a

In

WHERE LENIN STUDIED |

By BERT WHYTE

porte is certainly the word
ment azan. The town is first
1 peed in chronicles of the
og entury, but it was a home-
a tribes long before that,
a in the 6th
Es Y, then the Bulgars who
In the 10th Century and

Wed until th invasi
in the 13th, e€ Mongol invasion

Hote the tide of the Golden
Set 1 ebbed the Kazan Tatars
ed an independent Khanate.
the Conducted raids against
ehgier et All attempts to
the T Kazan failed until Ivan
€rrible raised a powerful
i 6 ed laid siege to the city
had st The previous year he
lich, t a fort upstream at Ug-
ae Peaubered each log, disman-
rafts “A fort and floated it as
a8 eewvastream to Kazan. It
Corded ~ sembled (the first re-
tion) ene’ of pre-fab construc-
Tic: pens the river from the
With R €adquarters and manned
battle Ussian troops. After fierce
% azan was taken.
group ce coming to Kazan our
Vatioug journalists had visited
Where 1 Places in Ulyanovsk
af €nin had lived. In Kazan
ae taken to the University
in 1887 hin began to study law
t » at the age of 17, only
helpin €xpelled in December for
meat He to organize a student
beating to protest the brutal
in Are and arrest of students
Scow,

Although Lenin passed his en-

trance exams brilliantly, the
University heads were reluctant
to accept him as a student be-
cause his older brother, Alexan-
der, had been hanged for his part
in an attempt to assassinate Czar
Alexander III. But a letter from
the director of his secondary
school tipped the scales in Le-
nin’s favor. The letter read:
“Greatly talented, always dili-
gent and conscientious Ulyanov
was the best pupil in all forms.
At the end of the course in the
secondary school Ulyanoy, as the
most deserving pupil due to his
success in studies, mental de-
velopment and behavior, was
awarded the Gold Medal. Neither
by deeds nor by words, inside
the school or outside it, has he
ever caused an unfavorable opin-
ion of himself on the part of the
authorities and the teachers.
“Ulyanov’s study and moral
development had been well tak-
en care of by his parents and
since his father died, by his
mother, who concentrated all her
care and concern on the educa-

.tion of her children.”

The letter was signed by
school director Yyodor Keren-
sky. This man was the father of
Alexander Kerensky, who head-
ed the short-lived Provisional
Government of Russia after the
February Revolution in 1917. At
one time the children of the Ke-
rensky and Ulyanov families
played together and were good
friends: later, in the fires of the
Revolution, they became irrecon-
cilable political enemies.

What about modern Kazan?

It is an industrial city with a
population topping the 800,000
mark. The town’s architects are
imaginative. At the same time
great care is taken to preserve
the city’s historic buildings, one
of the most interesting of which
is Peter and Paul Cathedral.

Tataria’s capital boasts many
industrial plants and machine-
building is an important indus-
try. Another plant, turns out the
best cinema film in the USSR.
And as the Tatar Republic is one
of the country’s richest oil and
gas areas, it is fitting that the
pipeline Druzhba (Friendship)
begins here, through which flows
oil to Poland, Czechoslovakia
and the German Democratic Re-
public.

Kazan stretches over 20 miles
in length from north to south
along the Volga, and the prob-
lem of urban transportation ‘is
handled by 195 trolleys and 349
trams, which carry 270 million
passengers annually.

Let us leave facts and figures
and turn to a human problen—
the relationship between Rus-
sians and Tatars. How are these
enemies of bygone times getting
along together today?

Tatars make up 47 percent of
the Republic’s population; Rus-
sians and others 43 percent. The
majority of the Council of Min-
isters are Tatars. Among repre-
sentatives to the Supreme Soviet
50 percent are Tatars.

The name Kazan means “pot”

Brezhnev, Hall talk

anti-imperialist unity

Leonid Brezhnev, general sec-
retary of the Communist Party
of the Soviet Union, recently
received Gus Hall, general sec-
tetary of the Communist Party,
USA.

Boris Ponmaryov, secretary of
the CPSU central committee,
also took part in the conversa-
tion.

Hall spoke about the activities
of the CPUSA, its growing influ-
ence in mass movements, and
the growing interest in the coun-
try, especially among young
people, in Marxist-Leninist ideas.

in Tatar—a cooking pot, that is.
Kazan’s mayor happens to be a
Ukrainian, but the deputy-mayor
is a Tatar and more than a third
of the executive council are
Tatars.

One daily newspaper and four
weeklies, plus nine magazines,
are published in the Tatar lan-
guage. There are 14 city schools
where all the teaching is done
in Tatar; in other schools both
Tatar and Russian are used.

