Thiruvananthapuram, March 20 – Kerala BJP President Rajeev Chandrasekhar criticized the Congress on Friday after Congress leader Shama Mohamed expressed concern over the lack of female representation in the party's candidate selections for the upcoming state Assembly elections, scheduled for April 9.
In a post on the social media platform X, Congress leader Shama Mohamed urged Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, to "help the women of the Congress in Kerala."
"While we may have been denied, we are not defeated. I respectfully urge my leader, Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi, whom I admire and respect, to help the women of the Congress in Kerala. Out of the 92 tickets, only nine were given to women in the Congress," she stated.
In her X post, she also wrote, "In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, only one woman was given a ticket out of the 16 Congress tickets distributed. And if that woman is talented, the situation is dire! This is very sad."
Reacting to Mohamed's concerns, Kerala BJP President Chandrasekhar accused the Congress of not promoting talent within the party.
The State BJP President said, "I don't know the woman (Shama Mohamed) or her background, but it is certainly clear that talent plays no role in the growth within the Congress. Otherwise, how can we explain D.K. Shivakumar becoming the Deputy Chief Minister (of Karnataka)? So there are other factors that determine growth within the Congress."
"Most of it depends on how sycophantic you are towards the Gandhi family – what you do for them. If you send briefcases and trunks full of cash to the Gandhi family, you immediately become a Deputy Chief Minister, that is how I see it; this is my opinion, and unfortunately, this is the opinion of most of the people in their party," Chandrasekhar added.
When asked about the prospects of the BJP-led NDA in the upcoming Kerala Assembly elections, the State BJP President said, "Every day that we are campaigning, we (NDA) are receiving a positive response from the people, which is beyond our expectations. This is not just about the BJP-NDA, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, me, or the party's candidates. People are saying they want change."
"They (the people of Kerala) want a new political dispensation that will give them development, and this is the undercurrent that is determining people's decisions in this state election. I have said before that this is going to be a historical election," Chandrasekhar added.