Ahead of INDIA bloc meet, CPM asks Congress to 'clear air' on Kerala poll remarks on ‘deal’ with BJP

NEW DELHI: Ahead of the INDIA bloc meeting on Monday, CPI(M) general secretary MA Baby, in a sharply worded letter to Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, has raised the allegations by Rahul Gandhi and other senior leaders during the Kerala polls that CPI(M) and the BJP had struck a deal and their call for ED action against then CM Pinarayi Vijayan. The Left party has asked the Congress to “clear the air regarding such disruptive moves.”

According to sources, in the letter to Kharge, Baby has alleged that there was a “systematic campaign” by the Congress leadership during the Kerala elections, wherein it was alleged that Vijayan had also struck a deal with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and a question was posed ‘Otherwise, why is it that he has not been interrogated or arrested by the Enforcement Directorate’?

Baby makes it clear that “unless these matters are clarified, the very purpose of the INDIA bloc would be in question”. “As the President of the Congress, it is up to you and the Congress leadership to clear the air regarding such disruptive moves,” Baby is learnt to have said in the letter, putting the ball in Kharge’s court.

The CPM general secretary has said that these were not stray remarks made in the heat of an election campaign, but were “the centrepiece of the Congress party-led UDF’s political campaign. “Every national leader, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi, and yourself, made such allegations repeatedly,” Baby has said in the letter.

In this backdrop, Monday’s INDIA bloc meeting is likely to see some straight talk and fireworks. The two-term CPI(M) led LDF lost to the Congress-led UDF in the recent assembly polls. Despite the sharp tenor of the letter, it is expected that CPM is not going to boycott the meeting, though the party leadership will take a final call on Sunday, senior leaders said.

While highlighting in his letter that the leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, repeatedly called for ED action against the then Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan, the CPM general secretary asks Kharge that “can this be termed as an anti-BJP stance or is it a case of inviting the Modi govt to take illegal punitive action against a fellow opposition leader?”

Baby recalls that the INDIA bloc was constituted as a broad platform to politically fight the BJP, and CPI(M) has worked sincerely to see such a united platform emerge.

Noting that strangely, now, the CPI(M) was being accused of having a deal with the BJP, Baby has said in the letter that this is a canard they cannot take lightly, as “this strikes at the very basis of the unity forged against the BJP.”

However, Baby has assured that CPI(M) will fully cooperate in Parliament with the INDIA bloc and other opposition parties to put up a united fight against the authoritarian, communal, and anti-people policies of the Modi govt.

The INDIA bloc meeting, happening after a long gap, is taking place amid changing dynamics within the Alliance, with DMK already saying it will not attend in the backdrop of the Congress severing ties with it to support TVK to form the government in Tamil Nadu. On Thursday, DMK spokesperson TKS Ekangovan told ANI that DMK is no longer part of the INDIA bloc.

In Monday's meeting, where the future strategy of the INDIA bloc is proposed to be chalked out, former West Bengal CM and national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee will be there to present the TMC's views and rally support amid the current developments in the state. The TMC, which has all along positioned itself as a dominant regional player within the INDIA bloc, is set to lose the clout the party enjoyed in the backdrop of the recent developments - the defeat in Bengal and the recent split in the party.

According to sources, at the INDIA bloc meeting, TMC leaders, among various issues, propose to share their views on the role of the Election Commission, the developments on the counting day and the reasons for defeat.