INDIAN politics since independence has not been short of milk-and-water socialism, such as that on offer in the Congress party. But it has lacked charismatic figures on the left. The exception—in a diminutive, elegant, determined shape—was Jyoti Basu. For 20 years, with a few breaks, Mr Basu was the leader of West Bengal’s opposition; for 23 years he was the state’s chief minister. He was also a communist, and a charming one.

His memoirs, written at the end of his life, proclaimed