Date:14/01/2009 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2009/01/14/stories/2009011456051000.htm

National

Somnath not to appeal to CPI(M)

Special Correspondent

KOLKATA: Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee has no intention to appeal to the leadership of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) asking to be taken back to the party.

But if ever a move is initiated to accept him back? “I don’t know … Then I’ll have many things to talk about as there have been many developments and I have my own views.”

Mr. Chatterjee was speaking to The Hindu over telephone on Tuesday from his constituency Bolpur in West Bengal’s Birbhum district following reports in a section of the media that certain leaders in the party wanted him back.

One of them, Subhas Chakraborty, a member of the CPI(M)’s State Secretariat, has written a letter to Biman Bose, Secretary of the party’s West Bengal State Committee, asking him to initiate steps for discussions on the return of Mr. Chatterjee to the CPI(M).

Mr. Bose described Mr. Chakraborty’s views as his (the latter’s) “own.” The issue has not been discussed in the party. “Mr Chatterjee is not a member of our party. He is only an MP,” he said in Howrah.

As regards the letter Mr. Chatterjee, who was expelled from the party on July 23, 2008 said he was not “consulted” and “did not know of it.” “Whatever I know is from newspapers.”

On whether he would accept a decision by the CPI(M) leadership to return to the party he said: “It is a hypothetical question.”

Mr. Chatterjee had been expelled from the CPI(M) for “seriously compromising the position of the party.” This was a day after the United Progressive Alliance government had won a trust vote in Parliament. “It [July 23] was one of the saddest day of my life,” Mr. Chatterjee said, recalling the remark that he had made sometime after his expulsion from the CPI(M).

“I never appealed against the decision of the party then; never criticised it, even then.”

As for his plans for the future, Mr. Chatterjee said: “I am not going to contest [elections] anymore. Physically I do not think I can carry on much further [in politics].”

“For a long time I have been wanting to retire and involve myself in social welfare work. That is my mission now,” he said.