THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Factional feud within the CPM at Venjarammoodu in the district here, which resulted in mass resignation of 168 members from the party recently, has prompted the party to make a climbdown and issue membership directly to persons who have no background in public activity, the breakaway faction alleges. In its effort to make up the loss caused by the exit of large number of cadres, the party is taking steps, hitherto unheard of, according to A M Rize, leader of the breakaway faction which got merged with the CPI recently. ‘’Allotting full membership directly to persons having no background in public activity is unheard of in the party. But now, they are making all out efforts to put up a brave face and not to yield the remaining foothold,’’ says Rize. He claimed that over 200 people, most of them having no background in working as part of frontal organisations of the party or any kind of public activity, have already been given membership. Normally, one has to work for three years to get full membership. He said that the breakaway faction took out a rally and held a convention on September 4 in which more than 1,000 people took part. After merging with the CPI, the breakaway faction also managed to get the Venjarammoodu local committee of the party reconstituted by claiming 11 members of the 14-member LC. When the factional feuds became intense, the CPM area committee had decided to divide the Venjarammoodu LC irking the rebels. The rebels were fighting the Koliyakode Krishnan Nair-led faction. The Rize-led faction had been alleging that Krishnan Nair-led official faction was taking a stand which was protective of the crusher, sand and abkari mafia. Their insistence on issuing licence for a crusher unit to level the Kottakunnu hillock in the Nellanad panchayat had irked the Rize-led faction which cancelled the panchayat licence. It was the breakaway faction which was in control of the Nellanad Service Cooperative Bank. The CPM official faction’s intervention to wrest control of it had also contributed to the rebels’ resignation and subsequent merger with the CPI. However, the CPM Venjarammoodu area secretary D K Murali has denied the rebels’ claim of CPM issuing direct full membership. He told ‘Express’ that there was no question of issuing full membership directly. He said that only district and state committee could issue direct membership, that too, in very rare cases. He also said that despite the rebels’ claim of resignation of 168 members, the fact remains that only 12 members had resigned from the party. A veteran leader of the party and former Nellanad panchayat president, K Meeran, has been appointed as the new local secretary. He said that issues involving the appointments to the Service Cooperative Bank led to the disputes and the exit of the Rize-led faction. He claimed that only members of four or five families had left the party along with Rize and it had not at all affected the party. He also claimed that despite the rebels’ claims, many of the party sympathisers would return to the party fold.
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