KR Gouri Amma, Kerala’s oldest communist leader and member of the first elected government, died at the age of 101.
Gouri Amma with Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan. (File photo)
KR Gouri Amma, Kerala’s oldest communist leader and member of the first elected government, died at the age of 101. Gouri Amma was treated in a private hospital in Thiruvananthapuram for age-related complaints.
Gouri Amma was the last surviving member of the first Kerala government. Gouri Amma was the first female finance minister of Kerala in the EMS cabinet from 1957. After the split in the Communist Party in 1964, she became part of the CPI (M). In 1994 she was excluded from the CPI (M) after internal cracks.
She then founded the Janathipathya Samrakshana Samithi (JSS) and joined the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF). Gouri Amma was Minister of Agriculture in the UDF cabinet from 2001 to 2006 in the government led by Antony and Oommen Chandy.
Gouri Amma, a communist soul
Gouri Amma was the driving force behind the historic land reform law in Kerala. After the first communist government took command in 1957, Gouri Amma issued an ordinance banning the eviction of all tenants.
In 1957 she married her colleague in the Kerala cabinet, TV Thomas. However, the relationship was broken off due to the historical communist split of 1964. While Gouri Amma joined the newly formed CPI (M), her husband TV Thomas joined the CPI.
The ideological difference put further strain on their personal lives and the couple finally separated in 1965. Interestingly, V Thomas and KR Gouri Amma found a place in the second EMS cabinet from 1967 to 1969 as ministers of two different political parties. In 1977 Thomas died at the age of 67.
Click here for IndiaToday.in full coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.
إرسال تعليق