Chatterjee’s book — Keeping the Faith: Memoirs of a Parliamentarian — which was released by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Saturday.

* On Left Front’s ‘arrogance’ during the UPA-I when they had lent outside support to the govt
After the formation of the UPA government with Manmohan Singh as the prime minister and Sonia Gandhi as the chairperson, it gradually became clear to all, especially those in the government, that the Left parties — which had 62 members in the Lok Sabha and on whose outside support the survival of the government depended — wanted to play the role of the ‘real power behind the throne’ as it were... The party gave the unpalatable impression that the UPA government could survive only with the blessings of the party’s leaders, primarily of its general secretary, Prakash Karat. Needless to say, the common man took this to be nothing but unjustified arrogance on their part.

* On CPM general secretary Prakash Karat
It seemed that (Prakash) Karat had decided that the prime minister and the UPA chairperson had to be taught a lesson for the ‘insult’ meted out to him... I feel that the supposed ‘affront’ to Karat by the prime minister and UPA chairperson had upset him so much that he did not or could not objectively consider the consequences of his decision to withdraw support to the government.”

* “The Expulsion: A Great Shock”
Throughout my political career, I have received a lot of guidance and affection from Jyoti Basu, who had been till his last day, my undisputed leader. I felt I should take his opinion at that critical juncture. I met him in Kolkata on July 12, 2008 and showed him my communication with the party. Of course he was fully aware of the party’s stand on the deal and I had no discussion with him on the issue...But he advised me that I should preside over the proceedings of the House on the confidence motion. My resignation, he felt as I too believed, would suggest that I was compromising my position as Speaker and allowing my actions to be dictated by my party, which would be wholly unethical...
...It was most surprising and unbecoming of a principled party like the CPI-M, which I always believed never misled the people, that its general secretary and some of his close colleagues would take a totally misleading position for public consumption, while at the same time confabulating among themselves to force me as Speaker to accept a subservient role to the party, even if such a step transgressed all principles of constitutional propriety.