Almost everyone knows by now the offer made to Jyoti Basu in 1996 to take over the leadership of the United Front and become the Prime Minister of India. It is also equally well known how Basu’s party, the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), for reasons never made public, turned down this offer, thereby committing what Basu himself described as a “historic blunder”.

But few people know that such an offer was first made to Basu in 1990 by Rajiv Gandhi, then the leader of the Congress in Parliament. Rajiv conveyed the offer through me in September or October 1990, at a time when the V.P. Singh government was on the verge of collapse, with no clear alternative in sight.Rajiv Gandhi suggested that I float the idea to Jyoti Basu as a stray thought and seek his reaction. I agreed. Next day, Jyoti Basu came to Delhi. I received him at the airport and told him that I had something important to discuss with him and would like to accompany him in his car up to Banga Bhavan. During the journey, I asked him if he would like to lead a coalition of political parties at the Centre, with the Congress extending outside support. Basu’s instant reaction was, “Are you all mad! I have been in politics for 40 years now… principled politics. How can I involve myself in such a situation where people will say that I have sacrificed my principles for the sake of gaddi? Besides, Delhi does not suit me”. That was the end of Rajiv’s idea of experimenting with a rainbow coalition comprising the Left and the Congress.But throughout his life, Jyoti Basu remained an ardent supporter of coalition politics, knowing fully well that the Left would never get an absolute majority at the Centre. The greatest quality of this Marxist stalwart was his non-partisan approach to political matters and his deep attachment to constitutional politics. During his student days in London, he was much influenced by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s idea of unity of all Leftist forces. After his return to India in 1940, he jumped into grassroots politics of the Communist Party and led the life of a full-time trade union worker.In 1946, he was elected to the undivided Bengal Assembly and spent many years as the Leader of Opposition in West Bengal Assembly. In between, Bidhan Chandra Roy banned the Communist Party in West Bengal, and a phase of underground politics followed for Jyoti Basu.With the advantage of hindsight, we can safely say that Jyoti Basu learnt a lot from Roy’s brand of politics, which included a healthy respect for Opposition parties.As chief minister, Basu gave utmost importance to two things: land reforms, which meant shifting land ownership from the haves to have-nots, and making Panchayati Raj institutions an effective tool of administration. Ironically, Basu made full use of Rajiv Gandhi’s gesture of providing funds from the Centre directly to the panchayats and thus helped the CPI(M) to spread its hold among the rural masses, which were earlier a pocket borough of the Congress. The CPI(M) won all the elections between 1977 and 2006. Basu also attached great importance to the continuation of the Left Front in West Bengal and often brushed aside his own party’s extremists to keep other partners in the United Front pacified. This policy was not followed after his chief ministerial days in spite of his efforts and the CPI(M) learnt a bitter truth due to the simmering dissatisfaction among other Left Front partners.Though he never became a member of Parliament, Jyoti Basu nonetheless exercised great power at the national level. Successive Prime Ministers sought his sagacious advice. There existed a great deal of goodwill and friendship between Jyoti Basu and Indira Gandhi — something that confused both the Congress and the CPI(M).Initially there was a bit of unpleasantness in Basu’s relations with Rajiv Gandhi, but they started respecting each other after some time. That they developed a great deal of commonality was evident by Rajiv Gandhi’s idea to make Jyoti Basu the Prime Minister.Interestingly, the CPI(M) decided to withdraw support to the Morarji Desai government in July 1979 after Charan Singh and others took the lead, while Jyoti Basu was in London on a holiday. He would not have given a nod for the withdrawal of support to the Janata Party government, had he been present in India. Similarly, he also openly opposed the CPI(M)’s move to withdraw support from the United Progressive Alliance government in 2009 on the Indo-US nuclear deal. Jyoti Basu felt that the CPI(M) should oppose the move without withdrawing support. Basu’s thinking was proved right when the Left strength in Parliament was considerably reduced in the 2009 elections.Jyoti Basu never wanted to give the impression that he was power hungry. On the issue of Singur and Nandigram, he criticised his own party cadres and tried to bring about an amicable settlement between the Trinamul Congress and the Left Front government.Outside politics, Jyoti Basu was a quintessential picture of a pleasant and cheerful Bengali bhadralok, courteous to all and offensive to none. Also, he was very kind to officials and tried his best to solve their problems, including personal ones. When I fought the 1996 Lok Sabha elections as a Congress candidate, he visited Contai to campaign against me, but did not utter a single word against me. Critics of the Marxist stalwart averred that his industrial and education policies were wrong, that they turned West Bengal into an industrial desert and an educationally backward state. He was pilloried for the abolition of English education in the state, which adversely affected two generations of Bengalis. However, the blame for all this should be put on the all-powerful CPI(M) cadres and members of the trade union, who followed a destructive trade union policy in relation to industry and also dogmatic and doctrinaire party leaders who imposed their own imprint on education and saw to it that only the CPI(M) activists were recruited as teachers in schools and colleges. Left to himself, Jyoti Basu could have been the Deng Xiaoping of India, creating his own brand of market friendly Communism. Ironically, his party became his limitation.Nitish Sengupta, an academic and an author, is a former member of Parliament and a former secretary to the Government of India

Nitish Sengupta