Govindan should have resigned after poll debacle: Sudhakaran

Kottayam: CPM rebel and independent MLA G Sudhakaran launched a scathing attack on CPM state secretary M V Govindan on Monday, calling him the real betrayer of the working class and demanding his immediate removal after the party’s setback in assembly polls.

“Govindan, who acted against the party’s constitution, is a class traitor in theory and practice. If he has any shame left, he should resign as the secretary,” he said in Ambalappuzha.Govindan, who should have shown political discernment, did not even know what ‘class traitor’ means, he said, adding that only the ill-informed would call him a theoretician. “He thinks he is holding an important space. How can someone who cannot correct himself correct others? He is not a real communist,” he said.For CPM, workers and farmers constitute the working class. Govindan, by working against his own class and pleasing capitalist-imperialist forces and the bourgeoisie, deserves the ‘class traitor’ label. Mistakes, whether by the party or individuals, must be corrected, he said, adding that those who fail to do so will end up in the dustbin of history.“It seems Govindan wants the party to perish. Does a party secretary, who lost every election under his watch, have any shame left to continue in that post?” he asked, adding that it is better if he kept his mouth shut.

Sudhakaran said he joined CPM during the era of C H Kanaran, A K Gopalan and EMS Namboodiripad and never spoke a word against Govindan until today. Responding to a politburo member’s remark that he had ‘fallen into the mud pit of Congress’, Sudhakaran hit back, citing CPM and CPI’s alliance with Congress, IUML and DMK in TN and CPM’s tie-up with Congress for a seat in Rajasthan.“I stayed away without renewing my membership on my own accord.

How can that make me a class traitor?” he asked, describing himself as an independent MLA, though he added that he would support the good things done by CM V D Satheesan.But Sudhakaran declined to criticize opposition leader Pinarayi Vijayan, calling him a powerful politician whose strength hadn’t waned. He recalled that he, along with P K Sreemathy and E P Jayarajan, had formed a protective ring around Vijayan but no one was there now to do so.