The 24th Congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) pays homage to the memory of:
Sitaram Yechury
The 24th Congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) pays respectful homage to the memory of Sitaram Yechury, General Secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), who was an outstanding leader of the Communist movement. He died on September 12, 2024 at the age of 72.
In his five decades of political life, he made his mark first as a leader of the student movement. As President of the Jawaharlal Nehru University Students Union and later the Students’ Federation of India, he made a big contribution to developing the progressive student movement.
Sitaram Yechury joined the Party in 1975 and he was elected to the Central Committee in 1985, to the Central Secretariat in 1989 and to the Polit Bureau in 1992. He was elected as the General Secretary of the Party at the 21st Congress in 2015.
As part of the leadership at the Party Centre for over thirty years, Sitaram, with his deep grasp of Marxism, played a key role in formulating the Party’s ideological political positions particularly after the fall of the Soviet Union. He also made a penetrating critique of the Hindutva ideology as espoused by the RSS chief, Golwalkar.
Sitaram Yechury played an important role in formulating the political positions of the Party from time to time. In the recent period, he played an active role in forging the broad unity of secular opposition parties, which led to the formation of the INDIA bloc. He was a member of the Rajya Sabha for two terms – from 2005 to 2017.
Sitaram Yechury was a prolific writer. He was the Editor of the Party’s paper, People’s Democracy, for over two decades. He was also the Editor of the Party’s theoretical journal, the Marxist.
In his untimely demise, the Communist and the Left movement of the country suffered a grievous loss. The Party Congress pledges to steadfastly follow the example he set for all of us.
Kodiyeri Balakrishnan
The 24th Congress pays homage to the memory of Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, prominent leader of the Communist Party and the Left movement. He was a member of the Polit Bureau and Secretary of the Kerala State Committee of the Party. He died on October 1, 2022. He was 68 years old.
Balakrishnan was one of the builders of the Students Federation of India in Kerala and served as its state secretary from 1973 to 1979. Later he was active in the youth organisation and also served as the state secretary of the Kerala Karshaka Sangham.
He was jailed during the Emergency for 18 months under the MISA.
Balakrishnan made his mark as an able Party organiser. He served as a secretary of the Kannur district committee of the Party, as a member of the state committee and the secretariat. He was elected to the Central Committee of the Party in 2002 and to the Polit Bureau in 2008. As the secretary of the state committee, he made a big contribution to the development of the Party.
Kodiyeri was also a brilliant legislator and was elected to the Legislative Assembly five times from the Thalassery assembly constituency. He was the Minister for Home and Tourism in the LDF government from 2006 to 2011.
The Party Congress pays tribute to his dedicated service.
Buddhadeb Bhattacharya
The 24th Congress of the Party pays homage to the memory of Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, an outstanding leader of the Party who was a member of its Polit Bureau and served as Chief Minister of West Bengal. He died on August 8, 2024. He was 80 years old.
Buddhadeb Bhattacharya joined the Party in 1966 while he was a student. He became the state secretary of West Bengal Democratic Youth Federation in 1968. He was elected to the West Bengal state committee of the Party in 1971 and became a state secretariat member in 1982. Buddhadeb became a member of the Central Committee of the Party at the 12th Congress of the Party in 1985. He was elected to the Polit Bureau in 2000 of which he remained a member till 2015.
Buddhadeb distinguished himself first as a minister and later on when he succeeded Jyoti Basu as the Chief Minister in November 2000. He played a key role in formulating the approach and policies of the Left Front government.
He made a significant contribution to the development of cultural institutions and sustaining progressive cultural values. He was a poet, playwright and writer.
N Sankaraiah
The 24th Congress of the Party pays tribute to the memory of N Sankariah, veteran leader of the Party and a dedicated Marxist. He died on November 15, 2023 at the age of 102.
Sankariah, joined the freedom struggle when he was a student. Joining the Communist Party in 1940, he was one of the 32 National Council members who walked out to form the Communist Party of India (Marxist) subsequently. He made a major contribution to building the Communist movement in Tamilnadu. He served as the secretary of the state committee from 1995 to 2002. He was elected thrice to the Tamilnadu state assembly in 1967, 1977 and 1980.
