The stage is set for a battle royale from the Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency that sits atop the Western Ghats in Kerala which goes to the polls for a by-election on November 13. With the  Bharatiya Janata Party ( BJP) announcing its candidate from the constituency late Saturday evening, the lineup of contestants is ready. Priyanka Gandhi, the super star of Indian National Congress, is making her electoral debut from Wayanad, which fell vacant following the decision of her sibling Rahul Gandhi to retain the family fiefdom of Rae Bareli from where he won the 2024 election with a brute majority. Rahul had retained the Wayanad constituency with a mammoth margin of 3,64,422 votes (59.69 per cent of total votes polled) and had literally decimated all his rival candidates.

Though the voters in Wayanad were disappointed by his decision to quit the constituency, Rahul had promised the electorate that a person who would be adored and admired by them would be fielded by the Congress and that is how Priyanka entered the scene. The fact that Priyanka is making her electoral debut from the constituency has brought Wayanad to the global political map.

On Sunday,  the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee announced that Sonia Gandhi will hold a road show in Wayanad on Tuesday along with Priyanka and Rahul, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha.

Sathyan Mokeri of the  Communist Party of India (CPI) is the Left Democratic Front (LDF) candidate from Wayanad. The BJP has fielded Navya Haridas, leader of the Mahila Morcha (the women’s wing of the party) as its fighter. Haridas, an articulate and suave politician is a councilor of Kozhikode Municipal Corporation.

Though she is a surprise choice as candidate despite a long list of seat seekers including K Surendran (the state BJP president) Shobha Surendran and V Muraleedharan, former Union Minister, Haridas is expected to put up a brilliant show in the by-poll. It is a foregone conclusion that Priyanka will win hands down from the constituency, what is being watched with keen interest is who would finish as runner-up in this race.

The ruling CPI(M) is not in the “best of health” as the CPI candidate would file his nomination from the constituency. The unnatural death of Naveen Baby, the additional district magistrate of neighboring Kannur district following the public humiliation meted out to him by the District Panchayath President P P Divya, popularly known as the Marxist belle, has caused a major dent in the CPI(M)’s image.

The constituency, since its inception in 2009, has sent only Congress candidates to the Lok Sabha. All Opposition parties in the State are aware of the ground realities. Surendran, who has amassed material properties than the votes during his tenure as BJP state chief has accepted the Congress win by stating that the Hindutva party candidate is likely to make an upsurge in the poll.

Along with Wayanad, the Assembly constituencies of Chelakkara (Reserved) and Palakkad would go to the polls on November 13. The seats fell vacant as the sitting members K Radhakrishnan  and Safi Parambil had to vacate the seats following their election in the Lok Sabha polls. Both Chelakkara and Palakkad will see triangular fights featuring the CPI(M)-led LDF, Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) and the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).