Vasilii Begma

Born Jan. 1 (14), 1906, in Odessa; died Aug. 12, 1965, in Kiev. Soviet Party and state leader. One of the leaders of the partisan movement in the Ukraine during the Great Patriotic War of 1941–45. Member of the CPSU from 1927.

Begma was born into a worker’s family. He began Komsomol and trade-union work in 1928; later, he held administrative Party positions. During the Great Patriotic War of 1941–45, Begma was secretary of the underground Rovno oblast committee of the CP (Bolshevik) of the Ukraine, a member of the illegal Central Committee of the CP (Bolshevik) of the Ukraine, commander of a partisan group, and chief of the Rovno staff of the partisan movement. From 1944 to 1949 he was first secretary of the Rovno oblast committee, and from 1950 to 1959, of the Khmel’nitskii oblast committee of the CP of the Ukraine; from 1959 he was chairman of the Party Commission of the Central Committee of the CP of the Ukraine. He was a delegate to the Eighteenth through Twenty-first congresses of the CPSU and a deputy to the first through fifth convocations of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. Begma was awarded four Orders of Lenin as well as other orders and medals.