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Failure of the brightest intellectuals of our time-BY H.L.D. MAHINDAPALA Source:Sundayobserver On June 7, 1964 Lanka Sama Samaja Party, the leading Trotskyite political party, was facing its biggest crisis since it was launched in December, 1935.  It was a time when it was at the peak of its power. The Fourth International Secretariat in Paris was boasting that the Ceylon Branch, as it was known then, was the ‘world’s largest Trotskyite party’. The head of the 4th International, Michel Pablo and his associates like Pierre Frank had thrown  their weight behind Dr. N. M. Perera, the President. They did not want to alienate the ‘world’s largest Trotskyite Party’. The New York Times ran a front-page story when Dr. N. M. Perera became the first Trotskyite to be elected as a mayor – the first significant political base won by any group of Trotskyites struggling in a world dominated by Stalin. The LSSP ...