On Sharad Patil’s Rejoinder

COMMUNICATION

In criticism of my article “Can the Left become the National Alternative (Mainstream, May 8, 2010), Sharad Patil, the General Secretary of the Satyashodhak Communist Party, has in his rejoinder “Can the Left (Communists) become the National Alternative?†(Mainstream, June 5, 2010) written: “All Lohiaites have formed, according to Mishra, casteist parties.†This is totally false. I have not written in my article anything regarding Lohiaites. Hence this is Asatyam Samarthan.

Similarly my article has nothing to do with either Jyoti Basu or Lord Buddha nor does it deal with the subject Patil has introduced. I was a member of the Bihar Assembly when Karpoori Thakur brought the reservation proposal. I supported it. The CPI supported it. So was the case with the Mandal Commission’s recommen-dations which the CPI supported.

Chaturanan Mishra (Former Union Agriculture Minister)

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