The State committee of the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) would take a formal decision on inducting V. Surendran Pillai, the lone Kerala Congress(J) MLA to stay with the ruling alliance, into the Achuthanandan Cabinet late next week.
Although the LDF State committee was scheduled to meet on May 6, it has been postponed as top CPI(M) leaders would be away in New Delhi from May 5 to 7 to attend party Central committee meeting. Alliance convener and CPI(M) Central committee member Vaikom Viswan told The Hindu over phone on Saturday that the LDF State committee would meet shortly after their return from New Delhi.
Mr. Viswan, who likened P.J. Joseph to ‘Judas' at a public meeting held in Kottayam to mark May Day, said that none of the Kerala Congress leaders had given any hint to the LDF leadership their plans to leave the ruling alliance. “It was most unethical on his part to have held discussions with Mani even as he remained in the LDF,” the LDF convener said.
According to LDF sources, the CPI(M) leadership has already indicated their willingness to induct Mr. Pillai into the Cabinet. The CPI leadership also is reported to be fully supportive of the idea. Party State secretary Veliyam Bhargavan was unusually harsh in his reaction to P.J. Joseph's decision to take his party out of the LDF and merge it with Kerala Congress(Mani).
Mr. Bhargavan had raised the KC(J)-KC(M) merger issue at an LDF committee meeting some months ago and had even insisted on an immediate clarification from the KC(J) leaders. Mr. Joseph had then told the meeting that the reports about secret parleys between his party and the KC(M) were baseless. Mr. Bhargavan, according to his party sources, is sore that Mr. Joseph did not give even persons like him, who had supported his re-induction into the Cabinet after the sexual misbehaviour case, any hint about his plans to move out of the ruling alliance.
Besides taking a decision on inducting Mr. Pillai into the Cabinet, the LDF leadership could also be expected to mount a scathing attack on Mr. Joseph and the larger implications of the KC(J)-KC(M) merger for Kerala politics and society. CPI(M) State secretary Pinarayi Vijayan has already set the ball rolling by coming down heavily on the reported role played by the Catholic Church top brass in egging leaders of the two parties to sink their differences and unite their two parties.
