WEST BENGAL: A NEW LEFT
The ageing CPI(M) is looking to reinvigorate itself
It was long overdue. Finally, the Communist Party of India (CPI-M) in Bengal is making space for younger leaders. “With 60 per cent of India’s population in the 18-40 age group, it would be unwise to leave Gen X behind in policy- and decision-making,” says Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) leader Sayandeep Mitra.
The party has been mulling over changes in the composition of its various committees since 2015. At its organisational plenum in Kolkata that year, it was decided that comrades above 60 would not be inducted into the state committee. The attempt was to bring down the average age of state committee and state secretariat members to 50. Simultaneously, there was an effort to restructure the social composition of the committees, with more representation for women and members of tribal and minority communities.
However, it took the party another few years to put their plans into action. Perhaps it had something to do with Left Front chairman Biman Bose, who is 79 but extremely active for his age. Now, an exception has been made for him, and the party is going ahead with the rest of its plans to recruit young leaders. This year, eight Students Federation of India (SFI) and DYFI leaders, all under 30, have been brought into the state committee. The state secretariat, on the other hand, has dropped four septuagenarian and sexagenarian leaders—Goutam Deb, Nripen Chowdhury, Dipak Dasgupta and Manab Mukherjee— and inducted leaders in their late 40s to early 50s, among them Samik Lahiri, Palash Das and Kallol Mazumdar.
The old guard, however, will be retained to lend their experience and expertise to the young leaders. “We are telling our veteran members to remain with us as our supporters and think-tank, even though they might not be politically agile any more,” a state committee member said.
SFI state president Pratikur Rahman, a 28-year-old law student, is among those inducted into the state committee. “The Communist party always believes in regenerating itself,” he says. “There will now be an interesting integration of experience and enthusiasm. We will be able to highlight issues pertinent to the young generation—lack of jobs, escalating costs and privatisation of education.” Another new entrant to the state committee, SFI secretary Srijan Bhattacharya, 26, is yet to get over the success of the Nabanna Abhijan (march to the state headquarters) on September 12-13 to demand jobs for unemployed youth, and wants to launch more campaigns in the future. “The content of the Communist party is ageless and timeless. It just has to be presented in a form acceptable to the new generation,” he says.