Since it's his birth anniversary, re-plugging a piece I wrote for @tfipost in 2018 titled:

'Jyoti Basu, not Lalu Yadav, will go down as the worst CM in Indian history'

He might be gone, but WB continues to suffer in the rot he created in the State. https://tfipost.com/2018/06/jyoti-basu-worst-cm-ever/

"Jyoti Basu served as the Chief Minister of West Bengal for a period of 24 years from 1977 to 2000, and the damage he has done to the State could well be irreversible.

Like a typical communist, he effectively killed industry and business in West Bengal"

"The party assaulted and captured virtually every institution that is important for the survival of a functional democracy.

Things reached such a state that you had to be a member or a sympathiser of the ‘cause’ to get a promotion or even a job"

"Schools & colleges were filled with teachers who were more interested in the interest of the party than education; municipal offices, lower courts, universities, panchayats & even cultural institutions were invaded by cadres who gradually came to hold complete sway over them."

"It was this systematic capture & destruction of institutions that helped the Marxists retain power for so long; booth capturing & rigging is so much easier when the polling officer is a comrade.

The worst aspect of the above tactics is that they've become West Bengal’s legacy"

"Close to 30,000 industrial enterprises were closed down and more than 27,000 units became ‘sick’ in the hey days of the Basu era of ‘Marxist Pragmatism’.

Militant Union culture still prevails in West Bengal, and has become part and parcel of the state’s ethos."

"Future historians will marvel at the naiveté of the nostalgic outpourings after his death when they contrast it with his track record. But such nostalgic naiveté can prompt India to make the kind of mistakes that him & his fellow comrades committed in their quest for Red glory."