In what is being seen as a bid to contain the resentment from within and revitalise the party after a below-par performance during this year’s Assembly elections, the Kerala Congress (KC) faction led by P.J. Joseph is initiating a thorough revamp of the outfit.
The exercise, according to party leaders, will begin with emergency meetings of the party district committees, starting August 22. It will be followed by a membership campaign and organisational elections next year.
Significantly, the reorganisation comes at a time when the regional party seemed drifting towards yet another phase of infighting along factional lines.
Confirming the move, party working chairman P.C. Thomas said the party high-power committee, which had met at Kottayam a few days ago, decided to revamp the party committees right from the ward till the district levels. The process will take place simultaneously during the scheduled meeting of the respective district committees, to be also attended by representatives of the KC State leadership.
“The whole process will be completed within three months, and we hope to conduct the organisational elections about six months after the membership campaign,” he said.
Naming of posts
As to the resentment within the party leaders over a reorganisation of its central leadership, Mr. Thomas clarified that the differences pertained only with regard to the naming of certain organisational positions. Official sources, however, said the issues within the party were unlikely to end anytime soon.
“While framing the new party constitution, the leadership has already given an undertaking to the Election Commission of India to hold the organisational elections within a year. But, in view of the widening differences, the party chairman has now proposed it as a cure for all ills. With this, the disgruntled leaders will have to stop raising complaints over ill-treatment,” observed a senior party leader.
In April this year, Mr. Joseph formalised its merger with the Kerala Congress led by P.C. Thomas and appointed him as the working chairman. Mons Joseph, a Joseph group strongman from Kaduthuruthy, was elected the executive chairman while Joy Abraham was made the secretary general.
Reservations aired
A group of leaders under senior leader Francis George and Johny Nellur later came out in the open, expressing reservations about some of these appointments. The two leaders joined Mr. Joseph as part of the veteran leader's efforts at expansion by bringing in new members and shifting old alliances so as to gain an upper hand over the KC(M) led by Jose K. Mani.
The process, according to dissident leaders, has disrupted the hierarchical order of the party, while the jumbo committees have rendered it an unwieldy structure.
