The rise and fall of Madhani and Soofiya

Yesterday’s villains become tomorrow’s heroes who turn villains again, not only in cinema but also in politics. If hints are anything to go by, one of the star campaigners of the CPM during the last Lok Sabha polls may have to campaign for his wife’s release from custody soon. Comrade Pinarayi Vijayan who stood like a rock behind Abdul Nasser Madhani during the poll is reportedly `out of range’ after the recent revelations about Soofiya Madhani’s terror link. The frame of Pinarayi Vijayan waiting in anticipation to receive Madhani on the dais of Hussein Randathani’s election convention at Ponnani is still fresh in Parasuraman’s memory.

Pinarayi was standing with a respectful face when Madhani’s wheel chair rolled on to the stage. The duo sat together, spoke to each other and also smiled together in front of beaming arc lights and television cameras. Those who were cynical about Madhani were pooh-poohed by CPM leaders.

For them Madhani was a secular leader capable of taking on Panakkad Thangal. Screaming reports in media proving Madhani family’s terror links were dubbed as rubbish by Marxist ideologues who dived deep into the book shelves in AKG centre library to find out the logic for equating Marxism with Madhanism. `Desabhimani’ published a series of reports glorifying the great leader.

But Parasuraman could see a shining star in John Brittas who struggled hard to get Soofiya Madhani in front of his camera and interviewed her at length. The innocent young woman who feigned ignorance about almost every serious issue, including the Kalamassery bus burning case, has now been identified as the mastermind of the Kalamassery incident. Parasuraman is surprised. How did Soofiya escape from Brittas’s sharp queries? The master interviewer, who has to his credit a number of interviews in which the interviewees broke down in front of the camera, couldn’t actually find out that Soofiya was telling a series of lies to save her face. Parasuraman can only chuckle at the fact that the CPM could realise the actual strength of Madhani’s party only after the Alappuzha bypoll. The PDP candidate who fought hard to defeat the CPI there could garner only 1800 plus votes. Then, comrade Pinarayi Vijayan realised that the alliance with PDP brought only shame to the CPM. The new turn in Kalamassery case will provide the party a `safe exit’ from the clutches of PDP. Smiles will only be on the faces of VS and Pandhe when that happens CPI leaders tell in secret that their Asan is behaving more like a child than a grownup politician nowdays. Last week when he was briefing the media after the state council meet, Asan said the CPI was not against giving concessions in laws to investors. Other state council members who were watching the press conference live on TV were shell shocked. A few hours earlier, Veliyam had expressed the same opinion in the state council. But, the council corrected him and convinced him that concessions were a taboo. Veliyam pretended to be a democrat and accepted the voice of majority.

But, at the right opp, the colour of a dictator was revealed. The anti-Asan lobby in the party leadership spreads the word that Asan is like this always.

There is even a saying `Pinarayiye kanumbol kavathu marakkuka’ in MN smarakam. Not only Veliyam, assistant secretaries K E Ismail and C N Chandran are also great fans of this idiom, say Parasuraman’s sources there. They are afraid what Asan and Ismayil will tell in the LDF when the single window clearance system comes up for debate. The other representative of the party, C Divakaran can also be relied upon in this case. CD also seems to have some hidden agenda with regard to the single window system. Will there be any chance for allowing a temporary entry for C K Chandrappan or Kanam Rajendran to that meeting?

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