Warlis would end serfdom and resist their oppressors. The Warlis understood the significance of the resolution and the conference quite differently from what the rest did. He understood his own declaration to end forced labour as a solemn pledge given to his fellow brethren which he must honour at any sacrifice and risk. The Warlis who returned home from the conference were not the same as those who had attended it. The conference had changed them beyond recognition. They no longer trembled in the presence of their oppressors but started defying them. They had carried with them a few Red Flags which had decorated the pandal of the conference. They felt that these would serve as their guide, friend and philosopher. They discarded their routine mode of life and went as missionaries from village to village, holding group meetings of Warli peasants and preaching the message of the conference. The message stirred the whole mass of Warli peasants and the whole jungle tract vibrated with its echo.”
On May 23, 1945, a conference of over 5,000 adivasis, 500 of them women, was held at the village Zari in Umbargaon (now Talasari) tehsil. It was addressed by Shamrao and Godavari, and it gave the clarion call to launch an uncompromising struggle around four main and simple slogans. These were: Do not cultivate the private land of the landlord unless he pays in cash the daily wage of 12 annas. Do not render any free service to the landlord. Resist him if he assaults you. You must all unite. Thus began the famed Warli Adivasi Revolt against a century of serfdom, bonded labour, debt slavery, exorbitant rents and, above all, inhuman oppression and exploitation by landlords, money lenders and forest contractors.
A remarkable feature of the Adivasi Revolt was that both Shamrao and Godavari Parulekar were not allowed to openly set foot in Thane district during the entire period of the struggle from November 21, 1946, to January 14, 1953. From 1946-48 they were externed, from 1948-51 they were underground, and from 1951-53 they were detained. 1948-51 was a time of further repression against the Communists, following the second Party Congress at Calcutta in February 1948. The Telangana, Tebhaga and other peasant struggles were even then mobilizing thousands of militants. Shamrao and Godavari remained underground during this period, and Shamrao ably carried out the responsibility as state secretary of the Party during this difficult period.
*Samyukta Maharashtra Movement*
The first general elections in 1951-52 were held when the Parulekars were still in jail. The Communist Party became the main opposition party in the Lok Sabha. Both Shamrao and Godavari fought the Vidhan Sabha elections from jail. They lost narrowly, mainly because the votes of thousands of illiterate adivasis were declared invalid. Although Congress candidates were elected, the Red Flag showed its prowess.
The massive movement for the demand of Samyukta Maharashtra as part of the democratic struggle for linguistic states rocked Maharashtra from 1955 to 1960. An unprecedented 106 martyrs were killed in police firing in Mumbai in the course of this struggle. The movement spread across the whole state and Thane district was no exception. A huge convention for Samyukta Maharashtra was held at Shirgaon by the Party. Over 1,200 Adivasi comrades were arrested and many of them tortured. It was as a result of this movement that several Marathi-speaking villages in Umbargaon tehsil were incorporated in the new state of Maharashtra on May 1, 1960. This became the new Talasari tehsil, which has for long been the strongest base of the Party in Palghar district.
It was also due to this movement that several communists and socialists were elected to parliament and to the assembly in the elections of 1957. Shamrao was elected to the Lok Sabha from Thane district and over the next five years he made his mark in Parliament as a fearless champion of the working people.
*Formation of CPI(M)*
When the Party split in 1964, almost the entire Party in Thane district, led by the Parulekars, unswervingly came over to the Communist Party of India (Marxist). The first state conference of the CPI(M) in Maharashtra was aptly held at Talasari in Thane district. But both Shamrao and Godavari were among the 163 leaders of the Party in Maharashtra who were then in jail. S.Y. Kolhatkar was elected the first state secretary of the CPI(M) and both Shamrao and Godavari were elected to the state secretariat.
In the wake of the India-China border conflict, several leading communists in the country were detained under the Defence of India Rules on November 7, 1962. They included B T Ranadive, the Parulekars and many other leaders who were later to form the CPI(M). At the seventh Party Congress at Calcutta in November 1964, B T Ranadive was among the nine members of the first Polit Bureau of the Party and S Y Kolhatkar and Shamrao Parulekar, who was then in detention, were elected to the first Central Committee of the Party.
*Demise of Shamrao in Jail*
But tragedy struck within months of this event. Com. Shamrao suddenly died of a massive heart attack on August 3, 1965, in the Arthur Road Jail in Mumbai. It was a shattering blow for Godavari, who was also in the same jail at the time. It took her several months to recover from this shock. In a sense, it would be true to say that she never fully recovered from this loss. Every year thereafter on August 3, she always made it a point to be alone at home that day with her memories.
When Shamrao died, most of the Party leadership in Maharashtra was in detention. At such a time it was none other than the CPI(M) general secretary P Sundarayya and his wife Leela Sundarayya who specially took time off to come to Mumbai to stay with Godavari for over a week to help her get over her deep loss. It was a remarkable example of communist comradeship. Since both Shamrao and Godavari had devoted all their time to the Party, they had remained childless by choice. A unique partnership had come to an end.
Paying warm tributes to Shamrao in a huge condolence meeting, former AIKS president Krantisimha Nana Patil remarked, “One barrel of this double-barreled gun has been silenced for ever.” Shamrao’s relatively early death at the age of 63 created a big void in the Party and Kisan movement in Maharashtra, which proved difficult to fill.
*Illustrious Work by Godavari*
Godavari Parulekar continued the work of the Party and Kisan Sabha after Shamrao's demise. She was elected to the CPI(M) Central Committee and discharged this responsibility for over 25 years. She wrote her famous book 'Jevhaa Manoos Jaagaa Hoto' ('Adivasis Revolt') in jail. It was hugely welcomed and won the Sahitya Akademi Award.
In 1986, at the AIKS Golden Jubilee Conference at Patna, Godavari was elected the National President of the All India Kisan Sabha. After an illustrious life of struggle, sacrifice and service, she passed away on October 8, 1996. Her funeral procession of tens of thousands of Adivasis was held at Talasari on October 10.
The remarkable life and revolutionary work of Shamrao and Godavari Parulekar is an unending spring of inspiration not only for coming generations of communists, but also for all patriotic sections of the people of India.
