KOZHIKKODE: The man who is running the CPM’s electoral machinery in Kozhikode district is the master strategist and Pinarayi loyalist P. Mohanan, 62, who was accused in the T.P. Chandrasekharan murder case and later exonerated after spending 19 months in jail. And he still nurses mental wounds from that experience as he asks: “Who will compensate me for those days wasted in jail?”
Though the CPM state leadership yet to finalise the candidates’ list, Mohanan is busy oiling the party machinery in the district, consisting of 13 seats, sitting at the CH Kanaran Mandiram, the big district committee office here.
“It is too hot. Tough times ahead for all of us,” says Mohanan with his typical cold smile. Political foes are suspicious of this short, lean man saying that he is the master conspirator who unleashes all the evil forces in the party. They say that he is a ‘Pinarayi man’ without whose concurrence the T.P. Chandrasekharan murder could not have taken place.
In an interview with Deccan Chronicle, Mohanan denied everything. “I am totally innocent in the murder case. It was unfortunate. There was a political conspiracy to fix me. The allegation was that the conspiracy was hatched at a flower shop in Orkkattery in my presence. But, in fact, I have never been there so far,” says Mohanan. “I am sad only about the days I have lost, cut off totally from the masses. Who can give me back those lost days?” Mohanan asks.
Fondly called by partymen as Mohanan master, he was a master (teacher) at the age of 19. “I was a kutti (tiny) master and had to wear mundu to create a feeling that I was matured,” he said. In 1976, Mohanan master became a party member. He had to take a long leave of seven years for party work. “I left my career when the party asked me to resign from service in 2001,” he said.
However, Mohanan is now on a new mission to weave out a new electoral fraternity between the party and the agrarian settler community with the help of Malayora Vikasana Samithy, the farmers’ outfit patronised by the Thamarassery diocese.
“We were part of many agitations in the past,” says Mohanan. Now we are exploring the possibilities for an electoral tie-up which is a continuation of the past,” he added. Will he be in the fray this time? “I will not contest not only now but never in the future. I enjoy my party work rather than parliamentary responsibilities,” said Mohanan who served as the district panchayat member and later president in 1990s.
