Análisis para establecer los niveles relativos de comparación

Turkestan was Imperial Russia’s Central Asian territory east of the Caspian Sea and south of the Kazakh steppe. Yet apart from the identity of the overlords, conquest didn’t change much—Czarist rule “did not affect the patriarchal order […] and traditional forms of religious education were kept intact.” Unsurprisingly, the indigenous political outfits springing up after February 1917 had a clearly Muslim agenda and were often influenced by fundamentalist religious or pan-Turkic ideas. A number of them eventually revolted against Soviet rule.130 _{Nevertheless, the Bolshevik Soviet at Tashkent, in power since September}

1917, enjoyed a measure of support from such ‘nationalist’ forces, and on critical occasions actively sought cooperation themselves.131

To achieve this, the Bolsheviks on the spot successfully aroused a sense of victimization and cultural endangerment. A Central Asian journal wrote in August 1919 that the British were out to Christianize all other religions, especially Islam.132 At a Bolshevik rally in Merv, a speaker averred that the Soviet government would liberate Muslim workers. Yet in the spirit of Sultangaliev’s slogan “Muslim peoples are proletarian peoples” he characterized not the native exploiting class, but the British as the main enemies—not of material proletarian interests, but of Islam. The rally closed with the slogan: “Long live Islam and the true followers of Islam!”133 _{A Bolshevik flyer, probably from Ashkhabad,}

similarly denounced the British as “enemies of our lives and our religion […] Long live defenders of the Moslem faith in Turkestan. Long live the all-powerful Khalifate. Death to the British and their anti-Moslem might.”134

Far from revealing the need to improvise for the retention of Bolshevik power, postulations of this kind were exemplary implementations of Eastern revolution. In September 1920, the CPR(B)’s Central Committee transmitted detailed instructions on how to conduct propaganda work in Asia. Every revolutionary cell had to win over a member of

130 _{Dov Yaroshevski, “The Central Government and Peripheral Opposition in Khiva, 1910–1924,” in Ro’i, The}

USSR and the Muslim World, 20 (quote); see also Baymirza Hayit, “Basmatschi.” Nationaler Kampf

Turkestans in den Jahren 1917 bis 1934 (Köln: Dreisam 1992), 22, 27–31; and Smith, The Bolsheviks and the National, 126.

131 _{Smith, The Bolsheviks and the National, 128–9; on the effectiveness of religious accommodation for mass}

enlistment of Muslims in the Red Army, see Marwat, The Basmachi Movement, 46–51, and Hayit,

“Basmatschi”, esp. 146.

132 _{“The Voice of the Poor,” National Archives of India, Home/Political Files (hereafter: Home/Poll) 1919 Nr.}

4 December.

133 _{“Bolshevik Designs on Afghanistan and India,” National Archives of India, Foreign/Political Files}

(hereafter: Foreign/Poll) 1920 February Nr. 71-171, 26.

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the local clergy in order to have the “centres of spiritual life […] become the centre of revolutionary propaganda.” Naturally, this predetermined the latter’s character: “The strictest injunctions are given to show the greatest consideration to the religious rites and ritual of the Mahomedans, Parsees, Sunnites, Brahmins, Lamaists,” and so on.135 Strikingly, the text explicitly referred to Brahmins, the ritual and social elite of Hindu society, highlighting the remoteness of Bolshevik policy in the East from commitment to social transformation.

In the case of nomadic tribes, close relations had to be established with the chiefs, and generally the “greatest respect should be shown to the customs of every tribe, however great may be their divergences from the ideas of Communism.”136 _{At least there were tangible}

results: in 1921, the Somolvostok (Socialist Youth of the East), affiliated with the “League for Eastern Liberation,” called for a “Holy War” and successfully enlisted the cooperation of “warlike tribes,” some of whom joined the Red Army.137

Mohammed Barakatullah, erstwhile head of the Indian Provisional Government in Kabul during the First World War, was an eminent propagandist of the Eastern paradigm in Central Asia. His anti-imperialist credentials as envoy of King Amanullah of Afghanistan (who sought an alliance with the Soviets during his 1919 war with the British) earned him the opportunity to chalk out his position in the Izvestiya:138

I am neither a communist nor a socialist, but my political programme entails the expulsion of the British from Asia. I am an implacable foe of the capitalization of Asia by Europe, the principal representatives of which are the British. […] In this […] respect we are natural allies.139

