Southern States
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Kerala-Thiruvananthapuram
Karunakaran to mount campaign
By Our Special Correspondent
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, JAN. 27. The senior Congress leader, K Karunakaran, has decided to mount a major campaign against attempts to brand party workers as communalists.
Addressing a massive meeting of his supporters in the city today, Mr Karunakaran said he was not prepared to recognise the attempts to brand party workers as communalists and that he was prepared to protect their interests to any extent.
He said the general feeling among his detractors was that his health was failing and that he was not equipped for a fight. These people would become convinced about his ability only when the party and its workers are beset with a problem. Mr Karunakaran said that while campaigning for the UDF in the last Assembly elections, he had promised to work towards bringing the UDF to power to provide relief to the common man from the anti-people rule of the LDF, besides ensuring that the front would present a good administration.
"But I had also stated that I would be the first to raise my voice against misrule. And I am only keeping my word and trying to correct the Government. I would continue my untiring efforts to keep the UDF Government on the track of good administration and did not need study class on party etiquette. I will continue to strongly react if the Government were to commit mistakes," he said.
He advised the Government to take its employees, teachers and their organisations into confidence, instead of treating them as enemies before implementing the harsh steps taking away their privileges.
The meeting was presided over by the DCC president, Peethambara Kurup. T Saratchandra Prasad welcomed the gathering. The other prominent speakers included Padmaja Venugopal, V.S. Sivakumar, MP, and Varkala Kahar and K Mohan Kumar, MLAs.
An interesting feature in today's group meeting is the attempt to play up the contributions of the Karunakaran family. The speakers, including Ms. Venugopal, who touched upon this aspect, were unanimous in their decision to stand by Mr Karunakaran in what ever he might choose to do. Most of the speakers were of the opinion that Congress men in Kerala, especially those who had never joined hands with the Communists, were indebted to only two families-- the Nehru-Gandhi family and the Karunakaran family -- which had lined up more than 80 per cent of the Congress men in the State behind Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi.
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