India is mourning along with the militant, international trade union movement

Comrade Gurudas Das Gupta of the AITUC

Burdensome and harsh, the message came from Kolkata. Comrade Gurudas Das Gupta passed away. A top leader, a worthy child of the proud working class, who started the struggle since he was a child and a young man, and climbed slowly but stably all the stairways of the struggle until the top. Where he shone for his intelligence, his class-oriented point of view, his internationalist and uniting insight and spirit.

Today the World Federation of Trade Unions is mourning the loss of its worthy child. Of a consistent soldier of the international army which struggles for the abolition of the capitalist exploitation. Of a consistent defender of the WFTU and its class-oriented strategy.

Comrade Gurudas was born in 1936 in Barisal City and quickly became a leader of the students’ movement in Bengal, while right after he was elected as General Secretary of the Trade Unions in West Bengal. He was a member of the CPI, member of its national secretariat, deputy General Secretary of the CPI.

From 2001 until December 2017, he was elected as AITUC General Secretary. He was at the forefront of the organization and success of the great Pan-Indian strike in 2009.

For many years, he served as a member of the Indian Parliament , where he transferred the problems and claims of the ordinary people, both women and men. He wrote many important books and articles.

On behalf of the WFTU, we convey to AITUC and his family our condolences and once more we unite our forces with the working class and the peoples of India in their goals for a better world. His life and example will be an illuminating guide for all of us and the future generations.

Nothing ever goes to waste. The seeds that comrade Gurudas sowed with his life will grow!

The Secretariat