People's Democracy

SAMIR Putatunda, former secretary of the CPI(M)’s South 24 Parganas district unit, has been expelled from the party under articles 19/3 and 8/2 of the Party constitution. The CPI(M)’s state secretariat refused to accept the letter of "resignation from party membership" that Putatunda had submitted on February 18.

The CPI(M) state committee had earlier asked the state secretariat to deal with the issues pertaining to Samir Putatunda’s case of "resignation" and the circumstances surrounding it.

The South 24 Parganas district secretariat of the CPI(M) had earlier informed the state secretariat that Putatunda had refused to part with such important party documents as minutes of the meeting of the South 24 Parganas district unit and of the district secretariat despite repeated exhortations.

It was also revealed how Putatunda had refused to part with a cellular telephone and a personal computer which the party had provided him with when he became the district secretary of the CPI(M). He also refused to part with the all-terrain vehicle (popularly called a "jeep") which, too, was provided to him by the party. Nor would he provide the accounts of expenditure of his visit to Cuba; the funds for that visit were provided by the party.

Officiating secretary of the South 24 Parganas unit, Abul Bashar had written to Putatunda on February 24 to return the above articles by February 28. As Bashar’s letter to the state secretariat of March 1 noted, there has been no response at all from Putatunda. In the circumstances, the CPI(M) state secretariat chose to invoke the relevant articles of the party constitution to refuse to accept Putatunda’s letter of "resignation" and expel him from the party.