Interview: Rahul Gandhi’s progressive turn is drawing Left-minded people to Congress, says Prasenjit Bose

Economist and social activist Prasenjit Bose joined the Congress party in Kolkata on 15 September, almost a year ahead of the West Bengal Assembly elections.

Bose, 51, who is well known in the social and political circles of West Bengal, had resigned from the Communist Party of India (Marxist) in 2012 over differences with the party over supporting Pranab Mukherjee's candidature as the President of India.

Bose was an active student leader at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and one of the best-known strategists of the CPI(M)-backed Students’ Federation of India (SFI), from the mid-1990s to early 2000s.

Ex-Left leaders joining the Congress

Bose is not the first ex-Left leader to join the Congress party. At least eight former JNUSU presidents from Left organisations have joined the Congress party in the past.

Congress leaders Syed Naseer Hussain and Kanhaiya Kumar, both former Left leaders, attended Bose's formal joining in Kolkata on Monday.

In an interview with LiveMint, Bose speaks about why he chose the Congress, the party’s prospects in West Bengal, the decline of the Left, and the challenges before India’s economy amid global trade tensions. Edited excerpts from the interview:

Q – Why did you decide to join the Congress party?

A- Well, the central challenge before the people is how to defend the Constitution of India from the multi-pronged assaults launched by the ruling regime at the Centre. The latest one involved the Supreme Court staying several provisions of the Waqf Amendment Act.

Earlier, the Supreme Court was petitioned against Article 370 abrogation and the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 (CAA). Several legislations under the present regime have tested the Constitutional limits.

These assaults need to be fought not only through legal interventions but also through mass agitations. Only a national political party like the Congress can do this. The mass mobilisation efforts under the leadership of Rahul Gandhi, from the Bharat Jodo Yatra to the recent Voter Adhikar Yatra in Bihar, have inspired me to take this step. These initiatives have inspired quite a large number of people.

Q - Congress's future in West Bengal in the next year's election?

A- The Congress party has a major role to play in West Bengal. When there is a challenge at the national level, it automatically becomes a challenge in West Bengal. The BJP’s growth in West Bengal is a recent phenomenon, particularly since 2019. BJP got traction through its communal polarisation strategy involving issues like the nationwide NRC, CAA and the bogey of Bangladeshi infiltration.

Misgovernance of the TMC in West Bengal

The Trinamool Congress regime in Bengal has also come to symbolise corruption and state-sponsored violence. Economic stagnation, lack of employment opportunities for youth, declining education and healthcare, and gruesome atrocities against women plague the state.

This TMC versus BJP polarisation needs to be broken. Only a powerful force at the national level can take on the communal politics of the BJP at the centre and the misdeeds of the TMC in West Bengal. That is where I see potential for the Congress party.

Q - From Left to the Congress party. Not just you, other former colleagues of you in left have joined the Congress. Why does Left see so many exits?

A - The Left was in power in West Bengal for 34 years. People’s memories about the Left regime in the last decade have been unsavoury. That is a big reason why, rather than regaining its mass base, the Left has lost much of it to the TMC and BJP. Now, a TMC-BJP binary has been imposed on the people.

Under Rahul Gandhi's leadership, the Congress party has taken a progressive turn at the national level. He speaks up for the Dalits, Adivasis, minorities, unemployed youth, and farmers. He insisted on having a nationwide caste census and attacked crony capitalism. These are appealing to the natural constituencies of the Left. Such progressive politics has a lot of potential in West Bengal.

Q- What role do the former left leaders play in Congress?

A- During the Atal Vajpayee era, when we were students, the Left had played a major role in building the secular coalition alongside the Congress. The Left's ideological resistance attracted a lot of people. The difference today is that the space of the Left has shrunk in its erstwhile bastions, especially in West Bengal.

The causes of workers, farmers, and the marginalised communities remain. In that backdrop, Congress has taken a progressive turn and filled the space which the Left vacated at the national level, especially from Bharat Jodo Yatra onwards. Left-leaning Congress leaders have played a vital role in these initiatives.

Q- How does the shift from a comrade in a Left party to Congress going to be?

A - At a personal level, not many people know that I come from a Congress family. There is no personal crisis involved here.

Politically, what is the concrete analysis of the concrete situation? That is the Marxist approach. Today’s concrete situation is that India's secular, democratic Constitution is being destroyed by the Narendra Modi regime. Combatting that threat is the central issue. My decision is entirely driven by that objective.

West Bengal will see an assembly election soon. Before that, there will be a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls. We need a grassroots movement during SIR, like the one we had against NRC/CAA in West Bengal. We should learn from the Bihar experience and ensure that the right to vote for all sections is firmly defended and unfair deletions do not happen.

There will be a Voter Adhikar movement in West Bengal too. And Congress will play an important role.

Q – You are an economist. Where do you see the Indian Economy placed in times of Trump tariffs?

A—The direction of change for the Indian economy has been southward for quite some time. The central government has been manipulating official statistics to conceal the downward trend. Just see the latest GDP estimates for the first quarter of 2025-26.

Nominal GDP growth rate has fallen, but real GDP growth rate has gone up. That is because of a deliberate underestimation of the inflation rate.

All this statistical jugglery doesn’t change the adverse impact on people's lives. People perceive growing unemployment and falling real wages. Private investment has not taken off, and now, because of the Trump tariffs, exports are going to be affected.

‘Govt under a mistaken assumption’

The United States has been India’s largest export destination. We import the most from China and export the most to the US. When Trump was flexing his muscles against China, the Modi government was rejoicing under the mistaken assumption that India would benefit from the US-China trade war.

Now, in the backdrop of the Ukraine war, Indian oil imports from Russia have become a political issue. The entire table has been turned, and India is being punished more intensively than China.

What is the way out? We have to find new markets outside the US. That is what China has been doing all the time. We should have planned ahead for this and pursued export diversification. We need more independence and strategic foresight in our economic and foreign policies.

Q - Do we see you contesting elections?

A- I will be actively involved in grassroots mobilisation during the SIR in West Bengal. Being in Congress would enable me to intervene more effectively. I am prepared to contest the assembly election should circumstances require.