Former West Bengal finance minister, Marxist economist Ashok Mitra dies

Marxist economist Ashok Mitra, who served as finance minister of the India’s West Bengal state, has died at 90.

Mitra, who took the finance portfolio after Jyoti Basu formed the first Left Front government in 1977, died at a private hospital in Kolkata on Tuesday after protracted illness, according to the Indian media.

He was finance minister until 1987 when he resigned following differences with Basu, Anandabazar newspaper said.

It said Mitra criticised sharply the policy of the Leftist government of West Bengal, but never let the people forget that he was a communist.

According to the Hindustan Times, Mitra had famously told a bureaucrat in the late 70s, “I am a Communist, not a gentleman.”

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has condoled the demise of Mitra in a Twitter post.

 

"Saddened at the passing away of noted economist, former Finance Minister of Bengal and former Rajya Sabha MP, Dr Ashok Mitra. He had a long career with the World Bank, IIM Calcutta and as Chief Economic Adviser to the Government of India. Condolences to his family & well wishers," she wrote.

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) has also expressed grief over the death of Mitra.

“CPIM expresses its profound grief at the death of Ashok Mitra. Noted economist and Left intellectual, Ashok Mitra was Finance Minister in the 1st & 2nd Left Front Govts in West Bengal under Jyoti Basu,” it tweeted.

Born in Bangladesh, he became the chief economic adviser to the government of India from 1970 to 1972 when Indira Gandhi was prime minister.

Mitra taught at the Lucknow University after completing master’s in economics from Benares Hindu University, according to state-run news agency the Press Trust of India. He got his PhD from the Netherlands.

He worked for the World Bank, and also taught at the Delhi School of Economics and IIM Calcutta.

In the mid-1990s he became a member of the Rajya Sabha and was chairman of the parliamentary standing committee on industry and commerce.

Mitra was also associated with the prestigious Economic and Political Weekly (EPW) journal in its formative years.

Besides writing several books, he penned several columns in newspapers and was known for his scathing analysis of contemporary economics and socio-political issue.