The Left Front regime — meaning primarily the CPM regime — in Bengal has been ousted after wielding power for more than three decades. No political party can hope to remain in power indefinitely. But subject to this condition, the Left Front, under the control of an errant chief minister, must be regarded as having in no small measure contributed to its downfall.

Let me begin at the very beginning. I worked with Jyoti Basu as deputy secretary, transport, in 1967, when he was first inducted into the Bengal cabinet as minister, finance and transport; then as joint secretary, home (in 1969), when he became the deputy chief minister and, finally, as power secretary when he became the chief minister in 1977.

I was the first civil servant who got to know him (and, conversely, whom he also got to know) rather well. He was always forthright and was able to take quick decisions. He was not adept in the written word in Bengali, but he was a debater par excellence in the language, with a keen sense of humour and telling repartees. In the initial stages, when he was not a party man in the true sense of the term, he played the game of governance according to its rules and he would allow a bureaucrat to express his views freely. At a meeting, when a DIG of police parroted the views expressed by political bosses, Jyoti Basu pulled him up saying he knew those views well enough but what he wanted to hear were the officer’s views. That was in 1969.

Later, I suspect he became more of a party man and then began to tolerate sycophancy in top bureaucrats and to encourage bureaucrats who toed the party line (post-1977). The difference between the two personae of the man can be illustrated by a simple example. A communal riot having taken place in Malda, the district magistrate identified local CPM men as the culprits. The chief secretary, a known spineless sycophant, sent for the magistrate and asked him to substitute the name of the Congress in place of the CPM. The DM stood his ground and he was promptly transferred.

In 1969, a similar situation had arisen in Birbhum. G. Venkataramanan, the DM, rang me up to say that CPM followers were the trouble-makers and should be arrested. I asked him to go ahead and proceed against them in accordance with the law. I did not consider it necessary to consult Jyoti Basu, who later supported me to the hilt.

My stint in the power department in 1977 was a short one. As a result of a tiff I had with an important minister (who made a telling distinction between communists and gentlemen), I was transferred by Jyoti Basu to the sinecure, inconsequential post of director, Administrative Training Institute.

After some time, I was rescued from oblivion and appointed director-general of transport. On this occasion, I had a tiff with Jyoti Basu himself over the payment of compensation to the Calcutta Tramways Company, What Basu advocated, with full encouragement from the advocate-general, the late Snehangshu Acharya, was patently against the law.

I was once again, in copybook style, transferred to another sinecure and, in a monumental blunder, which I have not been able to understand till this day, the file in question was signed by Basu paying the compensation asked for. Ringside witnesses of the drama as it unfolded were Dipak Rudra and S.K. Singh, formerly of the IAS and IPS, respectively. Whether it was the party’s interests he was serving or not, I do not know.

My position in the Marxist regime had become untenable. So without further ado, I put in my papers (in 1989), resolving to quit the Bengal government once and for all. The discussion generated in the media by this turn of events caught the eye of the then Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, who instructed his minister, Sheila Dixit, to ring up Jyoti Basu and seek his consent for my transfer to the Government of India. That consent was readily given. I left Writers’ Buildings for the final time en route to New Delhi, taking leave of my minister, Jatin Chakravorty (one of the finest men one could have come across), but I did not see Jyoti Basu.

A marked change coloured Jyoti Basus’s persona from what it was in 1969. The party had increasingly begun to predominate in the affairs of government. The cadres took the law into their own hands with civil and police officers standing by as mute spectators. The bureaucracy and the police were emasculated. Chief secretaries, with rare exception, were spineless and de facto party functionaries. Without these qualifications, they would not have been elevated to their coveted position.

The politicisation of the bureaucracy inevitably took its toll on the functioning of government in that legitimate tasks were overlooked to make room for patently “party-centric” projects. To give one example, the report on administrative reforms presented by Pradip Bhattacharyya, IAS (Retd.), has been allowed to collect dust, for no “Red” mileage was to be derived from any reform.

The rot started in Jyoti Basu’s spell as chief minister but it reached its zenith (or rather nadir) during the regime of his successor. What happened at Nandigram on March 14, 2007, is a testament to this comment. In brief, the cadres took control of all roads leading to that hapless town. The air was ominous of the events to follow. The governor, Gopal Krishna Gandhi, sensing this, asked the chief minister to take active steps for the preservation of law and order. As a result of the gubernatorial intervention, the then director-general of police withdrew all forces from the potential war zone.

Policemen at the local police station were given strict instructions to remain indoors and not to venture out. The chief secretary remained — charitably put — a silent spectator of these goings-on. An orgy of murder, rape and arson followed. The chief minister was then able to announce with exultation that “we” had succeeded in recapturing Nandigram from “them”.

The chief minister, had he been a prudent administrator, would not have emasculated the bureaucracy and instead would have ensured its impartiality and sought its counsel based on its long experience. Had he done this, he might have avoided the many pitfalls he encountered.

After this is said, one cannot absolve the bureaucracy, represented by the chief secretary, of blame. He should have stood his ground. I myself have shown on more than one occasion that this can be done. Of course, the chief secretary would be running the risk of losing his coveted position. But what if his successor, or successors, followed suit?

Furthermore, the alienation of the Muslim vote bank, accounting for nearly 25 per cent of the electorate, cannot be overlooked. Jyoti Basu, like Siddharta Shankar Ray before him, was intensely secular, notwithstanding. Muslims felt absolutely safe and secure under him. But things changed drastically. The Sachar Committee report contains a graphic account of the plight of Muslims in Bengal.

With the CPM on a single-point agenda of aggrandisement and a non-functional bureaucracy, the public at large suffered on all scores resulting in a complete erosion of public faith in the powers that were and resulting ultimately in the stunning blow dealt at the hustings.

There is a lesson to be learnt from all this by Mamata Banerjee, the chief minister. But a sad beginning has been made by her party in running the Calcutta Municipal Corporation. Satraps of the reigning party have been given a role in the construction of buildings and, using this warrant, they collect sizeable amounts from hapless builders. The Corporation, known also as the ‘chorporation’, continues in its accustomed way. The mayor has not even been able to transfer the corrupt elements in the assessment department.

If the corporation is a precursor of the way in which things will be done in future, God help the people of Bengal, who will have to rue their fate of having jumped from the frying pan into the fire.

S.M. Murshed is a retired IAS officer of the Bengal cadre. He served in the Left Front government till 1989