Kobad Ghandy
Personal details
Born1951 (age 72–73)
Bombay, India
Spouse
​
​
(m. 1983; died 2008)​
EducationThe Doon School
St. Xavier's College, Mumbai
University of Cambridge

Kobad Ghandy (born 1951) is an Indian communist activist and ideologue. He became involved in revolutionary politics whilst a student in England in the 1970s, and worked as an organizer for the civil rights movement in India. He was a founding member of the Committee for the Protection of Democratic Rights. He was arrested on the accusation of being a politburo member of the underground Communist Party of India (Maoist) in 2009. He was acquitted and released after almost a decade in jail in 2019. [1][2]

Early life

Kobad Ghandy was born to Nergis and Adi. Adi was a senior finance executive in Glaxo. He hails from a wealthy Parsi family in Mumbai.[3] Ghandy attended The Doon School and later St. Xavier's College, Mumbai.[4] He went to Cambridge University, England[5] to pursue a course in chartered accountancy but got initiated in radical politics, was deeply influenced by the revolutionary ideology and returned to India with his course unfinished.[6]

Return to India

Upon his return to India, he became active in revolutionary politics in Maharashtra.[7] He was the founding member of Committee for the Protection of Democratic Rights.[8] He spent the late 1970s and early 1980s in Nagpur, working as a CPDR organizer.[9]

Party leader

Ghandy became a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) People's War in 1981.[7] When the CPI(Maoist) was formed in 2004, he remained a Central Committee member of the new merged party.[7] Ghandy reportedly participated in a 2005 meeting with the Nepalese Maoist leadership in Delhi, along with Kishenji, Prachanda and Baburam Bhattarai.[10]

Ghandy was elevated to the Politburo of the CPI(Maoist) at the 2007 Unity Congress.[7] He was placed in charge of the CPI(M) Central Committee sub-committee on mass organisations and was responsible for the production of English-language party materials.[7] He was expelled from the party in December 2021 for his anti-party statement in his book Fractured Freedom: A Prison Memoir, over charges of straying from the party line of dialectical materialism, embracing spiritualism and bourgeois idealism. [11][12]

Arrest

He was arrested in South Delhi[13] by the om 17 September 2009 while undergoing treatment for cancer.[14][7] His arrest was made public on September 21, 2009.[7] Per a statement by CPI(Maoist) the arrest had occurred after Ghandy had been betrayed by a party courier.[7] Ghandy had made a visit to the guerrilla zone prior to his arrest.[7] He was released from prison on bail in 2019, after serving a majority of his jail term in Vishakapatnam Central Jail. [15]

Personal life

Kobad Ghandy married Anuradha Shanbag in 1977[6][16][17] She was also a Central Committee member of CPI(Maoist).[6] She died of cerebral malaria in April 2008[6] in the jungles of Dandakaranya in Central India.

The character 'Govind Suryavanshi' in the 2012 Bollywood film Chakravyuh, portrayed by Om Puri, is said to be based upon Kobad Ghandy.[18]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Sedition case: Maoist leader Kobad Ghandy gets bail". The Times of India. 16 October 2019. Retrieved 24 November 2022.
  2. ↑ "73 yr old Maoist ideologue Kobad Ghandy gets bail". Deccan Herald. 14 October 2019. Retrieved 24 November 2022.
  3. ↑ Tripathi, Rahul; Mohan, Vishwa (24 September 2009). "Cancer landed Kobad in police net". The Times of India. Retrieved 24 September 2009.
  4. ↑ "India's unlikely Maoist revolutionary". BBC News. 23 September 2009.
  5. ↑ "14-day judicial remand for Maoist leader Kobad Ghandy". India Today. PTI. 15 October 2009. Retrieved 2 December 2021.
  6. 1 2 3 4 Rahul Pandita (26 September 2009). "The Rebel". Open magazine. Retrieved 26 September 2009.
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Indian Vanguard. Betrayal led to Kobad Ghandy’s arrest: CPI MAOIST
  8. ↑ Punwani, Jyoti (22 September 2009). "The Kobad Ghandy I knew". Hindustan Times. Archived from the original on 29 November 2014. Retrieved 20 November 2014.
  9. ↑ "Maoist who went to school in Doon, London". Indian Express. 23 September 2009. Retrieved 28 September 2009.
  10. ↑ CNN-IBN. Be practical, hold talks: Nepal Maoists to Kishenji
  11. ↑ Soumitra Bose (2 December 2021). "Maoist ideologue Kobad Ghandy suspended for 'anti-party' views | Nagpur News - Times of India". The Times of India. Retrieved 2 December 2021.
  12. ↑ "CPI(Maoist) expels Kobad Ghandy, accuses him of 'spiritualism', distancing himself from outfit". The Indian Express. 2 December 2021. Retrieved 2 December 2021.
  13. ↑ B Vijay Murty and Karan Choudhury (22 September 2009). "Top Maoist leader arrested in Delhi". Hindustan Times. Archived from the original on 26 September 2009. Retrieved 28 September 2009.
  14. ↑ Rahul Tripathi and Vishwa Mohan (24 September 2009). "Cancer landed Kobad in police net". Times of India. Retrieved 28 September 2009.
  15. ↑ "73 yr old Maoist ideologue Kobad Ghandy gets bail". Deccan Herald. 14 October 2019. Retrieved 24 November 2022.
  16. ↑ Kobad Ghandy (8 May 2010). "Letter to the Editor". Open magazine. Retrieved 12 May 2010.
  17. ↑ "Honest reflections". www.telegraphindia.com. Retrieved 2 December 2021.
  18. ↑ "Om Puri plays Maoist Kobad Ghandy - The Times of India". The Times Of India.
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