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Challenges Pinarayi to prove them, sees attempt to distract attention from logging line
K. Sudhakaran, MP and chairman of the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC), said on Saturday that Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayans’ allegations against him were intended to distract from the controversy over illegal logging in the State. He challenged the chief minister to prove the allegations.
Mr Sudhakaran, addressing a press conference at the DCC office in Kochi on Saturday, said he would produce a number of former students and teachers at Government Brennen College, Thalassery, to refute Mr Vijayan’s claims . (Earlier, in response to an interview Mr. Sudhakaran gave to a media outlet, Mr. Vijayan referred to a brawl in college, where he and Mr. Sudhakaran were contemporaries.)
Informal statements
Mr Sudhakaran said there were political differences between the various groups of students at the college at the time, but no violent action was planned. He claimed parts of the interview that appeared in a magazine had been disclosed to the reporter unofficially. Mr. Sudhakaran criticized the journalist for not keeping his promise that the remarks would not be published.
The congressman said that allegations such as plans to kidnap Mr. Vijayan’s children were absolutely false. Why then has no complaint been filed with the police in this regard, he asked. Mr. Vijayan had stooped down to make allegations against him and Congress and he would not respond in the same way.
He said that the chief minister, by bringing allegations against him, had departed from the scenario prepared by the public relations agencies hired by him. This was the case with the chief minister speaking in his own style, Sudhakaran said.
The BJP alliance
The Congress leader alleged that allegations by chief ministers that Congress colluded with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the recent assembly elections were misleading. Mr Vijayan’s first electoral victory in Koothuparamba, in 1971, was achieved with the help of Jan Sangh, the predecessor of the BJP, he said, adding that the CPI (M) had an agreement with the BJP. in the recent Assembly elections.
On the felling of trees, he said Congress was not against the interests of farmers, but would oppose those who take unfair advantage of the Finance Department’s orders on tree felling.
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