Communist Party of India (Marxist) former Idukki district unit secretary M.M. Mani, an accused in the murder of Congress activists, has reiterated that the United Democratic Front (UDF) government is slapping trumped-up charges against CPI(M) activists with the intention of destroying the party.
Mr. Mani, who has relocated himself to Kottayam following a High Court directive not to remain in Idukki (made as part of the conditions while granting bail on Friday), was inaugurating the fourth day’s agitation at Metran Kayal, near Kumarakom, being taken up by the party as part of its land stir. He alleged that Home Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan had implicated innocent persons in the T.P. Chandrasekharan murder case. Mr. Radhakrishnan’s narrow victory in Kottayam was on account of the compromises he had made communal forces, and as a Minister, he was paying for it, Mr. Mani said.
In an apparent reference to the Communist Party of India, Mr. Mani said that while resistance from the UDF leadership to the land agitation was understandable, certain other political parties, in an effort to cover up their incapability to take up such agitations, had taken a negative attitude. The CPI(M) agitation would intensify in the coming days, he said, as the UDF was continuing its support to the land mafia.
Hundreds of volunteers participated in the land agitation. Mr. Mani, following the court directive, has made his relatives’ house at Padua, near Kidangoor, his temporary residence.
