Turkestan Commission of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee

(also Turkkomissiia or the Commission for Turkestan Affairs), a commission established by a decree of Oct. 8,1919, of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People’s Commissars of the RSFSR. The original members of the commission were G. I. Bokii, F. I. Goloshchekin, V. V. Kuibyshev, la. E. Rudzutak, M. V. Frunze, and Sh. Z. Eliava; the membership later changed.

The Turkkomissia represented the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People’s Commissars of the RSFSR, and it acted on their behalf in the Turkestan ASSR. It possessed the authority of a body of both the state and the party. The commission was created in order to render aid to the Turkestan ASSR, which was cut off from the RSFSR for a prolonged period during the Civil War of 1918–20.

The members of the commission arrived in Tashkent on Nov. 4, 1919, with a letter from V. I. Lenin, “To the Communists of Turkestan.” The commission took steps to improve the administrative system in the republic and to isolate the nationalists. It also carried out measures to undermine the economic and political influence of those peasants who, after having settled in Turkestan, became kulaks and to free the peasants from the rich landowners. The Turkkomissia waged a resolute struggle against attempts of the bourgeois nationalists to effect Turkestan’s secession from the RSFSR. It also furthered the unification of the Communist organizations of Turkestan under the krai committee of the RCP(B). In March 1920 the Central Committee of the RCP(B) approved the Statute on the Autonomy of Turkestan. In May and June 1920, the Central Committee, with Lenin participating, discussed party and soviet activity in Turkestan and the work of the Turkestan Commission. On June 29, 1920, the Central Committee adopted the resolution On the Fundamental Tasks of the RCP(B) in Turkestan.

In the summer of 1920, the Central Committee established the Turkestan Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP(B); the bureau assumed the functions of the Turkestan Commission concerning party activities in Turkestan. After the creation of the Turkestan Bureau, the commission devoted itself to the solution of problems of economic and cultural development, such as carrying out land and water reform, increasing cotton production, and constructing railroad and irrigation facilities.

The Central Committee abolished the Turkestan Commission on Aug. 16, 1922. The work of the commission helped to strengthen party and soviet institutions in Turkestan and to carry out Lenin’s nationalities policy.