Even as CPM in Bengal woos Congress, Rahul Gandhi expected to lambast Marxists in Kerala

NEW DELHI: Even as the CPM in West Bengal is wooing the Congress for an alliance against the Trinamool Congress led by Mamata Banerjee, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi is expected to lambast the Marxists in Kerala during a two-day pre-poll visit to the state.

Gandhi is travelling to Kerala on Tuesday to participate in a public rally in Thiruvananthapuram to mark the culmination of state Congress president VM Sudheeran’s Kerala Jana Raksha Yatra. He is slated to also attend a meeting of the Pradesh Congress Committee executive, where the party’s strategy for the assembly elections will be framed up.

Gandhi’s visit to Kerala coincides with the last legislative assembly session before the elections turning extremely stormy and bitter over issues, such as the alleged ‘solar scam’ and the ‘bar bribery case’. What is adding unprecedented bitterness this time to the political bout is the unprecedented debate as to whether the Congress-led UDF government of Oommen Chandy stand a chance to buck the traditional cyclical electoral trend in the state.

Gandhi’s visit, therefore, coincides with the CPM-led LDF making all out attempts to run down the government in the countdown to the elections. Even though Gandhi will use the tour to target the Modi government and the BJP given that the saffron party is trying to emerge as a force in Kerala by breaching some traditional electoral base of both the Congress and CPM, the fierce battle for supremacy between the UDF and LDF makes the CPM his first target, and Congress circles bet on him to rise to the expectations of the gallery.

While Gandhi targeting the Kerala CPM suits the Congress, it only adds to the complications of the Bengal CPM, which is wooing the Congress with the endorsement of its central leadership. Already, some Congress leaders are trying to score brownie points against the Kerala CPM, asking its leaders how the Bengal CPM is courting the Marxists’ projected anti-Congress line.