By IANS,
Thiruvananthapuram: The Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) Monday agreed to include the Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) in the opposition combine but said the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) is not welcome.
UDF convenor P.P. Thankachen said: “The JD-S came to our aid during the Lok Sabha polls and they are certainly a force to reckon with. But we all saw the performance of the NCP. They lost their deposits in all the seats contested.”
The JD-S is led by former MP M.P. Veerendra Kumar and has five legislators in the state assembly. The JD-S was an ally of the ruling Communist-led Left Democratic Front, but fell foul with the latter over seat distribution in the recent Lok Sabha polls.
Two JD-S legislators, however, continue to be part of the ruling front.
The state unit of the NCP is headed by K. Muraleedharan, a former Congressman and son of four-time Congress chief minister K. Karunakaran.
“A delegation of the JD-S will soon meet with the UDF leaders to discuss the ways and means of cooperation. The outcome of the talks will be then reported to the liaison committee of the UDF and a final decision on whether to include them or not will be decided,” Thankachen said.
State Congress president Ramesh Chennithala said: “How many times have I said that NCP is one party which has time and again tried to wreck the Congress party. They will have no place amongst us. But as far as JD-S is concerned they did yeomen service to us during the last Lok Sabha polls despite they being in the LDF.”
Meanwhile, Muraleedharan refused to comment on the UDF decision.
“I don’t have any comments to offer on the decision made by the Congress not to include us in the UDF,” said Muraleedharan.