It is obvious that the Soviet
policy guaranteeing the rights of
nations has basically solved all
national problems in the Tatar
Autonomous ‘Republic. The age-
old division between Russians
and Tatars, mutual distrust and
enmity have been eliminated.
The people of all nationalities in
Tataria are advancing together
toward their single goal: com-
munism.

i By GEORGE LAMBERT
Shien can boast of great
 -vements in all spheres of
eye than a sevenfold in-

er in industrial output com-
atic al 1938; a steady rise in
the Ultural production and in
0 Peers income gs a result

fe wale socialist farming.
Ove Reeve farms account for
State f Percent of arable land,
QUXilia arms—over 14 percent,
an Be eons — 2.5 percent,
3 Percent vate sector just under
Introduction of 10-year
Sory education, up to the
e 16, and the expansion of
the ane system at all levels;

be ural advance that would
th ‘ any Canadian visiting
ne Ountry. There are perma-
towns theatres even in small
flourie literature and art are
able Ing and there is consider-
ech Progress in science and

Nology,
teachegyeh a stage had been
that in the economic field

le
om ul
Be
th of

hangee wd for far-reaching
Bement. in planning and man-

F

ig oo engaty — a country that
Questig M natural resources the
iNcren N of steady progress, of
the “Sed labor productivity and
200, dp Oduction of high-quality
bec, Ordér to be competitive
&hey € a matter of utmost urg-
the Oreover, the demand of
Come Me market, which had be-
be aay buyers’ market, had to
‘he but Customers wanted noth-
Rod, the best and substandard
Or j, Were left on the shelves
Warehouses.

View of all this, radical

changes in the methods of plan-
ning and managing the national
economy are quite understand-
able, and so is Hungary’s ad-
vocacy of more comprehensive
co-operation by the socialist
countries within the Council for
Mutual Economic Assistance.
Hungary’s economic reform was
the result of many years of
study, discussion and prepara-
tion. In fact, as far back as 1957
the number of centrally-set ob-
ligatory targets was reduced and
profit-sharing by management
and workers was introduced for
factories that surpassed the pro-
fit index set by the central au-
thorities. Obligatory deliveries
by farmers were abolished at
that time — Hungary was the
first country in the socialist
camp to do so.

“The main idea of the reform,”
an economist told me, “is to
create an organic connection be-
tween central planning and the

market. Central planning re-
mains in the sense that targets
are set for the growth rate of
the national economy, for allo-
cation of all types of resources,
for the rate of growth of the

‘different branches, and targets

regarding living standards, hous-
ing, schooling, and other social
problems. But these goals are not
broken down for individual com-
panies. The achievement of the
objectives is brought about by
economic regulators in the form
of taxation, interest rates, Cus-
toms duties, price policy, for-
eign-exchange rate, preferential
treatment, and so on.

“Some of the results are good
and some not so. good,” the eco-
nomist continued, “but one year
is too short a period to judge.
People were afraid of unemploy-
ment and inflation, but this has
been avoided, and consequently
they began to have confidence
in the changes. It can be said

ea" §

that the reform has
to the people.”

Here are some other features
of the reform, which are indica-
tive of its scope. If a company
produces goods that are not ne-
cessary and it does not shift to
other lines of production, or if
its production can be handled
more efficiently by another com-
pany, or if it is operating at a
steady loss, it might be closed
down. Of course, the govern-
ment props up financially some
weaker or less profitable plants,
but only for a limited time. In
some instances the management
is changed.

Naturally, wherever necessary
the state and the trade unions
have the responsibility to retrain
the workers from closed plants
and to find employment for them.
It is obvious that in a socialist
country the employees’ income
must be protected while the
changes are taking place. Thus

been ‘sold’

He noted the interest display-
ed by the American public in the
results of the international con-
ference of Communist and
Workers’ parties held in Moscow.
last June.

Hall outlined the political situ-
ation in the U.S. including the
growing movement for peace and
for ending the war in Vietnam,
and the mounting struggle of the
working class and the Negro
population for vital rights and
against the offensive of reaction.

Brezhnev spoke of the succes-
ses of communist construction
in the Soviet Union, the activi-
ties of the CPSU, and the politi-
cal and labor enthusiasm with
which the Soviet people is pre-
paring to celebrate the centenary
of Lenin’s birth.

Brezhnev and Hall were in
complete accord that the disse-
mination of the ideas of the
international conference of com-
munist and workers’ parties, the
implementation of the decisions
adopted by it, especially on joint
actions in the struggle against
imperialism, as well as the strug-
gle for the purity of the great
Marxist - Leninist teaching and
exposure of both “left-wing” and
right-wing opportunism were
among the most important tasks
of the Communist movement in
the present conditions.

They confirmed their striving
to develop further the fraternal
relations between the CPSU and
the CPUSA on the basis of the
principles of Marxism-Leninism
and proletarian internationalism.

wages for manual workers are
guaranteed by the state to the
extent of 100 percent, salaries
for executives -75 percent and
for the middle group, (heads of
departments) 85 percent.

Mention should be made here
of the profit-sharing system un-
der the reform. From the net
profit a company sets up three
funds: a development fund, a
profit-sharing-fund and a reserve
fund. Profit-sharing takes place
at the end of the year, with top
executives getting an average of
75 percent of the fund and work-
ers, as a group, 15 percent. The
idea was obviously to encourage
management to act boldly, to
take risks, but I understand that
a good many workers are oppos-
ed to this great disproportion in
profit-sharing, and they have
said so openly. I should point
out here that the gap between
workers’ wages and executives’
salaries is not very wide.

The fact is that nothing is
finalized. Many adjustments have
already been made\and others
will undoubtedly still be made.
The important thing is that the
trend is a healthy one and, that,
in the long run, the reform will
lead to greater independence on
the part of the companies, and
induce them to display initiative
and take risks; it will promote
the spirit of enterprise, it will
imbue the workers with initia-
tive and bring about their active
participation in guiding and con-
trolling economic processes. The
managers and the workers will
take responsibility for the goods
produced by their companies and
hence for quality,. profitability,
their own welfare and the wel-
fare of the people of Hungary.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—SEPTEMBER 26, 1969—PAGE 7 °