DMK offer and CPM democratic policies on Alagiri’s election

DMK offer and CPM democratic policies on Alagiri’s election
Chief minister M Karunanidhi’s remarks that the CPM was not reciprocating his gestures of friendship on Sunday evoked a sharp reaction from the Marxist party. Politics is not a place for bargaining, but “a battlefield for class struggle”, CPM state secretary N Varadarajan said, rejecting the DMK president’s hand of friendship and vowing to carry on its “dignified fight for the rights of the people”.

Reacting to Karunanidhi’s observation a day earlier that the CPM was spurning the DMK’s friendship offer despite him granting permission for the Left party to hold a rally and public meeting at Dindigul, Varadarajan, wondered whether allowing a public rally was an act of “magnanimity”. Whether there was an alliance or not, the CPM would make decisions on issues based on its political stand centred on public welfare, Varadarajan said.

“May be the chief minister is of the view that the CPM should have withdrawn the case (challenging Union minister MK Alagiri’s election to the Lok Sabha from Madurai) in exchange for granting permission for the public rally, the CPM leader said. However, the party would persist with the challenge through its dummy candidate in the election. Since the Tirumangalam bypoll, the DMK had made a mockery of democracy by distributing doles to voters and by stifling the opposition using police force, and the height of this trend was the atrocities committed in Madurai during the Lok Sabha elections, he alleged. CPM candidate P Mohan, who lost the election, went to the court, and after his demise, the CPM has taken up the case for the sake of democracy, Varadarajan emphasised.

The CPM has always put democracy first, he said, and recalled that his party had fought the Emergency alongside the DMK after being its strongest critic before the Emergency. And when the DMK government was dismissed, the CPM opposed it, he said.

It was improper on the part of the DMK to expect CPM to avoid condemning the government’s policies or the wrong approach of the DMK just because an RS seat was given to the party, Varadarajan said.