Bangalore: The son-in-law of communist icon E.M.S. Namboodiripad has sparked a controversy with a misogynistic comment on the widow of T.P. Chandrasekharan, a breakaway CPM leader who was killed by party cadres six years ago.

Guptan C.K. who is married to the daughter of EMS - as the late leader and former chief minister is fondly called - made the comment against Chandrasekharan's widow K.K. Rema in a Facebook post on Wednesday.

He was reacting to the latest political killing to rock Kannur, in north Kerala, where suspected CPM cadres murdered Congress worker M. Shuhaib, 29, with 37 cuts on Monday. But Guptan went on a tangent to attack Rema.

"The mind of a woman who uses her husband's death to hit out at the CPM is worse than a dung pit," he wrote in Malayalam, triggering a spate of abusive reactions from Facebook users.

Guptan pointed the finger of suspicion at the Revolutionary Marxist Party (RMP), the outfit Chandrasekharan launched in 2009 after leaving the CPM. "It needs to be probed if the RMP was behind the TP (Chandrashekaran) murder case," he said and wondered whether a Congress-BJP-RMP nexus was behind the latest killing in Kannur.

Guptan's comment against Rema, a well-known political figure, didn't go down well in a state that has been seriously debating misogyny in cinema and public life.

"It's a shame to even associate Guptan with the family of EMS. It's an even bigger insult to womanhood that this man's wife is a member of the state women's commission, which is supposed to protect women," Rema told The Telegraph on Sunday.

Chandrasekharan was killed on May 4, 2012, by CPM cadres for leaving the party and launching the RMP. Eleven persons, three of them CPM cadres, have since been sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder. Chandrasekharan died of 57 deep cuts all over his body. The appeal seeking the death sentence for the killers is pending before Kerala High Court.

"They have been humiliating me and insulting me with their planned attacks from Day I since I began seeking justice for my husband, whose killing is a reflection of the kind of party today's CPM is," Rema said.

She is now planning to head to Delhi for a sit-in demonstration tentatively to be held on February 21-22 outside the CPM headquarters, AKG Bhavan. Asked why she didn't go to police against Guptan's comment, Rema said she didn't have faith in a department that functions under chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan.

"After they insulted me during the 2016 state elections (when she contested from Vadakara), I had lodged a complaint. But nothing came of it," she said.

"It was very difficult to take their insults and character assassination with the sole intent of silencing me. I know I would have been the much-loved widow had I not questioned the CPM and its murder politics," Rema said.

"I have to say this party is a gang of anti-socials," she said, also questioning the silence of women leaders in the CPM.

P Sathidevi, the CPM women's wing state secretary, said she had not seen Guptan's post. "Facebook is full of comments from all sides. But I am yet to see this post," she told this newspaper, adding she wasn't sure if Guptan was a party member.

The Kerala CPM headquarters in Thiruvananthapuram refused to confirm or deny if Guptan was a party member.

Guptan did not respond to messages seeking his comments.