VS vs Pinarayi again: this time over Gujarat,or was it Tamil Nadu?

Two years ago,the Kerala CPM removed A P Abdullakutty,then an MP,after he had made a call to emulate the Gujarat model for development. Now another reference,by another leader,to another state unnamed but presumed to be Gujarat again- has reignited an old feud between Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan and party state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan.

The latest episode has come at a time when the Kerala government is in the last lap of its five-year term. At the party-sponsored International Congress on Kerala Studies in Thiruvananthapuram last week,Vijayan referred to Keralas investor-unfriendly approach and compared it with that of a state that fast-tracks industrial investment. He highlighted the lack of single-window clearance in Kerala and complicated official procedures to get an investment proposal cleared,then referred to a state where entrepreneurs could get clearance within a few days after meeting the Chief Minister.

Vijayan did not name the other state but Achuthanandan had no doubt it was Gujarat. He hit back days later,while inaugurating an IT park near Thrissur. By making industrial development in Gujarat a model,Kerala cannot offer its soil and nature for real estate business. Despite government efforts to make hundreds of acres of land ready for the IT industry,certain champions of progress insist that they can bring in development by filling mangroves and wetlands. One has to assume that such persons target something other than development. I want to remind them,this land is picturesque Kerala, he said.

Vijayan then came out with a clarification. The state he had showered praise on,he said,was neighbouring Tamil Nadu. He issued a press statement that he was referring to the period when M Karunanidhi was handling the industries department. No communist would dare to extol the state of Gujarat ruled by Narendra Modi,he said.