Thiruvananthapuram, April 11 : A day after being removed from the list of national parties by the Election Commission of India, state CPI secretary Kanam Rajendran on Tuesday said that it was "just a technical issue". "Certain new yardsticks are being taken while looking into giving the status of national party. It's not right to consider only one yardstick. What has happened now is just a technical issue only. This doesn't bar us from engaging in political activity or is it not an organisational issue. We functioned even when there was no permission," said Rajendran. Incidentally, the CPI in Kerala is the second biggest ally of the ruling CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front. In the 140-member Kerala Assembly, CPI has 17 seats after they contested the 2021 Assembly polls from 23 seats. At present, they do not have any representation from Kerala in the Lok Sabha, while there are two in the Rajya Sabha. They lost the national party status after it failed to qualify as a state party in West Bengal. At the moment they have the state party status in Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Manipur. The Communist Party of India (CPI) was one among the 14 parties that were recognised as national parties in 1952. /IANS