The CPI(M) in Kerala appears to be heading for yet another internal convulsion with the CPI(M) Polit Bureau openly rejecting Leader of the Opposition V.S. Achuthanandan’s endorsement of the demand for a CBI probe into the conspiracy angle of the T.P. Chandrasekharan murder case and party leaders not hiding their displeasure about his action.
In a terse statement issued in Delhi on Saturday, the CPI(M) Polit Bureau said Mr. Achuthanandan’s letter was ‘a wrong step’ and something ‘not in conformity with the party stand’ on the issue. Talking to reporters, party general secretary Prakash Karat made it clear that there was no need for a CBI probe in the case. The judicial verdict in the case had already come, he said.
This is for the second time in the last few months that the party Polit Bureau is publicly reprimanding Mr. Achuthanandan’s stand on various issues. In October, it had asked him to desist from making uncalled for remarks on issues that had been ‘decided’ by the party’s central leadership.
The reprimand followed Mr. Achuthanandan’s comment in the course of a TV interview on the last Kerala Assembly elections and the SNC-Lavalin case.
Taking his cue from the Polit Bureau statement, CPI(M) State secretary Pinarayi Vijayan told meetings addressed by him in Pathanamthitta and Kottayam districts in the course of his ‘Kerala Raksha Yatra’ on Saturday that Mr. Achuthanandan’s stand on the CBI probe question did not tally with the party stand.
‘UDF conspiracy’
According to him, the entire episode involving slain RMP leader T.P. Chandrasekharan’s widow K.K. Rema’s fast and the move for a CBI probe were part of a conspiracy hatched by the ruling United Democratic Front (UDF) targeting the CPI(M). The attempt now was to make Mr. Achuthanandan a participant in it, he said.
According to party sources, the official faction of the State CPI(M) had taken up the issue with the Central leadership on Friday itself and sought an immediate response to it. Sources indicated that the issue would now be taken up by the full meeting of the Polit Bureau and would then go to the CPI(M) Central committee, of which Mr. Achuthanandan is a member, at its next meeting, though any immediate drastic action against Mr. Achuthanandan might be unlikely given that elections are just weeks away.