COMRADE Ganeshan (PV Srinivas), a founding leader of the CPI(ML) Liberation, passed away at 2.30 am on 6 December 2016 in a hospital in Delhi, where he had been admitted with respiratory illnesses and tubercular meningitis. He was 78.

PV Srinivas was born in Kerala. Poverty drove his parents to migrate to Chennai. He studied only up till Standard V. He worked as a hotel employee and was among the first in Tamil Nadu to form a Hotel Workers’ Union that had a membership of 30000. As a labour organiser, he would also argue many workers’ cases in labour court. He joined the communist movement, becoming a leader of the CPI(M). Together with Comrade Appu, he had helped launch the CPI(M) Tamil organ Theekadir. However, he along with Comrade Appu and several other comrades developed several differences with CPI(M), he came out of CPI(M) and joined the CPI(ML).

When a young student comrade Ganeshan – an engineering student at Annamalai University who had joined the revolutionary student movement inspired by the Naxalbari uprising – was killed, PV Srinivas adopted his name to keep his memory alive, and has been known as Comrade Ganeshan ever since.

Comrade Ganeshan was arrested and jailed during the Emergency. He led many militant working class struggles in Chennai, Kancheepuram and Thiruvalluvar.

Comrade Ganeshan became a Central Committee member of the CPI(ML) in 1980, and was Polit Bureau member of the CPI(ML) between 1982-88, and was again elected to the Central Committee in 6th Party Congress of CPI(ML) in 1997. He was a member of CPI(ML)’s international department.

Comrade Ganeshan will be remembered as a revolutionary and organic intellectual of the working class. All his life, right up to his final illness, he enthusiastically followed the progress of Left movements, working class movements and people’s movements in India and the world over, maintaining a dialogue with intellectuals and activists in India and abroad across parties and across all sectarian boundaries. Comrade Ganeshan’s warm comradely hospitality to all guests and comrades at the CPI(ML)’s Central office in Delhi endeared him to all.

Memorial Meetings For Comrade Ganeshan

A memorial meeting for Comrade Ganeshan was held on 16 December at Gandhi Peace Foundation, Delhi. Comrades and friends shared their memories of Comrade Ganeshan there, and Delhi CPI(ML) Secretary Ravi Rai presided over the meeting. Radhika Menon recalled how Comrade Ganeshan would send useful mails to comrades on topics of their interest, helping younger comrades explore their ideas. She recalled how he would say that he became a communist in the quest for his own human liberation as much as for social liberation. KK Saxena, a publisher who runs Aakar Books, spoke about how he relied on Comrade Ganeshan for advice on which books to publish – and how Comrade Ganeshan would himself distribute copies of those books which he found useful for activists and intellectuals in the Left movement. Ajay Kumar of Udbhavna Prakashan also spoke about Comrade Ganeshan’s close interaction with him and other publishers and editors on the Left. Pratyush Chandra and Pothik Ghosh spoke about how Comrade Ganeshan was always pushing himself and others to read, learn, question about social and economic phenomena but also about their own movements and ways of organizing. Chintu Kumari, an AISA activist, recalled growing up with Comrade Ganeshan around as a very loving and caring mentor. Gopal Pradhan recalled Comrade Ganeshan spending many days at the JNU library, painstakingly searching the PC Joshi archives for documents to help prepare volumes of the History of the Communist Movement in India. Comrade Narendra of People’s Front, Srikant and Ravi Patwal also spoke about Comrade Ganeshan.

At the meeting, CPI(ML) GS Comrade Dipankar said that with little formal schooling, Comrade Ganeshan was a self-taught Marxist intellectual who was constantly learning. He was ever willing to confront his own weaknesses, face criticism, and be willing to change himself.

Comrade Dipankar said it was unfortunate that we could not document an important part of history which Comrade Ganeshan had helped create: the events of the workers’ and peasants’ movements in Tamil Nadu in the 1960s and 1970s. He recalled that he once Comrade Ganeshan Meena Kandasamy's novel, The Gypsy Goddess on the massacre of Dalits at Kilvenmani in 1968. He read the novel and spoke a lot about many of the places described in the book. Comrade Dipankar recalled Comrade Prakash Karat of the CPI(M) saying that CITU leader AK Padmanabhan spoke with great respect about Comrade Ganeshan.

Comrade Dipankar said that in times when communism isn’t fashionable, Comrade Ganeshan lived all his life with the energy, possibilities, and hope of the communist movement.

A memorial meeting for Comrade Ganeshan was held at Chennai on December 21st at Ambattur. The meeting also paid tribute to Fidel Castro and Tamil poet Inquilab who passed away recently. CPI(ML) Liberation’s Tamil Nadu Secretary Comrade S Kumarasamy presided over the meeting. CPI(ML) PB member Kartick Pal read out a message from the Central Committee, and PB member Swadesh Bhattacharya addressed the hall packed with workers. Comrade AS Kumar, TN President of AICCTU, spoke about Comrade Ganeshan’s evolution as a workers’ leader, a people’s leader and a communist leader. At the meeting, Comrade Kovai Easwaran, a veteran of the ML movement shared reminiscences of working together with Comrade Ganeshan and Comrade Appu in the 1960s.

At the meeting, comrades recalled how hard-working Comrade Ganeshan was, how generous in sharing his knowledge and insights. They recalled his love for the Tamil language and his committed internationalism.

Tributes For Comrade Ganeshan

Comrade Sivanandam Sivasegaram of the New Democratic Marxist Leninist Party, Sri Lanka, recalled meeting Comrade Ganeshan years ago in Delhi and saying he will be remembered as “a dedicated Marxist.” Comrade Sudhakar Reddy, General Secretary of the CPI, sent a condolence message. Comrade Mee.Dha. Pandian of Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist) People's Liberation also sent a condolence message. Comrade BN Singh and other comrades in Hazaribagh jail held a memorial meeting for Comrade Ganeshan.

Peter Boyle, of Social Alliance, Australia, wrote:

Comrade Ganeshan truly was a revolutionary and organic intellectual of the working class. I still treasure warm memories of this wonderful man from my visit to Delhi in 2000. So many cups of tea and wide-ranging discussions! And I remember enjoying the food he lovingly cooked for comrades, a skill he told me that he learnt during the years he spent in prison. If a brief visitor from far away could gain such a powerful impression of Comrade Ganeshan then surely his memory will live on strongly in the hearts and minds of very many in the people's movement in India.