Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee was West Bengal’s Renaissance man: Prakash Karat

Karat says Bhattacharjee was dedicated to what he had to do and the responsibilities assigned to him. But the same time, he had a certain detachment to see the larger picture. Former Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Prakash Karat was one of many political leaders who were close to late West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee. Here’s what the Left leader had to say about the ex-CM. Just before the Emergency, in 1974, I had gone to Kolkata because our Student Federation of India’s head office was there at that time. In the Youth Federation Office, I found a young man in his kurta-pajama sitting at a desk and writing away furiously. Years later, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee epitomised an era of communist politics in West Bengal, which has now ended with this passing away. Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee was as a person and a leader someone who touched various aspects of life and society in West Bengal. He was no ordinary communist cadre. He was also a person with literary accomplishments. And he had made a distinctive contribution to the development of cultural institutions and cultural life in West Bengal as well. Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee the administrator the chief minister and long time minister of the left Front government-- that is of course the most well known and most public aspect of his political life. But for us, we were more or less on the same generation. We both came into the Central Committee of the party in 1985 so we saw him as the party cadre, a party organizer and a party leader who started this work in the student movement and then the youth movement and then he came into the leadership of the party in West Bengal as a state committee and state secretariat member. So what was so distinctive about him was his capacity to be totally devoted to his work. He was dedicated to what he has to do and the responsibilities assigned to him. But the same time, he had a certain detachment to see the larger picture. And as you know, he developed not just as a party functionary, but had active interest and passion for literature. He carried this tradition in West Bengal of being a Renaissance man. Personality, he represented everything that was progressive, democratic, secular in West Bengal and its cultural traditions. Within that framework, he was also a loyal party worker and a leader. He also tried to implement the party’s understanding of how the Left front government should function with all the limitations of a state government.