The Congress jump-started its Lok Sabha campaign in Kerala, with the AICC general secretary (organisation), K.C. Venugopal flagging off a Statewide electioneering tour jointly captained by Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president K. Sudhakaran and Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan in Kasaragod on Friday.
The KPCC’s political peregrination, Samara Agni, will cover 20 Lok Sabha constituencies and culminate with a mammoth rally in Thiruvananthapuram on February 29.
The grand stage in Kasaragod broadcast a picture of unity, with Congress leaders across the party’s factional spectrum finding a space on the dais.
Earlier, speaking to journalists, Mr. Satheesan said town hall meetings with ordinary people reeling under the misrule of the Central and State governments were the highlight of the party’s public outreach programme.
Mr. Satheesan said Samara Agni would stand in stark contrast to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan’s “out-of-touch and elitist” Nava Kerala Sadas, which the Left Democratic Front (LDF) government allegedly conducted in the manner of royal courts populated by genuflecting courtiers and supplicants.
Inaugurating the rally, Mr. Venugopal alleged that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Mr. Vijayan were secret accomplices.
“The Chief Minister of Delhi is trying to fend off an ED arrest. Former Jharkhand CM is in jail. Assured that Mr. Modi is at the helm, Mr Vijayan is the only non-BJP leader who can sleep peacefully without fearing the ED or CBI will knock at the door,” Mr. Venugopal said.
Mr. Satheesan compared the alleged Modi-Pinarayi pact to the Stalin-Hitler axis struck in 1939. “A communist dictator and a fascist leader cynically agreed to carve up the world between themselves, leading to a genocidal war. History seems to be repeating itself in Kerala,” he said.
Mr. Sudhakaran said Mr. Vijayan’s nepotism and corruption cases against his family had caused fissures in the CPI(M).
“Though muted, CPI(M) leaders G. Sudhakaran, T.M. Thomas Isaac and M.A. Baby were critical of the current disposition. He said Samara Agni was also for idealistic communists resentful of Mr. Vijayan’s “one-man and for-family” rule.
Senior Congress leader Ramesh Chennithala cast the LS campaign as a twin-pronged fight against the BJP and the LDF. He said the Congress would not allow the BJP to open an account in the State.
AICC general secretary in charge of Kerala, Deepa Dasmunsi, UDF convener M.M. Hassan, MPs Kodikunnil Suresh and Rajmohan Unnithan, and other senior leaders were present.
