Hours after tweeting that ‘Metroman’ E Sreedharan, who recently joined BJP, will be the party’s chief ministerial face in Kerala, Union Minister V Muraleedharan went back on his statement, saying that the party has not made such an announcement.
Muraleedharan tweeted that he wanted to inform that through media reports he learnt that the party has announced Sreedharan as the chief ministerial face. But when he cross-checked with Kerala party president K Surendran, he said he has not made any such announcements, ANI quoted Muraleedharan as saying. The ANI tweet on this, has been retweeted by Muraleedharan.
What I wanted to tell was that through media reports I learnt that the party has made this announcement. Later, I cross-checked with the party chief who said that he has not made any such announcement: V Muraleedharan on his statement on E Sreedharan pic.twitter.com/anMBbkiPlw
— ANI (@ANI) March 4, 2021
Earlier in his tweet, Muraleedharan had said, “Kerala BJP will fight Kerala polls with E Sreedharanji as its chief ministerial candidate. We will defeat both CPM and Congress to provide a corruption-free, development-oriented Governance for the people of Kerala. #VijayaYatra,"
His social media post on Sreedharan's leadership in the Assembly polls came hours after Surendran said he had requested the party's national leadership to announce 'Metroman' as the NDA's chief ministerial face in Kerala.
Referring to Muraleedharan's change of statement, Congress leader Shashi Tharoor took a dig at the BJP, saying the saffron party was "confused".
"Hilarious! BJP4Keralam manages to be confused about who will occupy the top floor of a building that will never be built.There will be no BJP CM in Kerala," Tharoor tweeted.
Hilarious! @BJP4Keralam manages to be confused about who will occupy the top floor of a building that will never be built. There will be no BJP CM in Kerala. https://t.co/mlezWttift
— Shashi Tharoor (@ShashiTharoor) March 4, 2021
The development comes on a day the 88-year-old technocrat announced his decision to end his 24-year long career with the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) to enter electoral politics.
Earlier, Surendran, who is leading the party's Vijay Yatra said, if the NDA "under the leadership of 'Metroman', gets an opportunity to rule the state, "we are confident we will be able to implement development works under Prime Minister Narendra Modi with a ten-fold force in Kerala."
Addressing a party meeting in Thiruvalla, Surendran highlighted the achievements of Sreedharan, including the completion of the reconstruction of Palarivattom flyover here in five months, much ahead of the stipulated time.
"He completed the project in five months without any corruption.That is why we requested Sreedharan and our party leadership that he should be projected as the (NDA's) Chief Minister candidate," he said at the meeting organised as part of the "Vijaya Yatra" led by him. This was the first time the party indicated that Sreedhran will be the NDA's chief ministerial face.