Kolkata: Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) general secretary and former West Bengal minister Kshiti Goswami died at a private hospital in Chennai due to old age-related illness Sunday morning, family sources said. He was 77 and is survived by his wife and daughter.
Apart from age-related illness, Goswami was also suffering from a lung infection for which he was admitted to the Chennai hospital last week where he breathed his last, the family sources said.
The leader of the RSP, a constituent of the Left Front, served as the state PWD minister for more than two decades – since the late eighties till 2011, when the regime was voted out of power.
Goswami was also the West Bengal secretary of the RSP for a few years since 2012 and was elected the party’s general secretary last year during its national conference.
Although an important member of the Left Front, Goswami never shied away from criticising the erstwhile dispensation in West Bengal over some of its policies – be it forcible land acquisition in Singur for a car manufacturing plant or the attempt to set up a chemical hub in Nandigram despite stiff resistance from farmers.
Known as a jovial and media-friendly politician, Goswami was of the opinion that the Left in Bengal needed to reinvent itself to remain relevant in state politics. The veteran leader had opposed Left Front-Congress alliance in 2016 Assembly polls and had said it would be ‘disastrous’ for the Front and its constituents.
Goswami’s body will be brought to Kolkata in the evening and last rites will be performed Monday.
Leaders cutting across party lines condoled Goswami’s death.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said his death was a huge loss to Indian politics. “I am deeply shocked and grieved by the sudden demise of Kshiti Goswami. He passed away this morning in Chennai… This is an immense loss to Indian politics,” Banerjee said in a statement released from the Chief Minister’s Office.
West Bengal Left Front chairman and CPI(M) politburo member Biman Bose also expressed his condolences.
PTI