Bhakti Bhushan Mandal

Bhakti Bhushan Mandal, an Indian politician belonging to the All India Forward Bloc.[1] He represented the Dubrajpur seat in the West Bengal Legislative Assembly 1962-1967, 1967-1971 and 1996-2001.[2][3]

Mandal held the post of Minister for Judicial and Legislative in the second United Front cabinet formed in West Bengal in 1969.[3]

In the 1970s he took part in founding the Defense Committee, which sought to help Naxalites arrested in staged encounters.[4]

Mandal served as Minister for Fisheries and Co-operatives in the first Left Front cabinet.[5][6] He was a member of the All India Forward Bloc West Bengal State Committee.[5] At the time he was known as a civil rights campaigner and well connected with the Ananda Marg movement.[6] In 1978, he went on a 24-day tour of China and became the president of the India-China Friendship Association.[5]

In the early 1980s he led a Mandal Action Commission, which called for recognition as Other Backward Castes for 177 communities in West Bengal (encompassing around 50% of the population of the state).[7] Mandal met with exiled Naga leader Phizo in London and declared himself as intermediary between Phizo and the Delhi government.[5]

Mandal was publicly reprimanded by the Left Front chairman Promode Dasgupta for failure to maintain fish production levels.[5] After the West Bengal Legislative Assembly election, 1982 Kiranmoy Nanda of the West Bengal Socialist Party was named as new Minister for Fisheries.[8]

Mandal would again be named served as Minister for Co-operatives.[9][10] Due to ill health, he was absent for months from his office.[11] At the time of the swearing in of the Buddhadev Bhattacharya government in November 2000, Mandal was hospitalized at SSKM Hospital in Calcutta for malaria[12] Mandal was not nominated for re-election in the West Bengal Legislative Assembly election, 2001, due to health reasons.[13][14][15]

References

  1. ↑ The Hindu. Minister assaulted in Midnapore
  2. ↑ "Statistical Reports of Assembly Elections". General Election Results and Statistics. Election Commission of India. Retrieved 2010-10-01.
  3. 1 2 Communist Party of India (Marxist). West Bengal State Committee. Election results of West Bengal: statistics & analysis, 1952-1991. The Committee. pp. 379, 412.
  4. ↑ K. G. Kannabiran (2004). The Wages of Impunity: Power, Justice, and Human Rights. Orient Blackswan. p. 328. ISBN 978-81-250-2638-9.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 India Today. West Bengal: Sinophilia
  6. 1 2 India Today. Pressure all round
  7. ↑ Mridula Nath Chakraborty (26 March 2014). Being Bengali: At Home and in the World. Taylor & Francis. p. 67. ISBN 978-1-317-81889-2.
  8. ↑ Asian Recorder. 28. K. K. Thomas at Recorder Press. 1982. p. lxiii.
  9. ↑ D. Venkatachalam (1 January 1998). Bureaucracy: An Evaluation and a Scheme of Account Ability. APH Publishing. p. 71. ISBN 978-81-7024-927-6.
  10. ↑ Business Standard. Co-Op Movement
  11. ↑ The Telegraph. Wanted: a makeover for Bengal ministry
  12. ↑ The Telegraph. OATH OF OFFICE & GRAND FAREWELL
  13. ↑ The Tribune. 93 new faces on LF list
  14. ↑ The Telegraph. CPM PICKS NEW FACES & SUBHAS
  15. ↑ The Hindu. Another Minister dropped from candidates list
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 12/2/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.