Unidentified men stabbed a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh activist in Kathiroor town in Kerala’s Kannur district on Tuesday night while he was returning from work, the Hindustan Times reported. The RSS blamed the Communist Party of India (Marxist) for the attack on P Praveen.

Praveen was admitted to the Government Medical College in Kozhikode with two stab injuries, a sub-inspector at the Kathiroor Police Station told Scroll.in.

Around 8 pm, an hour after Praveen was attacked, a CPI(M) worker was admitted to the Koothuparamb Taluk Hospital in Kannur district with multiple stab injuries. The police in Meloor said KP Appukkuttan was on his way back home after participating in a protest against RSS workers for allegedly attacking a CPI(M) office on December 18. The party accused the RSS of stabbing Appukkuttan.

There have been several such incidents of right-wing and left-wing activists being attacked in Kerala over the past decade and a half. While there are no official figures, data obtained from a Right to Information query said that the Bharatiya Janata Party and the CPI(M) have lost at least 30 workers each between 2000 and 2016. Kannur alone reported 69 political murders in this period.