The CPI(M) satraps who have landed in a soup after giving a miss to the first death anniversary of party leader Subhas Chakraborty following the whip from party general secretary Prakash Karat on Tuesday, have decided to mark the 122nd birth anniversary of party founder-member Muzaffar Ahmed on Thursday with all renewed zeal.
Chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and state party secretary Biman Bose who had been glaring by their absence on Tuesday will address the programme on Thursday.
Significantly, the party mandarins including all the secretariat members on Tuesday had stayed away from the programme on the enfant terrible of the party on the pretext that the party Red book does not allow to observe birth or death anniversary of any party leader except Muzaffar Ahmed.
Sources revealed that the Marxist party will not only use the occasion to galvanise the demoralised cadres after the back-to-back poll debacles but also try to mollify the Subhas camp (also Jyoti Basu followers) in the party who have become unhappy with the party leadership for paying “utter disregard” to him by boycotting the programme.
“Subhas, a leader of the masses, as he had been in his life time, does not deserve such a shoddy treatment from his peers of the party after his death,” a state committee member of the North 24 Parganas said. He added that this should not, however, be a deterrent to observe the birth anniversary of the pioneer of the Communist movement, particularly at this critical hour of the party.