The State party leadership was irked over leaders not responding to persuasion and had gone ahead with the activities of the Save CPM Forum, which looked like a budding parallel outfit. Invariably, the Forum pamphlets found their way into most newspapers and for once gave the impression that the CPM was becoming incapable of maintaining internal discipline. In fact, the party leadership has always prided in its capacity to deal sternly with indiscipline, however mighty have been the violators.

Members from within and outside the party have interpretedthe Save CPM Forum activities as an open challenge to the party. This has been interpreted by several State committee members as betraying the party's confidence. It was in this context that the party set up a committee of State secretariat members to probe and report.

When the State committee debated the report of the Kodiyeri committee on Sunday, the CITU faction leaders desisted from mounting a major defence. But their apparent ploy is to pit the Yechuri committee report on factionalism in the State unit and the findings of the Kodiyeri committee in Kerala against each other. By doing so they hope to negate the adverse impact of the State probe and recommendations of the State committee.

But even there, the dice seem to be loaded against the CITU faction. According to sources, the apex party sub-committee's efforts have been a balancing act, rather than an indictment of the Achuthanandan faction. If one goes by the indictment of the CITU faction leaders by the three-member committee headed by Statesecretariat member Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, they can receive anything between public censure, removal from the party post, suspension from full party membership or expulsion.