Communist stalwart Surjeet dies after protracted illness

New Delhi: Veteran communist leader Harkishen Singh Surjeet past away on Friday following respiratory cardiac arrest, six days after he was admitted to the Metro Hospital in neighbouring Noida, doctors said.

"His condition had been very critical for the last four days," said a senior doctor at the hospital.

"He remained in the intensive care unit on life support systems. His condition continued to deteriorate and he passed away a little after 1.30 pm," he added.

Surjeet was admitted to the hospital on July 26 for the second time in the last three months.

Funeral on Sunday

The 93-year-old leader, a former Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) general secretary, had not been keeping good health for over an year and had been almost confined to his Teen Murti Lane residence in New Delhi.

He will be laid to rest tomorrow in the national capital, CPI-M sources in the capital said.

The body will be kept at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences morgue and will be brought to his official Teen Murti Lane residence Sunday morning to enable his comrades to pay him their last respects.

The body will then be taken to the CPI-M headquarters so members of the public can offer their tributes.

President Pratibha Patil and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh mourned Surjeet's demise.

While the president's office sent a condolence message, the prime minister described the late leader as a "great patriot".

Manmohan Singh, who reached Colombo yesterday to attend the SAARC summit, said the Marxist veteran was a "friend, guide and supporter".

Remembering Surjeet's role in bringing various political parties together to form a coalition, the PM described him as the architect of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA).

Communist Party of India (CPI) leader D. Raja said Surjeet's death was a "big loss".

Inspiring presence

Describing Surjeet as a "great inspiration", CPI-M leader Nilotpal Basu said: "He played a pivotal role in bringing together different political parties and changing the political scenario."

Mohammad Salim, a CPI-M lawmaker from West Bengal, said: "He developed a young band of communist leaders, who are politically aware, unlike others who promote their daughters, sons and in-laws. He was a very hard-working person and did not waste any time. He built the party and the movement and fought against divisive communal forces."

New Delhi (IANS) A hardcore nationalist, Harkishen Singh Surjeet took to politics at a young age as a follower of iconic freedom fighter Bhagat Singh.

For one who joined Bhagat Singh's Naujawan Bharat Sabha in 1930 when he was barely 15, Surjeet embraced Communism as a 20-year-old, joining the Communist Party of India (CPI). Decades later, he was one of the nine who founded the breakaway Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M).

By the time he came to head the CPI-M as its general secretary in 1992, an influential post he held until 2005 when failing health forced him into virtual retirement, Surjeet had come to know intimately virtually the entire brass of Indian politics.

Defiance after arrest

His congenial attitude - and his ability to share a joke, a rarity among his comrades - helped him in no small measure to make friends with the leading lights of the political establishment. So, when India entered the coalition era, Surjeet became the natural kingmaker.

Born March 23, 1916 to a Bassi Jat Sikh family in Badala in Punjab's Jalandhar district, Surjeet idolised Bhagat Singh at a young age. As a teenager, he hoisted the Indian tricolour on a court in Hoshiarpur, an action that led the police to open fire. He survived.

Arrested for his act of defiance, Surjeet declared his name as "London Tod Singh", or one who breaks London.

The nationalist joined the CPI in 1936 when it was India's second most powerful party after only the Congress.

Surjeet, who always sported a white turban, was passionately opposed to the Sikh separatist campaign that bled Punjab for a decade until 1993.