LF partners happy

CALCUTTA, NOV 18: Left Front constituents expressed happiness on Thursday over the continuance of Jyoti Basu as West Bengal Chief Ministe...

CALCUTTA, NOV 18: Left Front constituents expressed happiness on Thursday over the continuance of Jyoti Basu as West Bengal Chief Minister following CPI(M) politbureau request, but said that the front should discuss the issue of creating a new post of deputy chief minister.

The State’s Opposition parties including Congress, Trinamool Congress and BJP, on the other hand, decried the politbureau decision and said to ask the octogenerian leader to continue as the CM exposed the `bankruptcy’ of the party.

Hailing the decision, Ashok Ghose, state secretary of Forward Bloc, a major partner of the front, said that his party was happy. But the issue of creating a new post of deputy CM should be discussed in the Left Front, he said.

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Echoing his view, Manju Kumar Majunder, secretary of the state council of CPI, another front constituent, said, “We wanted Basu to continue as CM. We are happy that Basu yielded to the politbureau request to continue in his post”.

Turning to the politbureau decision to create a post of deputy CM to lessen the burden of the senior leader, he said that since the post was not there, the issue should be discussed in the front.

Secretary of the state committee of Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) Debrbrata Bandopadhyay said that his party welcomed the decision to create a new post.