THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Congress high command has taken a serious note of the boycott of the UDF meeting by senior leaders Oommen Chandy and Ramesh Chennithala. Opposition leader VD Satheesan apprised the central leadership of the deliberate move by the senior leaders to boycott the UDF meeting. Both of them attended the parliamentary party meeting in the assembly complex ahead of the Rajya Sabha election, ahead of the UDF meeting.
It is reliably learnt that Chandy and Chennithala are targeting Sudhakaran mostly for his unilateral party decisions. Satheesan had held detailed talks with Chandy at his house in the capital city during the weekend. Sudhakaran and Satheesan are upset that despite their all-out efforts to take all leaders along, the decision by the senior-most leaders to skip the meeting has created fissures in the UDF leadership.
“They could have attended the UDF meeting as they had come to cast their votes in the assembly. Satheesan had convened the parliamentary party meeting there. Their ploy is to create unrest in the party so that they can convey the message to the rank and file in the party that the incumbent leadership is a failure,” said a senior Congress leader.
The two leaders have been upset that the state leadership has not taken them into confidence when the recently appointed state general secretaries were given responsibilities. But the state leadership’s view is that it is unwarranted as it is their prerogative. Among the 23 general secretaries, only 16 of them have been given responsibilities, indicating that there will be a second leg of allocations, including the charge of feeder organisations. The three woman general secretaries — Deepthi Mary Varghese, Alippatta Jameela and K A Thulasi — are yet to be given charges.