Achuthanandan campaigns for Vijayan

The nonagenarian steered clear of any controversial comments and Vijayan, a bete noire of Achuthanandan was not present as he was campaigning elsewhere. Achuthanandan’s campaigning here came a day after Vijayan, who is contesting from the Dharmadom constituency in Kannur district in the May 16 polls, had stated that the resolution passed by CPI-M against Achuthanandan “still exists”. 

“The decision of the party and resolution remains and will not cease to exist unless it is amended or rejected,” Vijayan had said when asked whether the resolution passed by party secretariat in 2015 that “Achuthanandan has anti-party mind-set” still exists. 

However, Achuthanandan skirted the issue and instead exhorted the large gathering to ensure that Vijayan was elected with an “impressive majority”. The Marxist veteran went on to say, “The LDF candidate at Dharmadom is Pinarayi Vijayan. You all should vote for him and ensure that he is elected with an impressive majority,”. 

Slamming UDF, Achuthanandan described the ruling Congress-led UDF manifesto as a “big joke”. “I could not control laughing reading the UDF manifesto,” he said. Listing the alleged land grab cases during UDF tenure, he claimed barring the lone woman minister, all other ministers of the Oommen Chandy government were facing corruption allegations. 

Meanwhile, in a Facebook post on Wednesday, Vijayan had claimed, a section in the media was “creating false reports” that he had termed Achuthanandan as an “anti-party man”. “We are facing the polls without any differences and nobody should think that they can create impediment on that,” Vijayan had said.