V S Achuthanandan departs...
text_fields
Thiruvananthapuram: Comrade VS Achuthanandan, the star that shone as a guide on the paths of Kerala's agitations, is no more. Achuthanandan, the leader of the Punnapra-Vayalar revolt and the eyes and ears of the communists, was 101. The CPI(M) leader, party founder member and former chief minister of Kerala, was undergoing treatment at Pattom STU Hospital in Thiruvananthapuram for age-related ailments. He had been on ventilator support after suffering a heart attack on Monday.
Achuthanandan served as the 20th CM of Kerala from 2006 to 2011. He also served as the Leader of the Opposition in the Kerala Legislative Assembly from 1992 to 1996, 2001 to 2006, and 2011 to 2016. He was a former member of the CPI(M) Politburo and currently a permanent invitee to the CPI(M) State Committee. He served as the CPI(M) State Secretary from 1980 to 1992. He was a member of the Legislative Assembly from Malampuzha from 2001 to 2021, and from 1991 to 1996. Before that, he represented Ambalappuzha from 1967 to 1977. However, his activities as the Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly attracted a lot of public attention.
Born to Shankaran and Akkamma on 20 October 1923 in Punnapra in Kerala's Alappuzha district, Achuthanandan lost his mother at the age of four and his father at the age of 11. Due to this, he had to stop his studies in the seventh grade. He then started working in a tailor shop in the village to help his elder brother. After that, he also worked as a labourer in a coir factory.
He began his political career by organising agricultural workers in Kuttanad. This was on the advice of Comrade P Krishna Pillai. He then joined the Indian freedom movement and later the communist movement. V S was at the forefront of the Punnapra-Vayalar agitation in Alappuzha against Sir CP Ramaswamy Iyer's vision for the American model. Following this, he was arrested by the police on October 28, 1946 and was brutally beaten inside a police lockup. During the beating, the bayonet of a gun gravely injured his leg. Enduring such brutal torture, he was made to spend five years and six months in jail. He also spent four and a half years in hiding.
A massive agitation had to be launched to implement the Land Reforms Act passed by the government in 1967, and the agitation to pass this act was declared through the famous Alappuzha Declaration in 1970. V S was at the forefront of this agitation, and he led countless struggles during this period.
VS joined the Communist Party in 1940. In 1957, he became a member of the State Secretariat of the undivided Communist Party. In 1964, he was one of the 32 members who left the CPI National Council and formed the CPI(M). He became a member of the CPI(M) Politburo in 1985 and remained the same till 2009. He has also served as the chief editor of CPI(M) mouthpiece Deshabhimani and the weekly, Chintha.
