The Union Minister of States for power K.C. Venugopal has said that the Communist Party of India Marxist [CPI(M)], which had once helped leaders such as A.K. Gopalan and Krishna Pillai to go in hiding for nobler causes has degenerated to be a party giving safe asylum to slayers and their aides.
Inaugurating a get-together programme of head-load workers organised by the Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC) at the Town Hall here on Monday, Mr. Venugopal said that it was high time that the CPI(M) made a serious introspection about its attitude towards political rivals, at least in the wake of the brutal murder of the Revolutionary Marxist Party leader T.P. Chandrashekaran, the case in which many CPI(M) leaders and workers had already appeared in the list of the accused.
It was a grave mistake on the part of the party to conclude that the media attention would fade away from the issue after the initial few days like it used to happen in other murder cases. Its leaders fancied that this (the T.P. murder case) also could be “handled” in the same fashion they dealt with many other political murders in the past. “But that was a serious mistake,” said Mr. Venugopal.
The same party, which sternly washed its hand by stating that it had nothing to do with the murder in the initial stage began to change its stance slowly once proofs for the party’s involvement in the act began to come out one after the other, he said. Maintaining that the Congress as a political party wanted a foolproof investigation into the case not because it is averse to CPI(M) but because it sincerely wanted the “real culprits” behind this heinous act to be brought before the law, he said that anyone with at least a little amount of conscience would only support this investigation.
The Congress leader also reminded that the CPI(M), which upheld the ideology of the abolition of bourgeoisies was ironically turning intolerant towards the representatives of the working class itself to the extend of even annihilating them often. KPCC secretary N. Subramanyan, INTUC State vice president K. Sadiri Koya and congress leaders P.M. Niyas and M.T. Padma among others spoke.
