By IANS
Kolkata : Veteran Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) leader Jyoti Basu Saturday supported Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee’s advocacy of capitalism to carry forward industrialisation in West Bengal, saying it was no longer possible for his party to adhere to socialist goals.
“We have always maintained that a socialist system of government is our goal. But it is no longer possible to adhere to socialist ideologies at present. We are now working in a capitalist system,” Basu told reporters after attending his party’s state committee meeting here.
Reacting to the criticism from the Left Front partners about the state government’s support for capitalism, he said: “I don’t know why the allies are raising objections. We are working in a capitalist system. We are looking for investments both from within the country and abroad. But at the same time we want the interest of the workers to be protected.”
Once a strong critic of economic reforms, the former chief minister said his party now wanted reforms.
Left Front allies like the Forward Bloc and the Revolutionary Socialist Party recently accused the state government of toeing the capitalist path.
Basu said Left Front chairman Biman Bose would meet the allies Jan 10 to resolve the differences.
Addressing a function to mark the 42nd anniversary of CPI-M’s Bengali mouthpiece Ganashakti Thursday, Chief Minister Bhattacharjee had said: “There is no alternative to capitalism if we are to take forward industrialisation in the state. After assessing everything there is no way out but to follow the capitalist path.”
Before the last assembly election in West Bengal, in which the Marxists returned to power for the seventh consecutive term with a thumping victory, Bhattacharjee had admitted that “what we are doing here (Bengal) is not communism”.
The chief minister, whose reform process and policies of farmland acquisition for industry triggered violent protests, is a strong votary of economic reforms to keep pace with the capitalist global economy.