Remain united, Sonia to Kerala partymen

     Kochi: Kicking off the poll campaign in Kerala, Congress party president Sonia Gandhi today called party workers to remain united ahead of the crucial assembly elections in the state. Addressing the Congress Legislature Party she urged the 46 MLAs present in the meeting "not to underestimate the opposition- CPI (M)-led LDF".

     "Do not take the opposition lightly. You must be aware of the tactics and strategies of the opponents", she said and then quickly added, "If you work unitedly, we will surely return to power". Happy with the enthusiasm shown by the party workers Gandhi said: "It is a very good sign and victory is sure for us". The meeting was attended by Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, CWC member A. K. Antony, AICC secretary in-charge of Kerala Veerappa Moily and Union minister Vayalar Ravi. However, seven MLAs could not make it to the meeting that included Speaker and deputy speaker of the legislative assembly. The call of unity achieves significance with last year exit of prominent Congress leader K. Karunakaran from the party who later formed Democratic Indira Congress (DIC-K). Though there were no discussions on Karunakaran issue in the meeting, as told by K. C. Joseph, Congress Parliamentary party secretary, Gandhi later speaking to reporters said that it was up to the party's Kerala unit to take a decision on whether or not to have any tie-up with Karunakaran. In spite of confidence expressed by the Congress leaders the party is finding difficult to win the coming election as it has registered poor performance in all the elections conducted in last one year. Meanwhile, the Congress MLAs today urged the central leadership to consider the feelings of the party workers while taking poll related decisions. On Saturday, Sonia Gandhi while addressing a huge rally at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium here lashed out against Left parties for claiming credit of the different welfare programmes pursued by the UPA government at the Centre and said: "The party that is supporting us at the Centre is our main rival in Kerala, West Bengal and Tripura."

     Coming strongly against Left, Gandhi said: "We reject the opponent's politics of obstruction. We reject politics of violence, politics of gherao and sloganeering. We reject the policy of false propaganda by which serious national issues are trivialised". Patting the state UDF government's effort, Gandhi said that it was not easy for the UDF to fulfil its promises to the people as the main opposition party had tried to obstruct it at every single step and added that in spite of these obstructionist attitudes the state government has been able to fulfil most of the promises. Supporting the government's effort to attract investment in the state, Gandhi said: "Without investments, you cannot have economic growth and without economic growth, you cannot generate employment, especially for youth". .

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