In the run up to the Lok Sabha polls the traditional political rivals in Kerala are accusing each other of having a secret pact with the BJP.
If up until recently the BJP-led NDA was just relegated to a third position in the state’s poll battles, there has been a slight change in a few constituencies like Thiruvananthapuram, Thrissur and Kasargod. Here the BJP has made some inroads into the vote bank of the hitherto traditional rivals and this might give the Congress some heartburn.
Kerala has 20 Lok Sabha seats and in the 2019 polls, the Congress won a thumping victory by bagging 19 seats, with one going to the CPI-M.
This time around, the BJP is hoping to win a Lok Sabha seat and veteran BJP leader Prakash Javadekar who is the party’s incharge in Kerala is now spending more time here.
After his last visit to Kozhikode, early this week, he claims to have got a feedback from the traditional Left voters that things will be different for the BJP now in the state.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls the Kerala BJP-led NDA finished a distant third and managed a mere 15.64 per cent vote share, while the Congress-led UDF won 19 seats securing a vote share of 47.48 per cent. The then ruling Left Front got 36.29 per cent votes and one seat.
Similarly the BJP cut a sorry figure when in the 2021 Assembly polls in Kerala, the saffron party’s vote share went down by 2.60 per cent to reach 12.36 per cent as compared to the 2016 Assembly polls and the party lost its only seat.
So statistically, the traditional rival fronts are certain the BJP will not be able to do any wonders in Kerala and are accusing each other of having a secret pact with the saffron party.
In the words of Leader of Opposition, VD Satheesan, who accused the Left and the Sangh Parivar of having a secret pact to keep the Congress out, “Whatever pact they have, it will have no impact on the Congress as the people have already decided to show the door to Vijayan for his misgovernance.”
“Union Minister of State and BJP leader V Muraleedharan is the one who works with Vijayan,” added Satheesan.
However, an angry V Muraleedharan slammed Satheesan’s statement and said that Vijayan and Satheesan were hand in glove for their own interests, because if it was any other government at the Centre, would the Principal Secretary and then top IAS officer be cooling his heels in jail?
“There have been numerous scams in Kerala by the Vijayan led Government and Satheesan is looking away and not doing what a real Opposition leader should be doing. People who know what’s happening in Kerala know who all are in cahoots,” said V Muraleedharan.
However, Vadakara Congress MP, K Muraleedharan said, both Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and his daughter Veena Vijayan are in deep trouble following a scandalous deal done by her IT company which is now under the scanner of the central agencies. Vijayan will do his best to help the BJP open their account by ditching their second-biggest ally, the CPI, to please the national leadership of the BJP, as the central agencies are all set to conduct an examination into the affairs of her (Veena Vijayan) firm.”
On the other hand CPI(M) state Secretary, MV Govindan and other senior party leaders accuse the Congress of having a pact with the BJP. “Whatever happens, we will see to it that we keep the BJP out,” said Govindan.
The CPI(M) often says that it is they who are fighting the BJP tooth and nail and that’s how they were able to defeat the BJP at the Nemom constituency in the 2021 Assembly polls which the saffron party won in 2016.
But the fact of the matter is that the present State Education Minister V Sivankutty won from Nemom because K Muraleedharan though a sitting MP, contested the seat and managed to come third by getting sizeable votes which would have otherwise gone to the BJP candidate and this enabled Sivankutty to win.
Even as the three political fronts are blaming one another, the Congress-led UDF is sitting in pole position as the Vijayan Government’s governance is at its lowest ebb.
In the meantime, the BJP’s national leadership, right from Prime Minister Modi, is doing everything in its power to see that the saffron party opens its account in Kerala.
(The story has been published via a syndicated feed with a modified headline.)
