Left patriarch Jyoti Basu announces political sanyas

RETIRED: Basu says he is stepping down as CPI-M politburo member on health ground.

Featured Blog

Rajdeep Sardesai

26/11: Terror comes precariously close

Featured Slideshows

New Delhi: The 94-year-old Left patriarch, Jyoti Basu, on Friday expressed his desire to step down as a member of the CPI-M politburo on health ground.

He has also decided not to attend the party Congress next month where the party is likely to form its new politburo and the central committee.

After a meeting of the party's state secretariat in Kolkata, the former West Bengal CM said he has already sent a written communication to party General Secretary Prakash Karat, stating that he wouldn't be available for the party congress.

"I don't wish to continue and I have verbally communicated this to the party leadership," Basu said on Kolkata on Friday. "I will also not attend the next month's party Congress."

The veteran Marxist leader, who is also India's longest-serving chief minister, has been wanting to bow out of active politics for quite some time now.

Basu, who is not keeping well and has stopped attending party meetings outside West Bengal for quite sometime now, had expressed his desire to retire last year.

But the party is not allowing him to take political 'sanyas', considering his invaluable contribution to the party's policy-making decisions, especially in times of crisis.

On Friday also, Basu criticised the UPA government for not fulfilling the Common Minimum Programme and said that the coming Union Budget should be formulated keeping in mind the interests of the farmers, workers and common people.

He expressed confidence that the CPI(M)-led Left Front would win the Assembly polls in Tripura, which is slated for Saturday.