IUML attacks Kerala minister’s marriage to CM Pinarayi Vijayan’s daughter, calls it ‘adultery’

The Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), a Congress ally in Kerala, has attacked the marriage of CPI(M) leader and state Public Works Minister P A Mohammed Riyas. The minister is married to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan’s daughter Veena.

During a rally held in Kozhikode on Thursday against the CPI(M) government’s move to hand over appointments in the State Wakf Board to the government recruiting agency Public Service Commission, IUML state secretary Abdurahiman Kallai referred to Riyas’ wedding as adultery. “DYFI’s former all India president (Riyas) is a puthiyapla (bridegroom) from my region. Who is his wife? Was it a marriage? (It was) adultery. We should have the courage to say that. We should have courage like C H Muhammed Koya,” he said during the public meeting. Koya is a late IUML leader who was the former chief minister of the state.

The Muslim League had converted the brewing resentment in the community over the government’s decision on Wakf Board recruitment into a common protest plank against the CPI(M).

However, sensing danger, the chief minister announced earlier this week that the move would not be implemented in haste. After meeting pro-IUML Muslim scholars’ body Samastha, Vijayan had said that the status quo on recruitment would continue. His intervention came at a time when the IUML was planning a massive agitation against the state government.