Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) State president K. Surendran said infighting in the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)] had culminated in the murder of CPI(M) Peringara local committee secretary P.B. Sandeep Kumar in Thiruvalla.
Mr. Surendran, who sought to distance the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) from the crime, said the ongoing regional conferences ahead of the CPI(M) State conference next year had exacerbated the factional fighting for organisational control in the ruling party.
The CPI(M) had attempted to scapegoat the RSS to save its face and stave off public outrage. It felt compelled to protect the veneer of inner-party unity as the CPI(M) headed toward its national congress.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who heads the Home department, had not blamed the RSS for the murder, he said.
Notably, Manu, a close associate of Sandeep, had accused a criminal gang, and not the RSS, of his friend’s murder. The CPI(M) later made Manu withdraw the Facebook post. It ran counter to the party’s false narrative about Sandeep’s murder.
The immediate arrests of the suspects had thwarted the CPI(M) plan to plant party proxies with strong alibis in the place of the actual assailants.
Lauds police
The police had acted independently for once. And the local law enforcement paid the political price for the just action. CPI(M) cyber activists berated R. Nishanthini, District Police Chief, Pathanamthitta, on social media.
Soon, CPI(M) Polit Bureau member Kodiyeri Balakrishnan was in Pathanamthitta, threatening the Pathanamthitta police for not implicating RSS activists in Sandeep’s murder, he said. The CPI(M) had killed its own. The RSS had no role in the murder.
The persons detained in connection with the murder had CPI(M) links. “How else will Kannur resident Muhammad Fasal become an accused in the murder of a CPI(M) activist at Peringara in Thiruvalla?” he asked.
The other suspects, Nandu Aji and Vishnu Kumar, were CPI(M)-DYFI workers. Their relatives were CPI(M) card-holding members. Mr. Surendran also identified another accused Pramod Prasannan as a CPI(M) worker.