He was also involved in the development of the kisan movement and became the general secretary and president of the All India Kisan Sabha. He altogether spent eight years in jail till the eve of independence.
Central Committee Member
KM Tiwari
A trade union leader, he played an important role in building the trade union movement in Ghaziabad. Tiwari went on to become the Delhi state secretary of CITU. Tiwari was elected to its Delhi State Committee in 1988, to its Secretariat in 1991 and to the Central Committee in 2018.
Former Central Committee Members
Basudeb Acharia
He was an important trade union leader mainly of the railway and coal workers. An outstanding parliamentarian, who always took up people’s issues, he was elected to the Lok Sabha for nine times from 1980 to 2009 and served as leader of the Party group. He was a member of the Central Committee of the Party from 2005 to 2018 and Chairperson of the Central Control Commission.
M M Lawrence
Lawrence served the Party with distinction in several positions. He was the Secretary of the Ernakulam district committee, member of the State Committee and State Secretariat in Kerala for a long time. He was a well-known trade union leader. He also served as LDF Convenor.
Sivaji Patnaik
Sivaji Patnaik played a crucial role in the formation of the CPI(M) in Odisha when the split in the united Party took place. He was elected to the Central Committee in 1978 and continued till 1989. He worked both in the kisan movement and also the trade union movement in the state. Elected on three different occasions to the Lok Sabha from the Bhubaneswar seat he was widely respected for his honesty and integrity.
Kanai Banerjee
As a railway employee he made a big contribution to the development of the trade union movement in the railways. He was elected as an office bearer of the CITU in 1989. He was a member of the Central Committee of the Party till 2008.
Kumar Shiralkar
Shiralkar began his political life by founding the Shramik Sanghatana. He joined the Party in 1982 and put all his efforts in building the AIAWU in Maharashtra. He was elected to the State Committee of the Party in 1985 and to the Central Committee in 2005.
Madan Ghosh
During the decades of 1960s and 70s, when semi-fascist forces were ruling the state, he actively mobilised the people behind the Party, even while remaining underground for two and half years. He was elected to the West Bengal State Committee of the Party in 1992 and to the Central Committee of the Party in 2008. He served as State President of PBKS and as Vice-President of AIKS.
Mridul De
In the 1960s and early 1970s he fought bravely against police atrocities. He was jailed twice and was also externed from Darjeeling district for some time. He was elected to the West Bengal State Committee of the Party in 1985 and to the Central Committee in 2008.
Suneet Chopra
Active in the student movement and later the youth, he played an important role in organising agricultural workers in the north-western part of India. He was the Joint Secretary of the All India Agricultural Workers Union for a long time. He was elected to the Central Committee of the CPI(M) in 1995.
Members & Former Members of State Committees
The 24th Congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) pays homage to the memory of the following members and former members of the state committees of the Party:
Andaman & Nicobar Islands: Bipad Banjan Biswas, Sheik Khalil, Sobha Mazumdar
Andhra Pradesh: R Satyanarayana Raju (RS)
Assam: Rabin Das, Rajani Daimary, Madan Mohan Choudhury, Loknath Adhikari, Sudhendu Banerjee, Tripath Nath Chakraborty, Debananda Das, Ananta Kalita, Pran Krishna Das, Jatin Barman and Nurul Amin
Bihar: Sarangdhar Paswan, Hriday Narayan Yadav, Umakant Shukla, Bhogendra Yadav, Suneet Chakraborty, Dinesh Kumar, Rajendra Mandal, Ras Bihari Sinh and Ram Lakhan Singh
Delhi: Mahesh Kumar
Goa: FX Rodrigues
Gujarat: Bhartiben Parmar and Babubhai Sheth
Haryana: Pradeep Singh and Avtar Singh
Himachal Pradesh: AC Chauhan and N D Ranaut
Jharkhand: Jyotin Soren and GK Shukla
