When I met young Sitaram Yechury with 80-year-old EMS Namdooripad in Moscow

By Rajiv Shah
The year was, if I remember correctly, 1990. At that time I was special correspondent of semi-left Patriot daily and Link newsweekly in Moscow. Mikhail Gorbachev's parestroika and glasnost were on an upswing, though keen observers seemed to notice cracks beginning to appear in the powerdom under him.
Apparently to assess what was happening, the then Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary EMS Nambudaripad had come down to Moscow along with young Sitaram Yechury -- the party general secretary who passed away on September 12, 2024 at the age of 72. Young Yechury looked like the photo above.
I had never met either of them when in Delhi, but had heard about Yechury, who was a Jawaharlal Nehru student activist-leader associated with the CPI(M) student wing, Students' Federation of India (SFI). I was a year junior to him then, and was in Delhi University in first half of 1970s. Most of us in the Left would talk about him as an open minded, soft spoken student leader, indeed very different from other student leaders of SFI who seemed very arrogant.
On hearing that Namboodiripad was in Moscow, and was living in the Soviet Communist Party guest house off Park Kulturi, I phoned up to seek an appointment -- and, to my utter suprise, he readily agreed. A day or two later, after verifying my identity, the Soviet guards allowed me in. Entering the room, I saw Yechury sitting next to more than 40 years older leader -- Namboodiripad. The latter must have been 80 then.
Frankly answering all my questions, some of them on how did he see the future of the Communist movement with Soviet system collapsing, I gathered Namboodiripad was really not happy with the way in which Gorbachev was seeking to open up the country.

All through Yechury spoke very little, kept on smiling, appeared more keen to know from me how things were progressing. He didn't seem so much puzzled with Gorbachev -- which was quite unlike Namboodiripad.
It was lunch time, and my interaction with them, which must have lasted for more than an hour, ended, as they had been called for meal. As we moved to the lift, I asked Namboodiripad -- who could walk with difficulty, had difficulty in seeing and hearing -- what should now be done when in his view the Communist movement was in disarray with what was happening in the Soviet Union.
I distinctly remember Namboodiripad telling me, putting a hand on my shoulder, "Comrade, we will have to start all over again." Again, I saw Yechury, following Namboodiripad towards the lift, smiling, not reacting at all -- not even positively!
Following my interaction with the two leaders, I sought an appointment for the Leftist minded Indians who lived in Moscow as translators a few days later. I had an almost similar experience during that meeting also. While others were asking them very soft questions, I repeated my queries on what they thought of the Gorbachev era and the future of the Communist movement, and we got similar replies.
The two meetings were entirely off the record -- hence I didn't report a word.

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