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Even in death, E M S gives all to CPI-M

D Jose in Thiruvanthapuram

Communist Party of India-Marxist patriarch E M S Namboodiripad, who died on March 19, has bequeathed all his assets to the party which he served for six decades.

All Namboodiripad's movable and immovable assets, royalty from writings and even the cash balance in his bank would go to the party. The royalty from his books has been earmarked for the A K G Memorial Marxian Study Centre, which was his brain child.

Namboodiripad, who led a spartan life all through his political career, had donated the entire land he inherited to the party in the 1940s.

The will does not leave anything for his four children. His widow Arya Antharjanam would have to live on the pension she would get as an MLA's widow. Party sources said the CPI-M would take care of all her needs, including medical requirements. Namboodiripad, who lived with his youngest son Sasi, met all his expenses from the allowance he got from the party.

Though the patriarch enjoyed tremendous clout in the political and administrative circles of Kerala, he never used his position to promote his relatives. In fact, his son-in-law Dr K Damodaran, a noted scientist, had resigned his job in the government following differences with the present Communist regime headed by E K Nayanar. Namboodiripad never bothered to intervene in the matter, and the government accepted Damodaran's resignation.

All his children found jobs on their own. While his eldest daughter is a physician working with a private hospital in Thiruvanthapuram, the youngest son works in the accounts/administrative departments of Deshabhimani, the CPI-M mouthpiece. The eldest son, E M Sreedharan, an economist, is a member of the State Planning Board.

There were charges of nepotism against Namboodiripad when Sreedharan entered the political fray in 1991. But true to character, Namboodiripad did not campaign for his son who, incidentally, failed to make it at the hustings.

The patriarch was seemingly hurt by Arundhati Roy's alleged reference in her Booker-winning novel God of Small Things that he had converted his ancestral property into a star hotel. Though Namboodiripad came out with a statement terming it a blatant lie, he refused to join issue with the novelist. Such was the image of the leader that even his political rivals laughed off the attack.

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