When former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy was conducting the Jana Sambarkkam programme (interaction with people), it was Pinarayi Vijayan, as the then State secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)], who directed his partymen to physically attack Chandy and disrupt his interaction programme.
Having done that, Mr. Vijayan has no right to criticise the United Democratic Front (UDF) which has chosen to boycott the Navakerala Sadas, Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee president K. Sudhakaran has said.
The common man has no place in Mr. Vijayan’s show of ostentation, which is why the UDF is boycotting his so-called interaction. At the public programme at Manjeswaram, the poor had no place in the front. Mr. Vijayan did not personally listen to or receive any complaint or disburse any compensation.
On the other hand, when Chandy conducted his interaction programmes in 2011, 2013 and 2015, he received 94,698 complaints from Kasaragod alone. He spent 47 hours in the midst of people and disbursed financial assistance of ₹11.94 crore.
According to the figures given out by Mr. Vijayan in the Assembly, 11.45 lakh complaints were resolved and financial aid to the tune of ₹242 crore was disbursed through Chandy’s programmes. Mr. Vijayan can only pretend to play the role of a benevolent leader, but cannot hold a candle to Chandy who spent his entire political career serving the common man, Mr. Sudhakaran said.
He mocked that Mr. Vijayan has to be shameless to believe that all the development in the State was ushered in by him, when the fact remains that all mega infrastructure projects in Kerala today — Kochi metro rail, Kannur international airport and Vizhinjam seaport — were contributed by the UDF, Mr. Sudhakaran said. While inaugurating these projects, Mr. Vijayan wilfully did not even mention Chandy’s name, he added.
He said that the “development” that the Chief Minister is extolling is happening only in the families of Mr. Vijayan and that of other CPI(M) men. The poor and the debt-ridden farmers are committing suicide in the State because they have no means of living. The elderly women who were forced to beg on the streets because of the failure of the government to disburse social welfare pensions do not seem to figure anywhere in the government’s development agenda. The people of Kerala will not forgive Mr. Vijayan if he does not leave his airs and resolve the hardships of people, Mr. Sudhakaran said.
