On Monday, the Left Democratic Front’s (LDF) Lok Sabha campaign seemed to struggle for a political lifeline to pull itself out of a swirling vortex of arguably damning election-era controversies.
For one, the ruling front appeared striving to fend off Congress’s aggressive bid to yoke the CPI(M) local leadership to the accidental Improvised Explosive Device (IED) blast that killed one bomb-maker and seriously injured two others at Panoor in Kannur district last week.
The Congress seemed keen to shackle the CPI(M)‘s Lok Sabha campaign in the Vadakara constituency to the politically burdensome crime. Senior Congress leader Ramesh Chennithala demanded a CBI or NIA probe into the blast. He accused Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and CPI(M) State secretary M.V. Govindan of giving legal and political cover to party workers involved in the bomb fabrication that went awry.
‘All party workers’
Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan alleged that the Panoor blast had CPI(M)‘s handprint all over it. “The deceased and injured are party workers. The local CPI(M) leadership called on the family of the deceased. The few arrested by the police are also CPI(M) activists,” he said.
Mr. Vijayan and Mr. Govindan sought to distance the CPI(M) from the blast. They saw no wrongdoing in local CPI(M) leaders calling on the family of the deceased and termed the “social visit” altruistic. The CPI(M) also used the police’s purported finding that the suspects had fabricated the bombs to settle scores with a rival criminal gang to defend its campaign at the hustings.
On its part, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) sought to play up the Enforcement Directorate’s purported finding that CPI(M) had secreted away large tranches of unaccounted money in real estate and secret bank accounts.
The CPI(M) has termed the ED’s action politically motivated. However, the constant comings and goings of CPI(M) leaders outside the ED’s office in Kochi has arguably hurt the political optics of the LDF’s LS election campaign.
‘Vilification crusade’
Mr. Vijayan said that the ED’s notices to CPI(M) leaders in Thrissur seemed calibrated to shore up the BJP’s campaign in the constituency. However, he added that the vilification crusade would not pass muster with voters.
Mr. Vijayan also termed the Congress an enabler of the BJP-controlled Union government. The Congress had hankered for the arrest and incarceration of AAP leader and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. He alleged that the party pushed the same duplicitous line in Kerala.
