Siliguri Mayor Ashok Bhattacharya stable

Senior CPI(M) leader and Siliguri Mayor 69-year-old Ashok Bhattacharya, who underwent an angioplasty at a city-based hospital was on Wednesday shifted to a ward, doctors said.

Bhattacharya, who had suffered a cardiac arrest on Sunday, was shifted to a private hospital here on Tuesday where angioplasty was performed to put stents, hospital sources said.

"Ashok Bhattacharya was shifted to the ward after his angioplasty. He is doing well to the treatment. We are keeping a contact watch on him," the sources said.

Former Team India captain Sourav Ganguly paid a visit to Bhattacharya at the hospital on Wednesday evening.

Bhattacharya, considered a mass leader, became a member of the CPI(M) in Siliguri in 1968.

He was elected the chairman of Siliguri municipality in 1988.

He became an MLA for the first time in 1991 and was appointed as the state municipal affairs minister.

Bhattacharya was elevated to the post of a cabinet minister, which he held for three terms till Left Front lost the 2011 Assembly polls.