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Special pages :
Letter to Gleb Bokii, August 9, 1921
Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, 1976, Moscow, Volume 45, pages 248b-249a.
9.VIII.1921
Comrade Bokii:
In your letter about Shelekhes (Yakov Savelyevich) you say: âmany are putting in a word for himâ, including Lenin, and you request âpermission to ignore all petitions and pressures on the Gokhran caseâ.[1]
This is something I cannot allow.
The inquiry I sent in is neither âintercessionâ, nor âpressureâ, nor even âpetitionâ.
It is my duty to inquire, once doubt about the correctness of the proceedings has been brought up with me.
It is your duty to give me a reply in substance: âthe reasons or the evidence are serious, they are such-and-such, I object, to his release, to any mitigationâ and so on and so forth.
Those are the lines, in substance, on which you must reply to me.
You are free to reject any petitions and âintercessionsâ; âpressureâ is an unlawful act. But, I repeat, it is a mistake on your part to have confused an inquiry from the Chairman of the CPC, and a petition, intercession or pressure.
V. Ulyanov (Lenin)
Chairman, CPC
- â The Gokhran (State Depository of Valuables) case mentioned in the letter arose as a result, of the discovery of a large shortage of diamonds. Gokhran valuer, Y. S. Shelekhes, was accused of stealing valuables and was arrested by the All-Russia Cheka. On August 8, 1921, Lenin sent an inquiry to Deputy Chairman of the All-Russia Cheka, I. S. Unschlicht, over Shelekhesâs arrest and received a reply on August 9, from G. I. Bokii, a member of the Collegium of the Cheka. The present letter was written by Lenin in connection with his unsatisfactory reply.
See this volume, Documents 173, 180, 216 and 221; and also Collected Works, Fifth (Russian) Edition, Vol. 53, Document 215.