After branding the ongoing ASHA workers’ strike in Kerala, now in its third week, as ‘unnecessary’, the CPM, the leading constituent of the ruling LDF, is now proceeding to stage 2 of strike-denigrating, deploying its master-strike-denigrator — the ex-Minister and CITU leader Elamaram Kareem. This man is notorious for his anti-people stance in many earlier workers’ struggles, notably the epic struggle to end the terrible pollution of the Chaliyar river by Birla’s factory there. The full misogyny that defines the present-day CPM leadership in Kerala, as well as its reeking elitism, may be found in the ugly article that he wrote in the CPM’s organ, Deshabhimani a couple of days back. Despite the CPM’s claims about ‘women’s empowerment’, if one takes Kareem seriously, it now firmly believes that the public care work that the ASHAs do are only ‘service’ and that they are ‘not workers’.