Kannur: CPM Politbureau member Brinda Karat on Friday said the main focus of the Left party is to fight the BJP and the RSS, and extended cooperation to anyone who wants to oppose the right-wing forces.

Though she did not name Congress specifically, it can be assumed that the age-old party is also among those that she hopes would join this collective against the BJP.

"Our main focus is against the BJP and the RSS. Not just the CPM, the prime task of every patriot in India is to isolate and defeat this toxic force which wants to destroy the social fabric of our country," she said. She said her party extends its cooperation to all those forces who want to fight "this grave danger to India."

Brinda's statement is also in line with that of CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury and perhaps many other national leaders of the party.

Earlier, Yechury too had called for the "broadest possible front of secular forces" to fight the saffron camp.

However, it remains to be seen how CPM's Kerala unit takes all this. It is in Kerala that the CPM is the strongest. West Bengal and Tripura are no longer the party strongholds that they once were. It is no secret that the party's Kerala unit holds considerable sway in dictating the matters, even on the apex body nationally.

It is perhaps for this very reason why Yechury quickly offered clarifications as reports emerged that the Kerala contingent had made discordant noises about the inclusion of the Congress party in an alliance.

“I have not said it (the alliance) will not be possible without the Congress nor have I said it will be possible without the Congress,” Yechury explained.

He saw the Congress' refusal to allow its leaders to participate in the seminar organised as part of the Party Congress as a sign of the Congress's anti-secular approach.

He had said that the Congress party should put its house in order and should end its “prevarications and compromising attitude towards communalism”, a clear hint that the Congress would be valuable if it corrected its ideological deviations.

During the Party Congress in Kannur, CPM had decided not to enter into any political alliance with Congress even though the party admitted that Congress is not an equal enemy to the party compared to the BJP. 

KK Ragesh, speaking for the Kerala unit, attributed the reason for the bad plight of the Opposition in the country to the wrong policies of Congress.

Yechury also pointed out that Congress did not have the strength to stitch an alliance of various political parties which are opposed to the BJP.