KOLKATA: For the first time in its history, the Kolkata unit of Students’ Federation of India (SFI), the students’ wing of CPI(M) has got two women in the top two key positions, namely district president and district secretary.
While Didhiti Roy has been appointed as the Kolkata district secretary, Barnana Mukhopadhay has been appointed as the Kolkata district president. While Roy replaces Atif Nisar, Mukhopadhyay replaces Debanjan Dey.
The development, according to political observers, is extremely significant especially when the top CPI(M) leadership has been stressing on the induction of young and female faces in all slots of party leadership.
“This is the first time that two women have been accommodated in the two top posts of any district unit of SFI. You can call it a beginning of the process of changes in the organisational structure of the party by bringing in more young and female faces, ” said a state committee member of the CPI(M).
The state committee member further said that the introduction of new and female faces in leadership positions will not be restricted only within the mass organisations like SFI or the party’s youth wing Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI).
“In the coming days you can see similar introductions in the area committees, district committees and even in the state committee of the party as well, ” he added.
The party veteran and Left Front chairman in West Bengal, Biman Bose, too had recently on several occasions stressed on encouraging the fresh blood at different levels of leadership to add pace to the party programmes.
Political observers feel that the development is significant in the backdrop of the infighting in ruling Trinamool Congress on the issue of 'old guards' versus 'new faces'. Differences in the party started surfacing, though in a timid manner, since last year when the party’s general secretary and Lok Sabha member Abhishek Banerjee floated the concept of fixing the upper age limit at all levels of leadership.