By IANS,
Kolkata: Tributes have been pouring in for veteran Marxist Jyoti Basu on social networking portals, with hundreds of his followers posting photos, comments and condolences on various micro blogging sites.
“May his soul rest in peace forever,” a social networking group on Facebook site reads, terming the 95-year-old leader who died Sunday as “a classic personality and a true leader” of the nation.
Many visitors and members of the groups mourning Basu’s death also posted links to other web items and news on the sites.
On social networking site Orkut too many communities mourned the death of the communist leader saying, “Our great leader and former chief minister of West Bengal is no more.” The groups welcomed condolence messages from all members and visitors.
“Comrade, you are not with us. But we’ll continue to follow the path and ideology you’d showed to us. We will try to fulfil your dreams,” mourned Anindya, an Orkut member who wrote the condolence message in an open community on Jyoti Basu.
Basu, who was West Bengal’s chief minister for 23 long years, died here Sunday after a prolonged illness. He was 95.
Another member of the forum, Debdutta wrote: “Comrade Jyoti Basu is one of the most prominent and tallest leaders India has ever produced. We are deeply grieved by his demise …I personally feel that India lost someone who really could make a change in the history of the country’s politics.”
“And last but not the least, we dearly, respectfully and greatly miss the hero…May His Soul Rest in Peace,” the scrap reads.
Basu was hospitalised after a pneumonia attack and admitted to the Intensive Cardiac Care Unit (ICCU) of a Salt Lake-based private hospital Jan 1.
“Red salute to you comrade,” said Pulak, a member of the Jyoti Basu community.
Born in 1914 in Kolkata, Basu became chief minister of West Bengal in June 1977 and held the post, uninterrupted, until stepping down voluntarily on health grounds in November 2000.