Kolkata, Oct 3 (IANS): CPI-M Politburo Coordinator Prakash Karat said on Thursday that the Late General Secretary Sitaram Yechury was concerned about the party even when he was hospitalised.

“Before Yechury was hospitalised, he was busy in formatting the documents for the forthcoming party congress. When we went to meet him at the hospital, we saw that his only concern was the party Congress,” said Karat while addressing a commemoration gathering of Yechury, who passed away last month.

The next party Congress is scheduled at Madurai in Tamil Nadu next year and till that time Karat will be functioning through ‘collective leadership’ of the existing politburo with Karat as the “politburo coordinator.”

Karat added that considering Yechury’s rich academic background when everyone thought that he would end up as an IAS officer or a top corporate executive or a banker he chose to adopt the Marxist-Leninist path of revolution.

Yechury passed away on September 12 and he was the first party general secretary to die during his tenure.

CPI(M) politburo member and the party’s state secretary Md Salim said that there is a need to take lessons from the life of Yechury to combat the attempts to establish the concept of “political binary” in West Bengal.

“Be it in the name of religion or in the name of language or even in the concept of BJP-Trinamool Congress, an effort is on to establish a political binary in West Bengal. We have to break through such binary attempts and highlight the issues relating to the livelihood of common people. We have to take lessons from the life of Yechury in breaking through these binary attempts,” Salim said.

He added that the two consecutive deaths, first that of former West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee in August and the second of Yechury last month, have undoubtedly created a vacuum for the party leadership.

“For both of them, the motto was carrying forward through the path of revolution. Now we will have to carry that forward,” Salim said.