Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president Sunny Joseph claimed that Chief Minister Pinrayi Vijayan is repeatedly raising baseless allegations against Rahul Gandhi.
KPCC president pointed out that Rahul Gandhi was leading protests across the country against the policies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
He said that Pinarayi Vijayan is making such allegations to facilitate the CPI(M)-BJP alliance in the upcoming Assembly elections.
"Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan is never ready to say even a single word against the Prime Minister. Does the CPI(M) central leadership approve of the Chief Minister's stance? We all know that CPI(M) candidates in Tamil Nadu are asking for votes by using the photograph of Rahul Gandhi, the leader of India's opposition," he said while addressing a press conference here today, reported ANI.
"We know that because he spoke out strongly against the BJP and took firm political stands, more than 30 cases-36 cases to be exact- have already been filed against him in various parts of the country. Even though BJP leaders tried to trap him in legal cases to make him retreat, Rahul Gandhi is moving forward courageously as the face and leader of secular India."
"The country witnessed the malicious attempts made to revoke Rahul Gandhi's Parliament membership from Wayanad. Why is it that [the Chief Minister is silent on this]...?" Joseph said.
Congress General Secretary KC Venugopal on Tuesday alleged a "clear and unholy nexus" between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the CPI(M) in Kerala.
He claimed that both CPI(M) and the BJP have a tacit understanding in several constituencies.
Speaking to reporters in Alappuzha, Venugopal also said that his allegations are 'not baseless' and can be understood by analysing the candidate lists of the two parties.
Kerala CM Vijayan has dismissed the allegations and termed them as "baseless and absurd."
Addressing a press conference today in Idukki, Vijayan said, "These are baseless and absurd allegations. In 1971, when A K Gopalan contested from Palakkad, the Congress candidate was an RSS-backed leader."
The Congress, the chief minister said, "has a long history of aligning with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh without any hesitation."
"Such alliances have been repeated multiple times, eventually leading to what is known as the 'coalition of convenience.' Was it not the Congress that helped the Bharatiya Janata Party open its account in Nemom? The leakage of Congress votes was evident. The same pattern was visible during the Thrissur parliamentary elections as well."
The BJP had won its first-ever MLA seat in Kerala from the Nemom constituency in 2016 with the victory of O Rajagopal. However, in the 2021 elections, BJP's Kummanam Rajasekharan lost the seat to CPI (M)'s V Sivankutty,
Vijayan further said, "The BJP's primary political opponent has always been the Left. At various points, it is the Congress that has entered into opportunistic understandings. The BJP knows that it can easily deal with the Congress, and in many cases, it prefers a Congress victory. These allegations of a 'deal' are nothing but a preemptive defence by the Congress to cover up its own history of such arrangements. Those who are making these accusations are the ones who have long been accustomed to such political deals."
Meanwhile, in the upcoming April 9 elections to the 140-seat Kerala Assembly, the KPCC president Sunny Joseph is pitted against K K Shailaja of the CPI (M). Shailaja had lost the 2011 election to Sunny Joseph by a narrow margin of around 2,700 votes. Joseph had also won the 2016 and the 2021 Assembly elections from Peeravoor.
(With inputs from ANI)