829. Subodh Banerjee (1918-1974)

Subodh Banarjee
PWD Minister of West Bengal (1967), Labour Minister of West Bengal (1969), MLA(1952–1974)
Constituency	Kultali, Joynagar
Personal details
Born	1918
Died	16 September 1974 (aged 55–56) Calcutta
Political party	Socialist Unity Centre of India

To write about a politician, one runs the risk of being either a self-seeker trying to get some material advantage if one spoke good of him, or a run-of-the mill faultfinder who failed to get his desired benefits if one wrote against him. But being neither, I do not hesitate to record an incident of great moral magnitude regarding the late Subodh Banerjee.

Subodh Banjerjee was a firebrand labour leader with such incendiary oratorical skill that both his friends and detractors used to say that he could set fire to the sluggish currents of the river Hooghly. Unlike many of his ilk, he was not a purchasable commodity available to the highest bidder. Employers used to be afraid of him so much that they would always prop up another trade union with a pliable leadership to subvert his union. They would concede more to the other union than come to any understanding with Banjerjee’s union. He would fight hard to get his demands met. But once an agreement was made, he would ensure that it was strictly implemented both by his followers and the employer. He would not allow any under-the-table adjustment which would be personally beneficial to the union leaders and, of course, to the management leaving the workers high and dry. All his dealings in labour matters were open and above board leaving no scope for future manipulation by the twist of a phrase or turn of a punctuation. Employers always thought him to be an uncompromisingly obstinate and dangerous leader.

He belonged to the Socialist Unity Centre of India (SUCI). Its leadership believed in the Brahminical tradition of pollution free purity of socialist thoughts and principles. In the rainbow spectrum of Socialist-Marxist parties of West Bengal, it represented an extreme position. Though small in size, it had the reputation of being aggressively combative which could make its followers suffer untold police torture without any demur.

The late sixties of the last century witnessed tumultuous political upheavals in West Bengal. In 1967 the ruling Congress party was unseated from power by a hotch-potch combination of Right and Left parties who made a post-electoral alliance. Subodh Banerjee became the PWD Minister. Being scrupulously honest, the Department—which even in the British days had earned the sobriquet “plunder without detection”—felt the sizzling heat of a firebrand honest Minister. His lasting contribution was the removal of all statutes of “guardians and rulers” of the Indian empire from public places in Kolkata. But he did not destroy them. He appreciated the artistic value of many of them and stored them in some other public places not in the public view. The first United Front Government only lasted for seven months. The Ministry was dismissed and President’s Rule was promulgated.

After the election in 1969, the UF again came to power. Subodh Banerjee got the portfolio of his choice, Labour. In little over a year that this government lasted, he left a permanent imprint on the industrial scene by introducing “gherao” as an instrument of industrial action by militant workers. So much was the intensity of this new method of labour action that the word “gherao” got inducted into the English languge. The Concise Oxford English Dictionary, Eleventh Edition, 2004, on page 598 has the following entry: “Gherao: n (pl. gheraos). Indian; a protest in which workers prevent employers leaving a place of work until demands are met. Origin: From Hindi.”

So the English language was enriched by his gherao policy. Though as an incidental side-effect, the investment climate in West Bengal collapsed and a long process of de-industrialisation started. The second UF Government imploded because of its own internal contradictions. After a spell of another President’s Rule during the Bangladesh war, the Congress came back to power in 1972. He was always elected in the West Bengal Legilative Assembly from 1952 onwards  ( excepting 1962 and 1972). He died in 1974.