Kottayam: Jose K Mani, MP, has said that he will submit a letter to the Assembly Speaker seeking the disqualifications of MLAs P J Joseph and Monce Joseph for violating the whip in the no-confidence motion and the Rajya Sabha elections. The decision was taken by the party's state steering committee, Jose K Mani said.

Chief whip Roshy Augustine has been asked to submit the letter, he said.

The steering committee meeting decided that the party should come out with its political stance before the panchayat elections. It also instructed Jose K Mani to take an appropriate decision after assessing the current political situation.

The party will let know its stand on the Kuttanad Assembly bypoll when the notification comes. While the Joseph faction has said it will fight the Kuttanad bypolls, the Kerala Congress (M) would like to know the symbol and the address under which the group would contest, Mani said. The party will not allow the Joseph faction to use the two-leaf symbol.

Jose K Mani said it is poetic justice that those who had raised the party symbol controversy in the Pala by-election were being forced to contest in Kuttanad without the same symbol.

P J Joseph was spreading lies about the Election Commission of India’s verdict on the symbol dispute and the official recognition granted to the Kerala Congress (M), Jose K Mani said. He said he would lodge a complaint with the Election Commission against the actions of the members of the Joseph group.

The Jose K Mani and P J Joseph factions were involved in a dispute on who represents the official Kerala Congress (M) after the death of the party’s founding chairman K M Mani in April 2019. On August 31, the Election Commission of India passed an order recognising the Jose K Mani faction as the official Kerala Congress (M) and giving it the official ‘two-leaf’ election symbol.

During the no-confidence motion against the Pinaray Vijayan government and the Rajya Sabha elections held on August 24 before the election commission’s order, the Jose K Mani faction had issued a whip to party MLAs to refrain from voting. The Joseph faction, however, issued a whip saying all MLAs must take part and vote in favour of the UDF.

Jose K Mani’s move to get P J Joseph and Monce Joseph disqualified comes in the wake of the Election Commission giving his faction the official Kerala Congress (M) status.