Thiruvananthapuram: The infighting in the Kerala unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is set to bother its national leadership again soon after it recent bid to quell factionalism.
The group clashes in the state unit have intensified as a fallout of the party's involvement in the agitation linked to Sabarimala.
The group led by Rajya Sabha member V Muraleedharan has readied plans to report to the leadership that the BJP in the state, led by president P S Sreedharan Pillai, did not respond adequately to recent developments that have angered the cadres. They would cite the arrest of general secretary K Surendran and the resistance that Union Minister Pon Radhakrishnan faced from the police during his visit to Sabarimala.
The Muraleedharan group would also apprise the national leaders that the LDF government dared to pile up cases against Surendran because the state BJP unit is not putting up any effective resistance.
The latest strife in BJP cropped up after the earlier discord over the medical college bribery case had settled. It was reported that some state leaders had accepted bribes to get nod for medical colleges.
Considered neutral, Sreedharan Pillai was brought in to helm the state unit in a bid to end the battle of the groups, which had peaked during the medical college row. But the Muraleedharan group has now come out with the charge that Pillai is protecting the interest of only one group in the party.
The strife flared up again recently after the arrest of Surendran. The BJP and the RSS weren't lukewarm to Surendran, who rushed into the hill shrine agitation on his own. It is perceived that the right-wing leadership ignored Surendran as he faced legal hassles.
The police arrested Surendran at Nilakkal itself and kept him locked up with several cases. The Muraleedharan group alleged that even the state president did not bother to find out what was happening to him. Neither did anyone bother to raise a strong protest over Surendran's imprisonment.
The MP and his group pressed the charge that the state government dared to proceed with tough measures because of week resistance from the current state leadership of the BJP. They pointed out that the state unit's just issued a statement when a police superintendent virtually mocked the union minister who was proceeding to Sabarimala.
It is understood that Muraleedharan himself will submit the complaint to the national leadership.
The RSS-BJP workers have been on a warpath after the LDF government decided to implement the Supreme Court allowed women of all age groups to enter Sabarimala temple.
