Year 2016 has been extremely turbulent politically as far as Kerala is concerned but as it comes to a close, the major political parties in the State are facing credibility crisis for different reasons.
The State’s biggest party, CPI(M), had come to power with a huge majority in the May election promising to ‘make everything all right’, but it has obviously failed to fulfill it. The Congress is a house of discord thanks to its group wars which just two days was taken to the streets when a senior leader was targeted for assault.
The lDF Government headed by CPI(M) Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had started off in a promising manner but the conduct of the police has been a reason for bitter complaints all the way.
The charges against the Home Department reached a peak after the killing of two Maoists on November 24 in an allegedly fake encounter in Nilambur in Malappuram.
Even people who had supported the party’s protests against demonetization and several other policies of the NDA Government in the Centre, lashed out at it for its stand on this incident, allegations of atrocities against Dalits, nepotism and the most recent uncertainty in the public distribution system with food grain distribution coming to a virtual halt.
The biggest shock the CPI(M) received since it came to power was the nepotism charge against central committee member EP Jayarajan. Following this, he resigned as Industries Minister, enabling the party to claim that it valued morality in politics. However, the credibility so gained eroded after the induction of a new Marxist to the Cabinet in the place of Jayarajan.
The reason for this was that the new Minister was none other than MM Mani, the Idukki strongman who had openly claimed that his party used to murder its adversaries as per prepared hit lists. Even after a court found his alleged role in a murder case worthy of a probe, the party irked the people by its obstinate stand that there was no need for Mani to resign.
“The CPI(M) is going through so many internal contradictions regarding its policies and it is affecting everything the Government does,” said a former party theorist based in Kochi. “Pinarayi, who used to rule the CPI(M) with an iron hand when he was State secretary, is finding difficulties in reconciling the contradictions in his Government’s policies,” he added.
The condition of the State unit of the Congress is worse than that of the CPI(M), according to observers. “What Kerala saw on Wednesday – the bid to manhandle former spokesman Rajmohan Unnithan by supporters of his rival – should have never happened in a democratic party but it keeps happening in the Congress,” said a former Congress Minister.
Sources in the party admit that the faction war, which had till recently been between the ‘A’ group of former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and ‘I’ group led by Opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala, has now become multi-pronged with State party chief VM Sudheeran nurturing his own “group of the group-less”.
Reports say that Chandy, perhaps the most popular Congress leader in the State though he is-by his own choice -is not holding any official position in the party, has expressed his desire to stay away from the leadership not because he wants to call it a day but because the high command and Sudheeran are constantly trying to sideline him.
“Chennithala is facing the criticism –within the party and outside – that he has failed to prove his prowess as Opposition leader. The cold war between Chandy and Sudheeran, which had started at the time of the May election, has reached its peak. The high command, itself in a bad shape, is unable to control the rot. The workers are a disappointed lot,” said the former Minister.
