New Delhi, Apr 4 (IANS): Congress President Rahul Gandhi's decision to contest the Lok Sabha election from Wayanad in Kerala exposes the "ideological and political disarray" in the party leadership, the CPI-M has said.
"The Wayanad decision speaks much about the present state of ideological and political disarray in the Congress leadership," said an editorial in the CPI-M journal "People's Democracy".
"It indicates the inability of the Congress to take a wider view and rally all the forces to defeat the BJP at the national level," it said.
The editorial said that the Congress cannot claim to be the dominant secular party in many states.
"But yet, it tends to behave like one. Such a stance of the Congress is disruptive of the unity of the secular forces to fight the BJP."
The CPI-M wondered why Gandhi chose to contest from Kerala, where the CPI-M is the dominant political force apart from the Congress, instead of Karnataka, which the Congress governs in alliance with the Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) and where the BJP is a major force.
"Thus, instead of fighting the BJP, the target has become the Left."
The editorial also found fault with the Congress for putting up candidates in almost all the 80 Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh where it said the SP-BSP-RLD alliance can effectively take on the BJP.
In Delhi, the Congress had spurned the offer of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) for a tie-up though "it is evident to everyone that if the AAP and the Congress have a seat adjustment, it can win all seven seats in the capital. If they fight separately, the BJP will gain".
In West Bengal, the CPI-M had offered a mutual no-contest agreement in six sitting seats - four of the Congress and two of the CPI-M. "Even this reasonable offer did not find a positive response from the Congress."
The editorial said: "It is this attitude which has been displayed in the decision to contest in Wayanad. By fielding Rahul in Wayanad, the Congress hopes to increase the tally of the UDF... Such a sectarian approach is only going to further diminish the Congress."