Somebody is neglecting to tell the truth. Putin tried to remove the body previously, but there were objections from some quarters.
Lenin going! Moscow now capitalist den
M Chhaya in Kolkata | October 01, 2005 17:25 IST
India's top Communist leaders are stunned and upset over Russian President Vladimir Putin wanting to remove Lenin's mummified body from Moscow's Red Square and give it a final burial.
The Kremlin this week reportedly announced that it was time to bury Lenin's body alongside other Bolshevik leaders.
The news has been received with bewilderment and anger by top Communist Party of India-Marxist leaders like Jyoti Basu and Anil Biswas.
So angry was Basu that he said socialism was finished in Russia and that capitalism had grown deep roots in Moscow.
"They (Russians) have buried Stalin's body and now they want to do the same to Lenin's. This is most unfortunate," Basu said.
Stalin's mummified body was kept alongside that of Lenin for many years, and Basu remembered one of his Russia visits when he had seen the mortal remains of both leaders together at the Red Square.
Also angry was CPI-M's politburo member Anil Biswas who said Lenin's body had remained in Red Square despite several attempts within a quarter in Kremlin to bury it.
"Lenin's mummified body is a Russian heritage and a national memorial in itself. We don't support the move to bury Lenin's body" Biswas said.
Russia Weighs What to Do With Lenin's Body
Revisiting a proposal that thwarted Boris N. Yeltsin, who faced down tanks but in his time as president could not persuade Russians to remove the Soviet Union's founder from his place of honor, a senior aide to President Vladimir V. Putin raised the matter last week, saying it was time to bury the man.
"Our country has been shaken by strife, but only a few people were held accountable for that in our lifetime," said the aide, Georgi Poltavchenko. "I do not think it is fair that those who initiated the strife remain in the center of our state near the Kremlin."