The Hindu : Seat-sharing: CMP treads a different path

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Feb 12, 2004

Kerala

Kerala

Seat-sharing: CMP treads a different path

By Our Special Correspondent

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, FEB. 11. While most of the UDF partners have demanded a seat each in the Lok Sabha elections from Kerala, the Communist Marxist Party (CMP), another coalition partner, is treading a different path.

Instead of directly demanding a seat in Kerala, the CMP has urged the Congress president, Sonia Gandhi, to consider its claim on the basis of the all-India strength it has been able to mobilise under the banner of the Confederation of Indian Communists and Democratic Socialists, a grouping of former Marxist and Communist leaders. Given this strength, it wanted a place in the proposed secular front.

The CMP has based its demand on what it asserts is strong logic. According to the CMP leader, C. P. John, who was part of the delegation that met Mrs. Gandhi last month, the Confederation is a decisive factor in as many as 50 Lok Sabha constituencies spread over West Bengal, Orissa, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. In this context, the confederation, which is a grouping of leaders who fell out with left parties such as the CPI (M) and the CPI, is fully eligible for a place in the secular front at the all-India level.

Mr. John said that the Congress leadership has agreed to allot two Lok Sabha seats in West Bengal. Saifuddin Chaudhari would be contesting the Katwa Parliament seat. The confederation would field a candidate from Bankra, which had returned the noted CPI(M) leader, Vasudevacharya. The confederation is expecting the Congress leadership to allot a seat in Tripura, where the former CPI(M) MP, Ajoy Biswas, would contest, the Darjeeling seat, Faridkot in Punjab and Guntur in Andhra Pradesh. " In Kerala, we expect the Congress leadership to allot us a seat on the basis of our all-India strength. The confederation's claims should be viewed in the context of a fragmented polity where numbers are going to be very important," according to John.

In pursuit of its objectives, Mr. John and the CMP leader, K. R. Aravindakshan, met the Chief Minister, A. K. Antony, the other day and urged him to consider the CMP's claim for a Lok Sabha seat.

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