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CPI-M collects Rs 40 million for EMS academy

The Communist Party of India-Marxist in Kerala has collected a whopping Rs 40 million towards setting up an academy in the memory of legendary Marxist E M S Namboodiripad who died on March 19.

The amount was collected by party cadres and activists of class and mass organisations in just three days under the resource mobilisation drive held in the state from August 22 to 24.

CPI-M state secretary Chadayan Govindan said the collection at the end of the drive was Rs 40,183,716. He said the response, which belied the party's expectations, was the biggest tribute to the Communist patriarch who had bequeathed all his assets to the party. The collection crossed the target three times.

The late leader had donated the entire land he had inherited to the party in the 1940s. Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy wrote in her God of Small Things that Namboodiripad had converted the ancestral property in Kottayam district into a star hotel.

The veteran Marxist had smiled away the allegation.

A party worker, who participated in the resource mobilisation drive at Thiruvananthapuram, said all sections of the people -- both the poor and the rich -- had no hesitation in contributing to the fund.

The CPI-M, which conducts its diverse activities with public funds collected in this manner, had never received such a massive response in its past campaigns.

The proposed EMS Academy would have facilities for study and research on all matters connected with man, nature and society. The party is planning to set up a campus with state-of-the-art facilities. The Academy will also have a museum on EMS.

To perpetuate EMS' memory, the state government proposes to install his statue and party supporters in north Kerala have already started work on a super-speciality hospital in his name.

The flurry of ventures in Namboodiripad's name has not been free from controversies. For instance, the Sanskrit University's proposal to set up a separate bench in his name has evoked protests from the Bharatiya Janata Party.

The BJP opposed the move as EMS had opposed setting up the university for various reasons.

Following the controversy, the university authorities have kept the proposal in cold storage as the Union human resource development ministry has not taken kindly to the move.

The BJP has also raised objections against the government funding the proposed EMS statue; the party feels it will set a bad precedent.

Members of Namboodiripad's family are also sceptical about the memorial ventures. The family had opposed the institution of a people's planning award by the Bharat Sewak Samaj in EMS' name. The organisation cancelled the award after Local Administration Minister Paloli Muhammad Kutty, who was selected for the award this year, rejected it.

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