Noida (Uttar Pradesh), May 22: Veteran Marxist leader Harkishan Singh Surjeet, 92, has come out of coma, and doctors attending to him have said

that his condition is "slightly better", though he remains on the "critical" list. “He has been taken off the ventilator and there has been some improvement in his overall condition,” said Dr Purushottam Lal, the chief medical officer at the Metro Hospital in Noida, Uttar Pradesh.

Surjeet was admitted to the hospital on May 6, and slipped into coma on May17. A CAT scan shows that his brain is functioning, while his blood-related parameters are said to be normal.

The veteran CPI (M) leader is suffering from cardiac-respiratory problems, and was not included in the Communist Party of India (Marxist) Polit Bureau at the party's 19th congress in April this year as a result. He was instead nominated as a special invitee to the Central Committee. (ANI)