Chennai: Giving a clarion call to all to continue the good work of late Communist leader Sitaram Yechury, who aspired to make India a secular, fraternal, socially just and egalitarian nation, Chief Minister M K Stalin he lived a Communist all through his life and as a role model to the youth.
Speaking at a condolence meeting attended by leaders of all the alliance parties of the DMK, including the Left, Yechury used his education and the politics that he learnt through it bring in social change and had carved niche for himself in the galaxy of leaders who had emerged in the last 100 years since the founding of the Communist Party of India.
Recollecting Yechury’s seminal role in the formation of the INDIA coalition that was formed to take on the BJP at the national level though he had some disagreements with some constituents, Stalin said he wanted all the parties to stand together with the single objective of defeating the BJP and was one of the key persons behind the coalition’s exemplary performance.
Yechury, as the general for former CPM general secretary Harkishen Singh Surjit was instrumental making the Left parties stand by the alliance governments led by H D Deve Gowda and I K Gujaral and was behind the Common Minimum Programme that the coalition governments came up with by interacting with all the alliance leaders.
Attributing the spread of Leftist principles in the famous Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) to Yechury, he said that it was the CPM leader who converted the university into a Communist bastion. It was only appropriate that his body was kept for public homage in the university, Stalin said.
Describing him as a writer, who contributed regularly for many publications, including Theekathir, he said he had written a slew of books critiquing the HIndutva government, besides working as editor of People’s Democracy.
Stalin recalled with gratitude the relationship Yechury had with M Karunanidhi and how he spoke glowingly of him. When Yechury, on his becoming the general secretary of the CPM in 2015, vowed to unite all Leftist and secular forces in a speech, it was praised by the then DMK president, Stalin said.
At a condolence meeting organized in memory of Karunanidhi, what Yechury spoke was unforgettable, Stalin said, adding that he attributed the spread of progressive ideas in the State to Karunanidhi and also lauded him for his struggles for social justice and women’s equality.
Stalin said that he had an excellent personal rapport with the Communist leader whose smile could win over recalcitrant leaders refusing to come around during talks on coalitions.
