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Congress will back left parties to defeat Congress, says Karunakaran

Congress Working Committee member K Karunakaran today said his party would support the CPI-M and other left parties in Kerala and West Bengal to defeat the BJP in the coming Lok Sabha poll.

Participating in a meet-the-press programme, he said he did not see any incongruity in this policy as long as the Congress wanted to ensure the defeat of the BJP.

Defending his party's alliance with the AIADMK-led front in Tamil Nadu in which the CPI-M and other left parties are also partners, Karunakaran said the situation in Tamil Nadu and many of the states was different from that in Kerala and West Bengal. The Congress had to cooperate with left parties wherever the BJP was strong, he added.

He said all democratic and secular forces should cooperate with the Congress to ensure the defeat of the BJP whose return to power would endanger the country's security and economic independence.

In this context, he alleged that the Vajpayee government had failed to protect the country's borders and the lives of several soldiers were sacrificed to drive away a few Pakistan-backed intruders in the Kargil sector.

It was a total intelligence failure and even after getting information on infiltration in Kargil, the government failed to drive out the intruders. Even though the government claimed that the last intruder had been driven away from Indian soil, army casualties continued. Hardly a day passed in Kerala without the arrival of bodies of jawans killed in Kargil, he said.

UNI

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