The AMRI annexe where the tragedy took place. Picture by Amit Datta

Calcutta, Dec. 9: For a businessman, AMRI Hospitals part-owner Shrawan Kumar Todi had an unusual mentor and “elder brother”: communist Jyoti Basu.

It was in 1967 that a young Todi was introduced to Basu, deputy chief minister in the first United Front government, by his friend and CPM leader Snehangshu Acharya. The bond that was struck was never strained in the four decades till Basu’s death.

During this time, Todi rose from a small-time provider of loans for car purchases to an industrialist, with not a little help from the man who ruled Bengal for 23 years, CPM leaders acknowledge.

Perhaps this was why Todi, ever loyal and grateful to the former chief minister, declined to accept a paisa in charges when Basu passed away at AMRI Hospitals, Salt Lake, in January 2010.

“Our party was prepared to foot the entire bill but Todi insisted that it was time he repaid his debt to Jyotibabu, who had always considered him a younger brother,’’ a CPM leader said.

A CPM state secretariat member said that during Todi’s long association with Basu, he had always been ready to help the party, even before it came to power in 1977.

“It was because of Todi’s commitment to the party and his low profile that Jyotibabu developed so much affection for him,” the CPM leader said.

Todi would regularly drop in at Basu’s home and have a cup of tea, often in the company of the Marxist leader’s son Chandan as well. He continued to do so after Basu retired as chief minister in the year 2000.

“While it is true that Todi had an ideological tilt towards the CPM, he interacted mostly with Jyoti Basu and developed a personal relationship with him,” the CPM leader said. “He, of course, knew the other leaders as well but was never close to any of them.”

Another veteran CPM leader cited an example of Todi’s loyalty to Basu. In the early 1970s, when it was yet to win power, the CPM was looking to re-launch the party-backed newspaper Satyajug. Todi readily agreed to help at Basu’s request, the CPM leader said.

Many years later, in 1994, chief minister Basu reciprocated by personally making sure that neither the Calcutta Municipal Corporation nor government departments harassed Todi as he set up AMRI Hospitals in Dhakuria, then known as Apollo AMRI.

During Basu’s tenure, the CPM and Todi enjoyed a “cosy” relationship, a party leader said. So much so that the Bangiya Swaksharata Prasar Samity, backed by the CPM to promote the Bengali language and literacy, would hold many of its meetings at Todi’s Shrachi Tower, next to the Ganashakti office in AJC Bose Road, and sometimes in Todi’s office itself.

However, after Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee became chief minister in November 2000, the government began to distance itself from Todi.

CPM leaders said Bhattacharjee believed that the state government should not “get close” to any businessman; so Todi seldom got to meet the CPM’s new chief minister.