'Leaders of alliance parties should not interfere with the internal issues of the Congress'
Congress MP B. Manickam Tagore has taken exception to INDIA bloc alliance parties VCK, MDMK and Communist parties for interfering with the internal issues of the Congress party.
Referring to a news article in a section of the media in which the alliance party leaders had criticised the acts of Congress functionary Praveen Chakravarthy, Mr. Tagore wondered since when did alliance parties begin to dictate to the Congress party on dealing with internal issues.
"Will these parties accept such remarks on their internal party issues?" he questioned in his social media post.
He posed this pointed question towards VCK MP D. Ravikumar, MDMK MP Durai Vaiko and state secretaries of CPI (M) P. Shanmugam and CPI M. Veerapandian and asked whether they would tolerate similar criticism against their parties.
He said that alliances are built on mutual respect and not on the politics of common pressure.
"Differences of opinion, if any, among the alliance partners should be discussed within the alliance and not through media statement," the Congress whip in Lok Sabha said.
The comments made by the leaders against the alliance party has created a dangerous precedence. "This would weaken the collective strength of the alliance against BJP-RSS. It would also stoke the self respect of the Congress party functionaries," Mr. Tagore said.
Mr. Tagore appealed to the high command of CPI and CPI (M) to advise their party state secretaries on minimum political respect and on how to maintain alliance discipline.
MDMK leader Vaiko and VCK leader Thol Thirumavalavan should ask their party MPs to respect the 'Lakshman Rekha' on the activities of alliance parties.
"The meaning of unity is not silence, but it means discipline and patience. Alliance dharma is equal to all alliance partners and it does not apply to Congress alone," Mr. Tagore said.