THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: With just a day left for the campaigning, top leaders of the CPM and Congress are busy trading charges against each other regarding secret understanding with the BJP. The CPM had on Thursday accused the Congress of fielding Ayyappa Seva Singham leader D Vijayakumar to woo BJP-RSS votes and now Pinarayi has gone one step further alleging that veteran leader A.K. Antony was working out an arrangement with the Sangh Parivar. Antony said Pinarayi was getting restless because he had stated that CPM and BJP had the same interests.
CPI central control commission chairman Pannyan Raveendran said Antony was in the habit of making such statements to mislead voters on the eve of polls. He was one of the architects of Kolibi alliance in 1991. Since 1957 elections the Jan Sangh or the BJP had failed to open their account in the Kerala Assembly. However, it happened in 2016 when O Rajagopal got elected from Nemom thanks to Congress. “Antony should first explain where all the votes of Congress in the constituency went. The Congress didn’t even show the audacity to probe the vote shift,” he said.
The Left leaders slammed the Congress for trying to portray the support given to JD(S) in Karnataka as big “sacrifice.” “They had 120 plus seat in Karnataka. After elections it got reduced to 78. How can they blame others for the defeat?” Pannyan asked. Pinarayi had on Thursday launched a scathing attack on Antony accusing him of seeking the support of RSS for the victory of UDF candidate in Chengannur. CPM state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan also targeted Antony saying that the veteran leader had publicly admitted that UDF had fielded a candidate who could even get votes of BJP.
Stung by Pinarayi-Kodiyeri attack, Opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala hit out at the CPM leaders. “Pina-rayi Vijayan is not uttering a word against Narendra Modi. This clearly indicates the CPM - BJP tie-up. Kodiyeri is functioning like the BJP’s PRO in Chen-gannur,” he said. With just hours now left for the campaigning to end, the LDF and UDF have scaled up their attack over RSS-BJP link. Unfortunately, the issues of the common have relegated to backstage.
