Jyoti Basu was a perfect communist: Karat

KOLKATA - Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) general secretary Prakash Karat Monday said Marxist patriarch Jyoti Basu was a perfect communist and was unique in many ways.

Jyoti Basu for us was a perfect communist in the true sense. He always aimed to perfect himself as a true communist. But for us what he did in his political life, party life showed us the ideal way to become a good communist, Karat said in an interview to a private Bengali news channel.

The party followers marked Basu’s first death anniversary Monday in a big way in West Bengal while CPI-M launched a statewide fund collection drive for a proposed research centre named after him.

Karat said: Basu was always a communist party member in its true sense. He always abided by the party decision, the collective decision of the party.”

We have learnt lot of things from Basu. If you have faith in your political ideology and in people, you will overcome all odds, said Karat when asked about the most important things the party members learnt from Basu.

Born July 8, 1914 in Kolkata to a wealthy family, Basu took to Communism in London. On his return to India, he joined the undivided Communist Party of India (CPI) and plunged into the Left movement.

Basu made his debut in electoral politics in 1946. He was elected to the state assembly 11 times, losing only once in the hugely controversial 1972 elections.

After the CPI split in 1964, he joined the CPI-M and was elected to its central committee and politburo.