What are the first names that come to mind when asked to name members of the CPI-M? Jyoti Basu, Harkishen Singh Surjeet, Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, possibly Somnath Chatterjee or E K Nayanar. Those with long memories may be moved to name names from the past such as E M S Namboodaripad.

But which of you would ever think of a gentleman called Radhika Ranjan Pramanik?

Pramanik represents Mathurapur -- a constituency in the South 24 Parganas district of West Bengal -- in the Lok Sabha. He has been a member of Parliament since 1989. Yet, despite being a parliamentarian for 14 years, few would have heard of him even in his own state. And that says something about the hypocrisy of the chattering classes...

On February 3, Pramanik announced he was snapping ties with the CPI-M. He gave a very specific reason for doing so, accusing his former comrades of ‘exerting pressure to misuse funds from the MP quota for the coming Panchayat polls'.

He added, ‘When I made it clear I would spend the money for schools, colleges, hospitals and other developmental works, the district committee leaders insisted I spend this amount for panchayat elections. I cannot abide by the party's dictate on the MP fund. It is meant for public welfare, and should be used for it.' He has, I understand, subsequently repeated the same charges in a television interview.

This, of course, is precisely what the Samajwadi Party boss Mulayam Singh Yadav has accused Chief Minister Mayawati of doing. He says there is taped evidence of the lady ordering her party colleagues -- MPs and MLAs alike -- to give at least a portion of their funds to the party coffers.

The Bahujan Samaj Party leader has vehemently denied doing or saying anything of the sort, accusing Mulayam Singh Yadav of doctoring evidence. The controversy has ballooned, leading to violence in the Uttar Pradesh Vidhan Sabha and not a little commotion in the Lok Sabha.

Pardon me, but the stench of double standards starts to become overpowering at this point. Radhika Ranjan Pramanik had made precisely the same allegations about the Marxist leadership a month before the Samajwadi Party came up with its tape. Yet, with the exception of a few newspapers in West Bengal itself, his remarks were given short shrift elsewhere. But is there any difference at all in the substance of the two charges?

There are, of course, a few differences in detail. For one thing, even the Samajwadi Party does not dare to claim the Uttar Pradesh chief minister demanded her colleagues spend everything on party purposes -- which is what Pramanik has accused his party bosses of doing.

Second, while the Bahujan Samaj Party leader has rebutted the allegations against her, there has not been a single peep from the Alimuddin Street headquarters of the CPI-M -- though it has been a month and a half since Pramanik publicly accused the party. The sole response has been a show-cause notice from the local district committee, which Pramanik did not even bother to respond to.

I can understand why the Left Front is not keen to discuss Pramanik's allegations, even if it is only to rebut them. Panchayat elections are due soon in West Bengal. Raising the issue of misuse of funds allotted for development work could lead to voters wondering where the money has gone.

But what of other parties? Why is it that neither parliamentarians nor the media are discussing what he said? Is there one standard for the Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies, and another one altogether for 'secular' and 'progressive' groups?

There is, of course, a larger issue -- the question of giving MPs and MLAs such discretionary funds in the first place. When the Union finance minister proposed cutting the subsidy on urea by Rs 700 crore [seven billion] there was an immediate uproar. Well, the total amount doled out to legislators -- those from Parliament as well as those in the assemblies -- comes to about Rs 4,000 crore [40 billion]! Yet nobody seems to know what is being done with all that money. (I invite you to name the development activity in your own constituency which has been started with these funds.)

Is nobody concerned? Well, it seems at least one man was indeed worried about the misuse of funds -- Radhika Ranjan Pramanik. What does it say of us that nobody studied his charges seriously, and that even now we are not debating the issues involved?