Thiruvananthapuram, March 28 (IANS) The Congress has chosen to support candidates who are over 70 years for the Rajya Sabha elections from Kerala, a move which as left younger party workers unhappy, whereas the CPI-M has supported young blood.
For next month's polls to the upper house, the Congress has persisted with older leaders as Vayalar Ravi. The CPI-M has gone in for youth and has chosen 44 year-old former Students Federation of India (SFI) president K.K. Ragesh.
Kerala has nine seats in the upper house. The Congress has three - all in the above 70 plus category. A.K. Antony will be 75 in December, Ravi will be 78 in June and P.J. Kurien will turn 74 on Monday.
The CPI-M has four members in the house. P. Rajeev, whose terms ends next month is 47 years old, K.N. Balagopal and T.N. Seema whose terms end next year are 51. The only exception is C.P. Nair who is 78.
Nair was nominated in 2012 taking into account his more than five decades of association with the think tank of the party.
"Congress should learn from the CPI-M the way we groom youngsters for the world of parliamentary politics. They (the Congress) ensures that even when fielding a young leader, they are ejected after two terms.
"But in our party, the buzz word is once you enter the upper house, they do all sorts of things to ensure they have a very long run," said an agitated youth leader of the Congress who did not wish to be identified.
In retrospect, now CPI-M politburo member M.A. Baby, a legislator and a former state minister, created history in 1986 when at the age of 32 he became the youngest member of the upper house then and retired from the upper house after two terms.
A. Vijayaraghavan was 42 when he had one term when in upper house in 1998.
While the CPI-M ensures that upper house members are not given a long run, Congress leader Antony has been in the upper house from 2005 and has had two terms in the past from 1985.
Ravi has been in the upper house from 2003 and had another term in 1994, while Kurien started off in the Lok Sabha from 1980 and had six terms. Since 2005, he has been in the upper house.
Outgoing upper house CPI-M member Rajeev told IANS that their party has always had a strategy of promoting youth and women leaders.
"Just look at our higher committees. The average age of our state committee is now below 60 age group and our district committees it is below 50," said Rajeev who in February was elected unopposed as the new Ernakulam district secretary of the CPI-M.
"No wonder that the Congress party has touched 44 seats in the Lok Sabha. If the posts are for senior leaders only, it wouldn't be long that the party would slowly disintegrate because what's there for the ordinary Congress worker," asked another disgruntled youth Congress activist.
What are BJP leaders doing at Oli's party convention in Nepal?
The Tenth Congress of Nepali Communist Party (Unified Marxist Leninist) party of former Prime Min
US President Joe Biden made a big announcement on Tuesday amid the ongoing war between Russia and
Japan Earthquake: Earth trembled again in Japan, the intensity measured at 6.1 on the Richter scale
Strong tremors of the earthquake have been felt in Hokkaido, Japan. Its intensity has been measur
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg spoke to hundreds of company employees on Monday. In the conversation, h
Lucknow The state of the second wave of the global pandemic Coronavirus infection has become extr
Team India defeated West Indies by 2 wickets in the second ODI match. With this, India has taken
PM Narendra Modi has said that in this era of global instability, India has established itself as
Know which company's smartwatch can be a better option for you
Like the smartphone, now the smartwatch has also become a part of our life. Every important featu
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) and the ED on Tuesday raided several locations of the Pop
Road accidents are a major reason for untimely deaths in cities. To reduce these deaths, many cou