However, his views went beyond simple anti-imperialism. A couple of months before, he had drawn parallels between socialist and Islamic visions in his pamphlet Bolshevism and

the Islamic Body-Politic, a piece widely distributed in Central Asia with Bolshevik

assistance: Just as the workers of the west had identified “personal ownership” as the source of all worldly evils, Islam had instituted the commandment of charity. His romanticizing references to the early days of Islam bore obvious parallels to Salafism: The first caliphs’ treasury vaults had inexhaustibly mitigated the misery of the poor. Just as the theistic religions, socialism had been “revealed” in order to end “destitution, indigence, toil,

135 _{All quotes from Reports of the Director, Central Intelligence, 14 February 1921, Home/Poll/1921 Nr. 90}

March, 20. This led to “unrestricted promotion of non-socialist culture” outside the Russian heartland: Smith,

The Bolsheviks and the National, 169.

136 _Ibid.

137 _{Times of India, 5 March 1921.}

138 _{Reports of the Director, Central Intelligence, 13 October 1919, Home/Poll/1919 Nr. 454-457 September,}

11–12.

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misfortune and oppression.” Barakatullah exhorted Muslims to heed the “divine cry” of “brother Lenin.” He also actively rallied Muslims along the Volga river and in Central Asia to the Soviet cause.140

The approach seemed to resonate. British intelligence agencies worried that Soviet support for Amanullah had “given some color to this new pose of the Bolsheviks that they are the friends of the Muhammadans”141 (emphasis added). Yet they missed the fact that in addition to possible political gains, Soviet championing of Afghan independence and Muslim self-determination was a direct result of the commitment to secure “independent and free development” for all peoples and cultures. Even after the conclusion of the 1921 Anglo-Soviet trade agreement, Bolshevik policy remained committed to the implementation of its vision for the East. Islam continued to play a vital part in it, and to receive concessions. Article 10 of the 1921 treaty between Soviet Russia and Turkey subjected citizens to the laws of their country of residence, with exceptions made only in military service and concerning “family rights [and] the right of inheritance.”142 _{Radical Islam’s anti-}

imperialist proponents, such as the colony of the Wahhabi “Hindustan fanatics” near Chamarkand in the NWFP (North Western Frontier Province), continued to receive Bolshevik assistance.143

A practical example of a working arrangement between communist activists and the traditional life-world of Central Asia’s non-Russian inhabitants is provided by M. N. Roy himself. His Memoirs recount his participation in the Bolshevik conquest of Bokhara in September 1920. Roy had reasoned beforehand that without Bolshevik intervention “the Muslims [sic] masses would be the victims [of counter-revolution] […] The purpose of the revolution would be […] to protect the Islamic masses throughout Central Asia against the […] feudal ruling class.” In view of the repeated emphasis on the population’s dominant religion, it seems that even the Muslim-ness of the “Muslim masses” had to be protected from corrosive influence. Indeed, the prevailing outlook infused a considerable dose of

140 _{Quoted in Reports of the Director, Central Intelligence, 13 October 1919, Home/Poll/1919 Nr. 454-457}

September, 11–12. See also “Bolshevik Designs on Afghanistan and India,” 44–6, and Chattopadhyay,

Communism and Bengal’s Freedom, 30. For an exposition of Barakatullah’s views, see Moisej Persits, Revolutionaries of India in Soviet Russia: Mainsprings of the Communist Movement in the East (Moscow:

Progress Publishers 1983), 45–9.

141 _{Reports of the Director, Central Intelligence, 16 June 1919, Home/Poll/1919 Nr. 701-704 June, 21.} 142 _{“Treaty between Russia and Turkey,” in Milestones of Soviet Foreign, 56.}

143 _{David Petrie, Communism in India 1924–1927. Reprint, ed. Mahadevaprasad Saha (Calcutta: Editions}

Indian 1972), 178–9. See also the sustained Bolshevik efforts in Jeddah to rally Muslim pilgrims against imperialism: Ibid., 182–5; West Bengal State Archives, Kolkata, Information Bureau Files (hereafter WBIB) File 17/26 SL 114/1926, xv–xvi.

