Thiruvananthapuram: Chief Minister Oommen Chandy has pushed the AICC leadership to te backfoot by standing firm on granting party tickets to his close confidants and cabinet colleagues much against the wishes of the party leadership.
Top leaders of the All-India Congress Committee feel that Mr Chandy’s firm positioning to field even ‘tainted’ ministers and KPCC president V. M. Sudheeran’s spirited opposition to the proposal left the leadership in a quandary.
Top party sources said both the senior leaders failed to assess the ground reality and are standing for their loyalists and to protect their respective groups. But they are more agitated with Mr Chandy over his show of defiance and emotional blackmail in the form of his decision not to contest the elections should his stand be accepted. A top AICC leader told DC that Congress president Sonia Gandhi got so disturbed that she did not feel like sitting in the meeting for more than 15 minutes.
“The AICC leadership did not want to take the blame of not fielding the candidates,” the leader said. “But instead of sorting out the issues amicably between the two senior leaders, they dragged on the issue giving ammunition to the Opposition and the media alike to criticize the State and central leaderships.”
A senior AICC leader told DC that Chandy was more concerned of giving seats to his ‘team’ rather than checking the winnability of the five ‘tainted’ sitting MLA’s. But he also informed that Mr Chandy has taken a huge risk in rallying behind them.
It should be recalled that this is not the first time Mr Chandy had given a hard time to the AICC leadership. The first was in 2009 when he wanted his trusted then Youth Congress State president T. Siddique continue in the post. Mr Gandhi wanted a change of guard at the helm of the youth leadership which was vehemently opposed by Chandy as the former initiated an interview process where M. Liju was chosen the new president. Mr Chandy threatened the AICC leadership that he would not cooperate with the talks to the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections forcing Mr Gandhi to retain Siddique.
Later in 2011, when the YC list for the Assembly elections was being prepared, Mr Gandhi avoided several youth leaders belonging to the Chandy camp which did not go down well with him. Then Mr Gandhi walked out the meeting not giving an opportunity to talk with Mr Chandy in person. But a powerful Mr Chandy fielded Congress MPs to influence the AICC leadership which saw Mr Gandhi surrendering to his demands.
