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Top communist leader hospitalized in Indian capital |
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July 29, 2000
NEW DELHI (AP) - Jyoti Basu, a veteran communist leader and the top elected official of West Bengal state, was Friday hospitalized after he complained of uneasiness at a party meeting in the Indian capital, his party officials said. "Basu was admitted with a history of giddiness and low heart beat. But his condition is quite stable," a senior doctor at the government-run All India Institute of Medical Sciences said on condition of anonymity. He was taken to the government-run Ram Manohar Lohia hospital from the Communist Party of India (Marxist) headquarters where he was attending the party central committee meeting. He was later shifted to the intensive care unit of AIIMS for specialized treatment. Basu, 85, has led the communists to victory in every state election in West Bengal state since 1977 and headed the governing party in the state since then. Citing falling health, Basu earlier this year said he wanted to step down as the state chief minister. But the party leadership persuaded him to continue for some more time and appointed a deputy to help him run the state administration. Basu's illness comes at a time when the CPI (M) is facing a tough political challenge from the Trinamool Congress, a breakaway group of the Congress party, led by Sonia Gandhi. The CPI (M) suffered a major defeat at the hands of the Trinamool Congress in the local elections held earlier this month in Calcutta, the capital of West Bengal state. The state assembly elections are scheduled to be held early next year. In 1996, the CPI (M) refused Basu to become the consensus prime minister of leftist and socialist groups because it felt that the federal coalition would be shaky and may not last long. Basu later described the decision as "a historic blunder." |