The seat-sharing within the UDF for the Lok Sabha election got more complicated between the Congress and Socialist Janata Democratic (SJD), as the talks held between the two remained inconclusive on Saturday.
As both parties refused to make any compromises, the decision to give either the Wayanad or Vadakara seat to the SJD was left with the Congress high command. In the third round of talks between the two parties, SJD stuck to its claim that it deserved to contest in both Wayanad and Vadakara. However, the Congress leadership expressed its discontent in giving away the two sitting seats.
According to sources, the Congress offered the Rajya Sabha seat which will be vacant in 2015, but SJD refused to budge. Both the parties have decided to leave the matter to the Congress high command to take a final decision. Speaking to mediapersons, SJD president M P Veerendrakumar said that his party deserved to contest from both the Wayanad and Vadakara Parliament seats. “From a political point of view, we deserve to contest either from Vadakara or
Wayanad. We put our demands before the Congress leadership, but they informed of their inconvenience in giving away the sitting seats. We are told that a final decision will be conveyed after discussing the matter with the Congress central leadership,” Veerendrakumar said. He added that the SJD could not be denied the seat on the basis that both were sitting seats of the Congress. “In the 2009 Parliament elections, the UDF leadership had asked us to contest from the Vadakara seat, but we did not contest as SJD was not a constituent of the UDF at the time. We will stick to our demand.” Veerendrakumar also added that the issue of Rajya Sabha seat also came up in the discussions but refrained from making any further comments.
UDF convener P P Thankachan said that there were some issues and a final decision would be taken by the Congress high command. Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Mullapally Ramachandran had walked out of the UDF convention held earlier in the day, over his displeasure in giving the Vadakara Lok Sabha seat to SJD. However, his office said that he had left to attend other engagements in the district. Apart from Veerendrakumar and Thankachan, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, KPCC president V M Sudheeran, Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala, SJD secretary general Varghese George, parliamentary board chairman Charupara Ravi and general secretary Sheikh P Harris were present.