Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi dies at 71 after being in coma for 8 years

Senior Congress leader Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi, who was in coma since 2008, passed away on Monday at a hospital in New Delhi.  He was 72.

He is survived by his wife Deepa Dasmunsi and son Priyadeep Dasmuni.

“ He had been critically ill since the past one month and succumbed to the illness at 12.10 pm. His family members including wife Deepa Dasmunsi and their son were at his bedside at that time,” Apollo hospital authorities said.

Dasmunsi was heading the All India Football Federation when he suffered a paralytic stroke and he could only breathe through a tracheostomy tube. The blood supply to Dasmunsi’s brain, according to doctors had been cut off leading to a neurological damage, that rendered him unable to speak or recognise any one.

He began his political career with the Indian Youth Congress and later entered the Indian Parliament in 1971. He became a minister for the first time in 1985, when he was sworn in as Union Minister of State, Commerce. Within his home State, he was known for his strong anti-Left credentials.

Dasmunsi, who represented the Raiganj Lok Sabha constituency in West Bengal, served as the union minister of parliamentary affairs and the minister of information and broadcasting during the first term of the Manmohan Singh-led UPA government. He hogged headlines after banning Western TV networks, including AXN and Fashion TV, for programs with “obscene” content.

Dasmunsi served as the President of the All India Football Federation for almost 20 years and was the first Indian to serve as a match commissioner in a FIFA World Cup.

With inputs from PTI