A song often sung by communists who fought the government during the 1970s said young bamboo supported the revolution. Bamboo shoots were the fighters' main food during the long revolutionary war as there was nothing else to eat in the jungle.

Nearly three decades later, a group of former insurgents have spent more than Bt300,000 to build a unique temple in Nakhon Thai district of Phitsanulok province with a crematorium in the shape of a bamboo shoot.

This memorial to their struggle is located near the former Communist Party of Thailand (CPT) stronghold Phu Hin Long Kla. This time, the bamboo shoot does not represent food but symbolises the growth of people from many roots.

"Like bamboo, we emerge from different roots and grow in the same place in unity," said Phra Sutta Techataro, abbot of the temple and a former communist fighter.

The CPT's members came from many backgrounds and included radical students, peasants and ethnic minorities who joined the revolutionary party with the common goal of liberating Thailand, he said.

The temple - Wat Sam Saeng Tham (Three Dhamma Lights) - does not look like the usual Buddhist temple. Besides the bamboo-shoot tower, it has a bell tower shaped like a lotus bud and a toilet block built in the shape of a bird. The only thing to indicate it is a Buddhist temple is the Buddha image in a wooden pavilion where the sole monk lives.

The temple's name comes not from the Buddhist concept of dhamma but from its location at the junction of three former strongholds of the now defunct CPT - Phetchabun, Phitsanulok and Loei.

The temple is in Ban Huay Tin Tang, Phra Sutta's home village, and just 15 kilometres from Phu Hin Long Kla, which was his base during the armed struggle.

Phra Sutta - known then as Comrade Chart - spent 11 years in the jungle fighting government forces between 1971 and 1982.

Security authorities regard the temple and its abbot with suspicious eyes, wondering whether the communist insurgents are still active or have changed to a new form of fighting. In fact Army chief Sonthi Boonyaratglin recently suggested that communist insurgents might be still active. Many of them from former strongholds in the North and Northeast may have regrouped to orchestrate violence in the South, he said.

Phra Sutta said he was tired of the questions about the temple's activities posed by security officials in the area. "The conflict has been over for more than two decades but officials remain suspicious of former communist fighters," he said.

The abbot said he got the idea of building the temple in 1990 after brainstorming with other former communist comrades. The idea was to have a place for former fighters to gather to recall their struggle and make merit for those who passed away during the struggle.

"I needed to take the robes to take care of this place myself. Ordinary monks could not serve here as they don't know communist legend and history or the spirit of this place," he said.

Former communist fighters have gathered at the temple every October since it was set up in 2001. The cremation tower was used for the first time that year to cremate "name plates" of former comrades who died during the revolutionary war.

Among the more well-known former fighters to have attended are members of caretaker Prime Minister Thaksin Sinawatra's Cabinet such as Education Minister Chaturon Chaisang, Public Health Minister Pinij Charusombat and former deputy agriculture minister Prapat Panyachatrak, the abbot said.

In between waiting to see former comrades at the annual reunion, Phra Sutta began to work to uplift the lives of people in the community whose family members also joined the CPT in the 70s and 80s.

The monk said he did not know much about communist ideology when he joined the movement but was merely running away from a manhunt by local authorities who accused him of supporting the communist insurgents.

"In the beginning I did not realise that the Hmong whom I traded with were communist insurgents, but joined them because they sheltered me from the authorities," he said, adding that many families in his village had fled to the jungle for the same reason.

But the communists later taught him several things about social justice and how to uplift the lives of the people, and this spirit remained with him when he returned home after an amnesty was granted during Prem Tinasulanonda's administration in 1982.

"Armed struggle to liberate people from the suffering of oppression would not work now, but there remain several methods to reach the goal," he said.

"Buddhism? Yes," the monk said, adding that many leftists had laughed at him when he threw away Marxism-Leninism and took religion, which Karl Marx considered an "opiate" to ease the pain of class suppression.

"For me, Buddhism and communism share the same goal of liberating people from suffering, so I see no contradiction in taking robes after leaving the armed revolution," he said.

He said many comrades joined the Buddhist orders and many had been quickly promoted to senior levels.

"I mix Marxism, communism and Buddhism to teach people in the village to manage their lives to get out of the vicious circle of capitalist exploitation," he said.

Following the rules of capitalism to become rich and accumulate material wealth will lead to a debt burden, so the best way to get rid of suffering is a proletariat economy, he said.

"In simple words, self-sufficient economy or His Majesty the King's theory - call it whatever you like, but it can keep you free from capitalist dependency," he said.

Phra Sutta used a lot of leftist terminology to explain the stage of the economy in the community.

 The monk criticised Thaksin for making people too reliant on capitalism as a means of production. Introducing the

village fund was the beginning of a vicious circle that would drag villagers into endless troubles, he said.

"It begins when one borrows money from the fund, loses it in farm investment and borrows from other sources to repay the fund. There's no way out but to be laden with debt."

Asked if his former comrades should share some of the blame for helping Thaksin to create his problem for villagers, the monk declined to reply, saying that everyone had their own methods.

"I believe they are still fighting for democracy and social justice. I don't know much about what they do for Thaksin, I can only say that what Thaksin has done cannot be called democracy because it's fake," he said.

Supalak Ganjanakhundee

The Nation

PHITSANULOK