Karnataka: VP Kulkarni, Bheemsi Kaladgi, Mallayya Jalahalli and G C Byya Reddy
Kerala: T. Sivadasa Menon, Anathalavattam Anandan, M Chandran, AV Russel, K.V Ramakrishan, Sarojini Balanandan, AK Narayanan and K Kunhiraman
Madhya Pradesh: Dinesh Singh and Ramesh Sharma
Maharashtra: Pandit Munde, Shankarrao Danav, Jaisingh Mali, Kumar Shiralkar, Barkya Mangat and Ashok Banerjee
Manipur: Laishram Kulluchand Singha and Thounaojam Maloti Leima
Odisha: Jaganath Mishra, Lambodar Nayak, Banamali Dhupal, Purnna Chandra Samantaray, Jagannath Pati, Rebati Ballav Mohapatra, Kalu Panda and Bansidhar Das
Puducherry: Dhatchayani
Punjab: Gurdev Singh Bandi, Lal Singh Dhanula
Tamilnadu: MNS Venkatraman, S Ramani
Telangana: P Anantha Rama Sarma, Kasani Ailaiah
Tripura: Manik Biswas, Samsul Haque, Keshab Majumder, Samar Adhya, Manik Dasgupta, Bidhu Bhushan Malakar and Samir Chakraborty
Uttarakhand: Bachhi Ram Kanswal, Ramesh Dhiman and Dinesh Pande
Uttar Pradesh: Sreedhar Sharma, KN Bhatt, Gulab Singh, Deen Nath Singh, Ateek Ahmed, Ramachal Yadav and Ambika Prasad Mishra
West Bengal: Manab Mukherjee, Narayan Biswas, Swadesh Chakraborty, Dilip Ganguly and Muzaffar Hossain
Party Centre: Virender Singh & Rajiv Jha.
The 24th Congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) pays respectful tributes to the memory of these comrades who have departed since the 23rd Congress of the Party.
National
The 24th Congress pays homage to:
Atul Kumar Anjan: Secretary of the Communist Party of India.
Dr Manmohan Singh: Former Prime Minister of India.
Mulayam Singh Yadav, veteran leader of the Samajwadi Party and three-time Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh and former Union Minister.
Prof. Abhijit Sen: renowned economist, expert on agriculture, rural economy and planning.
Amiya Kumar Bagchi: Outstanding Economist.
MS Swaminathan: Renowned scientist and pioneer of the Green Revolution in India.
Mukchund Dubey: Former foreign Secretary of the Government of India.
Shekar Joshi, progressive Hindi writer and former Vice-President of the Janawadi Lekhak Sangh.
Vivan Sundaram: One of India’s foremost creative artists
Ku Si Pa: Noted literary figure and one of the founders of the Progressive Writers Association in Tamil Nadu.
Shyam Benegal: Renowned film maker.
Zakir Hussain: Musician and tabala maestro.
Dr GN Saibaba: Delhi University professor and activist.
International
The 24th Congress pays tributes to the memory of:
Jiang Zemin: Former General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and former President of the People’s Republic of China.
Nguyen Phu Trong: General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam.
Jose Ramon Balaguer Cabrera: Former member of the Polit Bureau and Head of the International Department of the Communist Party of Cuba.
Haider Akbar Khan Rano: a prominent freedom fighter and leader of the Communist Party of Bangladesh.
Shahidullah Chowdhury: Former President of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Bangladesh.
Martyrs
The 24th Congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) dips its Red Banner in salute to the martyrs who valiantly fought and made the ultimate sacrifice in the cause of the party, the people and the democratic movement in the country, in the period since the Twenty Third Congress.
The 24th Congress salutes:
Subhash Munda who was killed by the mafia in Jharkhand.
S Shajahan and Jithin Shari who were killed by RSS goons; Poovanazhi Shammer, Ambady and PV Sathianathan who were killed by the drug mafia and Pushpan survivor of a brutal police attack in the year 1994, in Kerala.
Shahid Miah, Dilip Shukladas and Badal Shil who were killed in attacks by the BJP in Tripura.
Atanu Ghati, Ram Kora, Laxmiram Tudu, Sanjib Kr Mandal, Mansur Alam, Rajibul Haque, Rosan Ali, Pulak Sarkar, Sukur Ali Sekh, Rintu Sekh and Anarul Isalam who were killed in attacks by TMC goons in West Bengal.
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) will always cherish the memory of these martyrs. It pledges to continue the fight to fulfill their unfinished tasks.
