Kozhikode:
Minister of State for Home M Ramachandran on Tuesday asked the Kerala government to take seriously a CPI-M leader's speech threatening to kill a dissident leader who was later murdered.
TV channels in Kerala have run clippings of a Feb 5, 2010 speech made by VP Gopalakrishnan, the Onchiyam area secretary of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M).
Gopalakrishnan is reportedly heard saying that the party would not hesitate to chop off TP Chandrasekheran's head if he or his newly formed party dared to take on the CPI-M.
Chandrasekheran was murdered May 4 this year by a group of hired killers, some of who have been linked to the CPI-M. The party denies its involvement in the killing.
A similar threatening speech was also made -- and exposed by the media -- by another CPI-M leader, MM Mani.
"If the state government has taken a serious note of the speech by Mani, Gopalakrishnan's speech should also be taken in the same manner," Ramachandran told reporters.
Mani had boasted that the CPI-M had killed four people who had taken on the party.
Ramachandran's statement comes at a time when Advocate General KT Dandapani informed the Kerala High Court Tuesday that Chandrasekheran was murdered because he had left the CPI-M.
Chandrasekheran quit the party in 2008 and formed a new outfit.
The advocate general told the court that the murder followed a conspiracy that first started in 2009.
Dandapani made the statement after two CPI-M leaders, who are among the more than 40 arrested in the murder case, moved a bail application.
Those arrested include middle and senior level leaders of the party in Kannur and Kozhikode districts.
TV channels in Kerala have run clippings of a Feb 5, 2010 speech made by VP Gopalakrishnan, the Onchiyam area secretary of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M).
Gopalakrishnan is reportedly heard saying that the party would not hesitate to chop off TP Chandrasekheran's head if he or his newly formed party dared to take on the CPI-M.
Chandrasekheran was murdered May 4 this year by a group of hired killers, some of who have been linked to the CPI-M. The party denies its involvement in the killing.
A similar threatening speech was also made -- and exposed by the media -- by another CPI-M leader, MM Mani.
"If the state government has taken a serious note of the speech by Mani, Gopalakrishnan's speech should also be taken in the same manner," Ramachandran told reporters.
Mani had boasted that the CPI-M had killed four people who had taken on the party.
Ramachandran's statement comes at a time when Advocate General KT Dandapani informed the Kerala High Court Tuesday that Chandrasekheran was murdered because he had left the CPI-M.
Chandrasekheran quit the party in 2008 and formed a new outfit.
The advocate general told the court that the murder followed a conspiracy that first started in 2009.
Dandapani made the statement after two CPI-M leaders, who are among the more than 40 arrested in the murder case, moved a bail application.
Those arrested include middle and senior level leaders of the party in Kannur and Kozhikode districts.
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