Idukki (Ker), Mar 9 (PTI) Senior Kerala CPI(M) leader C V Varghese’s alleged remarks that KPCC president K Sudhakaran was “living on CPI(M)’s favour” triggered a political row on Wednesday as prominent Congress leaders rallied behind their party chief demanding stringent legal action against the former.
The controversy erupted after a video surfaced in the public domain in which the Idukki district secretary purportedly said that “Sudhakaran’s life is CPI(M)’s favour” as his party did not want to kill a “wretched creature”.
The speech was reportedly made during a recent protest meet organised by the Marxist party at Cheruthoni in the hill district against the alleged “murderous politics” of the Congress, which had convened an explanatory session in the wake of the killing of SFI activist Dheeraj in the Government Engineering College here.
During the meeting, Sudhakaran had defended the Youth Congress activists who had been arrested in connection with Dheeraj’s murder.
As Varghese’s controversial speech surfaced, senior Congress leaders, including AICC member K C Venugopal, opposition leaders V D Satheesan and Ramesh Chennithala, came out in support of Sudhakaran.
While Satheesan felt that the CPI(M) district secretary was speaking like a “goon on the street”, Venugopal alleged that the Marxist party had conspired to kill Sudhakaran several times before and has now publicly admitted to it.
Terming the remarks as “sheer arrogance”, Satheesan also said the inflammatory remarks amounted to trigger a political clash and a case should be registered against Varghese at the earliest.
“The statement is a challenge to the rule of law…the district secretary should not forget the fact that Sudhakaran is the president of the KPCC. The CPI(M) has stooped to the level of appointing people who make such provocative and degenerating statements as district secretaries,” Chennithala said.
Varghese’s speech proved that CPI(M) was the advocate of murderous politics, Chennithala said, adding that a non-bailable case should be charged against him.
However, the CPI(M) leader defended his remarks saying that his speech was just a reply to what Sudhakaran said in the recent meeting where he had strongly “defended” Dheeraj’s murderers. PTI LGK LGK HDA HDA
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