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religion into the Bokharan Revolutionary Committee’s deliberations: Communists “were advised not to do anything which might offend the religious sentiments of the masses.” In order to win over the Muslim clergy, Roy even studied the Koran to a point where he could “justify the Revolution on scriptural authority.”144

Indeed, given the general lack of education among the population, it was the mullahs who grew into crucial factors for the revolution’s implementation. Upon marching into Bokhara, the emir’s estate was nationalized and “administered by the Chief Imam as a trust.” To Roy, incorporation of religious elements did not in the least detract from Bolshevik determination “to protect and promote the interests of the downtrodden masses.”145 _{An anecdote confirmed this congruence: During a conference of people’s}

representatives, the call for prayer sounded; yet most delegates, overwhelmingly in favor of joining the prayer, were not sure whether this would conform with the new state’s character. Roy claims to have saved the day by proclaiming that revolution was not about having “quarrel with any religion,” and suggested that the meeting be suspended for prayer.146 _His

appreciation of Bolshevik policy towards religious communities belies pragmatist interpretations of his intervention:

The Russian Bolsheviks not only stood for the liberation of the colonial peoples […] they had actually set free millions of Muslims subjugated for centuries by Czarist absolutism. Now it was the turn of the liberated Muslims to extend a helping hand to their brethren across the frontier.147 Obviously, to Roy, as to Stalin before, ‘Muslim’ superseded nationality as the main feature of Central Asia’s non-Russian inhabitants, and was a quality that distinguished them from ‘colonial peoples.’ Under communist tutelage, it was not that the minds of Central Asian nationalities were to be ‘liberated’ from Islam, but that Muslims were to be ‘liberated’ from foreign influence. Having outgrown a primarily religious frame of reference, Islam had come to acquire a national and ethnic dimension imbued with a strong component of essentialized resistance. Hence, Roy deemed it perfectly natural for Soviet Muslims to set out, as Muslims, to help other Muslims “liberate” themselves, also as Muslims. This is the Eastern revolution in a nutshell, substituting ‘Muslims’ for ‘workers.’ Since Roy would be the pivotal figure in the CPI’s early years, it is difficult to see why fanatical religiosity should have been problematic for the first subcontinental communists, who are just about to enter the stage.

144 _{All quotes in Manabendra Nath Roy, Memoirs (Delhi: Ajanta Books 1984), 446–7.} 145 _{Ibid., 449.}

146 _{Ibid., 450.} 147 _{Ibid., 469.}

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Synopsis of Chapter I

The basic Marxist mode of analysis, distinguishing between essence and appearance, defined the terrain on which communist responses to religion and religiosity would grow. Marx himself thought it important not to neglect appearance. However, his famous aphorisms on religion characterized it as an ideological reflection of the misery caused by relations of production. Mainstream Marxism appropriated his heritage in a polarized and substantialized manner. Lenin conceived of social constellations fostering the development of religious ideology mainly as conscious and active meddling by the ruling classes. As a consequence, religiosity among the revolutionary subject seemed artificial, ephemeral, and therefore largely unproblematic.

Marx and Engels identified the proletariat as the class standing to gain most from radical social change. This was ontologized by later Marxists as an inherently progressive and revolutionary quality to which the proletariat and, later, the ‘masses’ had to be awoken. Both figured as population sections coerced into a society initiated, run, and directed by the ruling classes. Resisting it almost automatically became progressive.

Lenin expanded this set-up with a key element. He supplemented the international of workers with the international of “suppressed nations.” Although Lenin refused to acknowledge “national culture,” the conceptual neglect of appearance (that is, ideological phenomena outside economics) led to the incorporation of culture into the Bolsheviks’ agenda. The categorical distinction between “suppressing” and “suppressed” nations yielded an equally categorical distinction between the respective content of revolution. While “suppressing” nations in the West were deemed needful of cultural and social self-criticism, “independent and free development” (necessarily including culture and religion) assumed primacy in the case of “suppressed” nations in the East.

This fundamental division constituted the meaning of Stalin’s passing distinction between an Eastern revolution and a Western one. Indeed, it pointed to two diverging paradigms with far-reaching implications for the consideration of religion. In the West, it remained an insubstantial anomaly either ignored or fought. In the East, it could itself function as a vehicle of progress as part of a resistant “nationality.” The elevation of Muslims to a quasi-national collective of resistance in early Soviet policy would provide a momentous example for subcontinental communists.

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II Communist Roots: Spiritual Politics and the ‘Masses’