Veteran Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader and former West Bengal minister Nirupam Sen died after suffering a cardiac arrest in Kolkata on Monday, PTI reported. He was 72.
Sen was being treated for a prolonged illness at a city hospital and had been on life support since early December, the news agency quoted a family member as saying.
An unidentified party official said Sen will be cremated in his home town of Burdwan on Wednesday. The former West Bengal commerce and industry minister is survived by his wife, son and daughter.
Sen had been impaired by a cerebral attack in 2013, an unidentified hospital official told PTI. “Sen was fighting kidney ailments,” the official said.
The former minister was considered to be the chief architect of the industrial reform drive in the state during the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee administration, News18 reported. Sen also played an influential role in the industrial drives in Singur and Nandigram, which led to the eventual decline of the Communist government in West Bengal.
Party officials said the Communist leader’s body would first be taken to his residence and then to a private mortuary. “On Wednesday, Sen’s body will be taken to the Centre of Indian Trade Unions office,” the official said. “After that it will be taken to the party’s state head quarters where people will be allowed to pay their last respect.”
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee expressed her condolences with his family. “Saddened at the passing away of Nirupam Sen,” Banerjee tweeted.
Sitaram Yechury, CPI(M) general secretary, described him as a dedicated communist. “He devoted his entire life to the cause of the working class and the peasantry,” Yechury tweeted. “He served in various capacities including as a member, Polit Bureau and a senior minister in Left Front governments.”
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