CPI(M) in dilemma over Basu, Surjeet

The party is mulling whether to drop the ailing nonagenarians from the politburo

NEW DELHI: With less than two months for the crucial 19th party Congress, the CPI(M) is on a dilemma - whether to retire or retain Jyoti Basu and Harkishan Singh Surjeet - stalwarts in the party’s highest decision-making body, the politburo (PB). They are also the two surviving members of the original PB that was formed in 1964 after the split in the Communist Party of India (CPI).

For the first time in the history of the party, the nonagenarian duo not be able to attend the five-day 19th party Congress being held in Coimbatore between March 29 and April 2, due to poor health.

The party is also struggling to fill three already existing vacancies in the 17-member PB due to the death of former Kerala chief minister EK Nayanar, CITU general secretary Chittabrata Majumdar and West Bengal secretary Anil Biswas. If Basu and Surjeet insisted on retiring, the party has to find five new PB members.

There is also a thinking in the party to induct new PB members from states other than party bastions in Kerala, West Bengal and Tripura as part of a strategy to expand base outside these three states. While party does not have weighty names from the Hindi belt who can fit in the slot, indications are that someone from Andhra Pradesh, where the CPI(M) is tryng to expand base, may find a place in the PB.

For more than a year now, the Basu and Surjeet have not been able to attend the PB meetings due to poor health and both, the 93-year-old Basu and 92-year Surjeet, have requested the party apparatchik to relieve them of their responsibilities as PB members.

A section in the party feels that since both are at an advancing age and ill, they should be dropped and new members be inducted, while some others want both the veterans retained in the PB as a symbolic gesture of their eminence and service to the party. Basu had last year made public his intention to retire from active politics.
 
The last party congress had elected a 17 member PB and an 85-member central committee. With the CPI(M) striving to expand its base outside its bastions, efforts are on to increase the strength of central committee and induct at least three more members into the PB.

Indications are while the existing two vacancies caused by the death of comrades from West Bengal may be filled up, the one from Kerala may have to wait because of the intense factional feud between the supporters of chief minister VS Achuthanandan and state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan.

Among the probable names from Kerala are state education minister MA Baby, one of the senior-most after VS and Vijayan, home minister Kodiyeri Balakrishanan and local administration minister Paloli Mohammed Kutty. But all the three are camp followers of Vijayan and any one of their appointment may upset the delicate balance of power in the state party set up.

Three senior leaders from West Bengal in the race for the two vacant slots are CITU general secretary Mohammad Amin, peasant leader, central committee member Binoy Konar and state industry minister Nirupam Sen.

Sources said Amin has the best chances of making it because of two reasons - CITU general secretary is a must in the PB as he represents the worker’s front and in Amin case, the party would be too glad to induct a Muslim face in time of “minority empowerment” or “Muslim appeasement” as the right wingers say.

Sources said both Nirupam Sen and Konar are lobbying hard for a slot in the PB. While chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee is pushing for his cabinet colleague Sen, Basu may back Konar, who is brother of veteran Marxist leader Hare Krishna Konar.

k_benedict@dnaindia.net