Prakash Karat replaces Surjeet as CPI(M) general secretary

Not only that, 56-year-old Karat's wife Brinda, a Bengali in her fifties, became the first woman to become a member of the party's highest policy-making forum the Politburo.

However, the party did not accept the request of 91-year-old former chief minister of West Bengal Jyoti Basu to relieve him of being a member of the Politburo because of his age and failing health. Both Basu and Surjeet, who had offered to step down as party general secretary, have been retained in the Politburo.

The choice of Karat as the party general secretary came at the CPI(M)'s party 18th Congress which concluded on Sunday.

Prakash Karat, who had had part of his education in Britain, joined CPI(M) in 1970 and shot to fame as the leader of the party's students' front in Jawaharlal Nehru University here.