New Delhi, July 11 (IANS) The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) politburo has blamed the factional feud in its Kerala unit on “parliamentary opportunism” and on putting the interests of “individual leaders or groups above the collective interests” of the party.
According to the CPI-M politburo’s views on the Kerala issue, which were accessed by a Malayalam TV channel reporter, “parliamentary opportunism, which affected sections of the Kerala unit to different degrees, is the root cause of factionalism in the CPI-M Kerala unit”.

“Putting the interests of individual leaders or groups above the collective interests and the struggle to capture the control of the party committees represents the worst form of groupism,” was the politburo view articulated at the two-day meeting of the party’s central committee that began here Saturday.

A Malayalam TV channel reporter while filming a central committee member reading from a document, focused on the paper and “leaked” it to the media.

“The control of the party committees is seen to be the key to undermining the positions in the parliamentary forum. Factionalism based on parliamentarism had its origins among the top leadership and it became the power-factional activities percolating below,” the politburo maintained.

Meanwhile, Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan, who arrived here Friday evening to attend the central committee meeting, is reportedly planning to leave for Kerala Sunday morning and would not be present for the second day’s session, according to sources.

Achuthanandan has reportedly asked officials of Kerala House, where he is staying, to book his flight to Thiruvananthapuram in the morning.

The 85-member central committee meeting is being held after the CPI-M politburo met last week to discuss the Kerala issue.

Achuthanandan has been demanding that his arch rival, the powerful state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan, be removed as he has been named an accused by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the Rs.374 crore SNC Lavalin corruption case.

In retaliation, the Vijayan faction has demanded disciplinary action against Achuthanandan for “violating party discipline”.

The feuding resulted in the party faring very poorly in Kerala in the April-May Lok Sabha elections, winning just four of the state’s 20 seats.