THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Congress-led UDF's poor performance in the recently concluded local body elections, despite the controversies against the state government, has paved way for heavy criticism within the Congress as well as in the UDF. It is learnt that the party workers are so distressed with the failure that they are blaming the leadership for taking decisions behind close doors by ignoring the workers. On Thursday, party MPs and others came down heavily on the leadership.

Senior leaders like PJ Kurian have taken over the criticism which was launched by K Muraleedharan the other day. KPCC working president K Sudhakaran said that the party cannot move forward without a change of leadership. The High Command, which expressed dissatisfaction with the setback, however, rejected the demand for a change of leadership. Meanwhile, workers at the grassroots level feel that the leadership must at least change its working style ahead of the upcoming assembly elections.

Various allies of the Congress are also blaming the Congress leadership for the setback. The Muslim League and the RSP have stated that the controversy over the Welfare Party had affected UDF's performance in the election. Leaders of the Muslim League and RSP blamed the lack of clarity among the Congress leaders. This may lead to heavy criticism at the UDF meeting on Saturday.

Soon after the four Congress leaders held a joint press conference and claimed that there was no setback in the local body elections, former KPCC president and MP K Muraleedharan came down heavily on the leadership and openly rejected the leaders' claims. Following this, several others supported Muraleedharan and lashed out at the leadership. While posters in favour of Muraleedharan appeared on Wednesday in Kozhikode, posters attacking prominent leaders were widely posted in the capital yesterday. The party's miserable decline in the corporation has brought the workers to the brink of an explosion.