Mohit Sen - Political Life

Political Life

Mohit Sen arrived in India during a period when India had won her Independence. The appraisal of the CPI at that time was that the country had not really got freedom, but was still a 'semi-colony' of Britain. The following words of Jawaharlal Nehru, who was then prime minister, to visiting Soviet leaders, Nikolai Bulganin and Nikita Khrushchev in 1955, aptly summarizes the CPI's position then. To quote Nehru,

Until this year (1955) the Communist Party was saying that Indian people were not independent; they even opposed our National Day celebrations.... They also said that when they were in doubt about the right line of action, they had to get directions from the Soviet Union. Early in 1951-52, some principal leaders of the Communist Party went to Moscow secretly, that is without passports. They came back and said that they had got directions from Mr. Joseph Stalin. At least this is what they said. The line then laid down was one of full opposition (to the Government) and, where possible, petty insurrections.

Mohit Sen stood for collaboration with Congress for fighting against imperialist forces. When the CPI split, and gave raise to a new party the Communist Party of India (Marxist), Sen remained with the original CPI, under chairmanship of S.A. Dange, which was following nationalist line. He became a national council member of CPI in 1966 and was elected to party central executive committee in 1971. Sen parted ways with the CPI, following its anti-Congress stand, in 1978, following Indira Gandhi's emergency and subsequent failure in the election. In 1985, Sen joined the Indian Communist Party and when it merged with the All India Communist Party in 1988 to become United Communist Party of India, Sen became its general secretary, a post he held for 15 years till his death. At the time of his death Sen, 74, was a widower and had no children.