PALAKKAD: The simmering tensions between the CPM and the CPI at the grassroots level burst into the open in Palakkad on Tuesday after CPM district secretariat member and former Lok Sabha MP S Ajaya Kumar launched a sharp and personal attack on CPI state secretary Binoy Viswam, questioning both the CPI’s political relevance and its role in the LDF.
While inaugurating a public meeting at Mannur in Ottapalam – an area long marked by CPM-CPI rivalry – he accused Binoy of behaving “like a fourth-rate politician”.
Kumar accused the CPI of following a convenient political line: holding the CPM fully responsible for defeats while appropriating all credit in the event of a victory. He went on to question the CPI’s electoral strength, claiming the party commands barely five percent of the vote in Kerala and lacks the capacity to win any Assembly constituency or local body on its own.