Antony admits all’s not well

Former Kerala CM A.K. Antony met party chief Sonia Gandhi today. Antony, in charge of Karnataka, discussed issues about both states with her. Positioning himself against a split, he added: ‘‘I would not like to lose even a single party colleague because it is like a division in the family or even worse.’’ But he admitted Congress in Kerala ‘‘is on the verge of a split’’.

Antony is understood to have deputed former minister K.V. Thomas to broker a compromise with Karunakaran. Thomas met Sonia, Ahmed Patel, the Kerala in-charge, and Karunakaran. Sources said the peace-bid seemed to make headway, but fell through due to inadequate effort by all quarters.

In Thiruvananthapuram, all but one of his 16 MLAs stayed away from the rally. Another absentee was Sooranadu Rajasekharan, the Kollam DCC president, the rally’s general convenor. ‘I’ group sources said the MLAs had decided with the leadership’s concurrence that it would be better to stay away than risk disqualification.

Addressing the ‘I’ group workers, Karunakaran said whatever they called themselves in future, they would remain Congressmen.

He warned CM Oommen Chandy that he would be playing with fire if he continued to harass his followers. Muraleedharan also accused Chandy of persuading voters to vote against Congress in the last polls, including in Muraleedharan’s constituency in Vadakkancherry, and trying to buy ‘I’ group men. He reiterated that there was no question of compromising with Chandy and declared that Kerala would soon have a ‘‘genuine’’ KPCC.