Kochi: Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram has remembered former Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy as a leader who understood what the people needed. Chidambaram took a swipe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi even as he paid a touching tribute to Chandy.

“Chandy did not claim to be a god or god's representative. He did not claim to be non-biological. He did not claim that the almighty sent him to Kerala. He was an average, ordinary member of the Congress who went up step by step, learned from his experience and worked with the people to know what they needed. Once he understood what the people needed he went about implementing them silently,” Chidambaram, a Rajya Sabha member and former Union home minister, said.
He was referring to a pre-election interview in which he claimed that he was convinced that God had sent him and his energy could not be from my biological body.

Chidambaram made the remarks at a meeting organised by the State Youth Congress to commemorate Chandy on his first death anniversary. Recollecting Chandy government’s tagline ‘Athivegam bahudooram’ (farthest at fastest), Chidambaram said the Congress in Kerala should adopt it as its signature slogan and work towards coming back to power in the state polls due in 2026.

Chidambaram said the kind of final farewell Chandy received in which millions of people took part was not a tribute everyone would get. He remembered seeing huge crowds during the funeral processions of leaders like Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi, but he could not believe his eyes as he saw “a native son of Kerala who knew his limits” receive the same kind of affection from the people.

He said Chandy was a leader who never forgot the core principles of the Congress. He said he could not understand how some people could throw away the basic principle of their party and embrace the opposite ideology overnight.
In what sounded like advice to his Congress colleagues, he said: “If you look at the dhoti around your waist and the shawl around your shoulder, both are pieces of cloth. But both can't be treated as the same pieces of clothing. The piece of cloth that you tie around your waist is what (decides) your dignity, persona and attitude. The shawl that you wear can be thrown away, not the dhoti. Posts like MP, MLA and party positions are shawls. Your dhoti is your core principle.”

Top Congress leaders in the state including V D Satheesan, Ramesh Chennithala, M M Hassan, K C Joseph and Benny Behanan attended the event. Youth Congress state president Rahul Mamkoottathil chaired the meeting.

At the event, the Youth Congress announced that it has chosen former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for an award instituted in memory of Chandy to honour people in public service. The award carrying Rs 2 lakh and a memento will be presented to Dr Singh in Delhi later, Mamkoottathil said.