The Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) has convened a series of meetings on Thursday and Friday amid increasing nervousness about the possibilities of the United Democratic Front (UDF) slipping into policy paralysis.
The party-government coordination committee meeting is perhaps the most important among them. It is being convened in the backdrop of an impasse on the way forward on the issue of renewal of licences for as many as 418 liquor bars. No consensus has been reached on the issue that has now wound its way to the court, which has issued a six-week ultimatum for a decision on the liquor policy. Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and KPCC president V.M. Sudheeran are on two diametrically opposite poles. The differences have also blurred the factional loyalties, with several leaders reluctant to toe the lines of their respective factional leaders. But what is worrying the UDF leadership is not the tussle over liquor policy, but the difficulty in getting ahead with other policy matters and decisions.
The Congress has been losing control over several local bodies and the party leadership has not been able to arrest this trend. The KPCC wants to push the party apparatus into an election mode for the local body polls. But the series of no confidence motions against ruling dispensation have virtually paralysed decentralised development process. Sources said that if this trend continued, the majority of the local bodies under Congress-UDF control would not be able to spend Plan funds.
Mr. Sudheeran has promised to initiate the reorganisation of the party, a process which was launched by his predecessor Ramesh Chennithala. These three issues are expected to dominate the various party meetings.
Apart from the coordination committee meeting, Mr. Sudheeran has also convened a general body of the KPCC on Friday afternoon, the first since assuming office, preceded by a meeting of office-bearers of KPCC, Congress Legislature Party (CLP), DCC, and feeder organisation presidents.Given the size of these meetings, no major decisions were expected other than providing a platform for party leaders to express their views, sources said.