With the BJP getting ready to wage a determined civic poll battle and several majority community outfits preparing to announce a grand alliance with it, politics in Kerala is undergoing a big change: The State’s politics, which for more than three decades has strictly been a bipolar affair between the Congress-led UDF and the CPI(M)-headed lDF, is rapidly becoming triangular.
No forces other than the two main fronts used to figure in poll-time discussions in the Kerala media till recently, but this time the BJP and the several Hindu communities that are getting ready to float a political formation are the main topic. Observers expect the new situation to make a significant change in the political and electoral history of the State.
So far, the BJP was being considered as an also-ran in elections in Kerala. Despite its stunning performances in some of the Assembly and lok Sabha constituencies in some elections, it has never been able to take its vote-share beyond 10.4 percent, leave alone the question of “opening account”.
But observers say that this situation has undergone a big change since the June 27 Assembly by-poll in Aruvikkara in which the BJP’s vote-share went up from just six percent in 2011 to 24 percent though party candidate O Rajagopal could claim only the third position. “Aruvikkara is perhaps a pointer to the shape of things to come in Kerala politics,” said a senior journalist.
“It is impossible at this stage to predict the gains BJP may or may not make in the coming local polls or Assembly election. But the BJP has indeed gained a lot of strength since Aruvikkara. Its dream of opening account in the next Assembly poll with the help of the Hindu community outfits and popularity of the Central Government need not be entirely unrealistic,” he said.
The game-changer in the civic poll to be held in the first week of November is going to be, according to pundits, the grand alliance — which is yet to take a formal shape — between the BJP and the various majority community outfits, especially the SNDP Yogam, the organisation of Hindu lower caste Ezhavas who constitute over 20 percent of the State’s population.
The leadership of the SNDP, whose constituents, the Ezhavas, are considered as supporters of the CPI(M) traditionally, has already launched a massive offensive against the Marxists with Yogam general secretary Vellappally Natesan attacking them at every available opportunity by targeting the left’s star campaigner, Opposition leader VS Achuthanandan.
Even CPI(M) leaders are admitting that the SNDP’s decision to ally with the BJP along with more than a dozen other majority community outfits may affect their prospects to a certain extent both in the November civic polls as well as in the Assembly polls to be held in less than seven months.
The Marxists’ only relief is that Vellappally has many times in the past proved to be a failure in influencing poll results as in the case of senior Congress leader VM Sudheeran, presently Kerala PCC chief, and KC Venugopal, former Union Minister. Vellappally had wanted to see their defeat but he could not ensure this though they had contested from his own home town.
“SNDP is a community organisation which has members and office-bearers who are leaders and workers of different political parties. We don’t see any possibility of such people giving up their political beliefs for the sake of Vellappally’s political ambitions. That is simply not going to happen,” said a CPI(M) leader from Vellappally’s native village, Kanichukulangara.
The Congress and the UDF which are heavily dependent on minority communities are unperturbed by these developments for the time being. They feel that a grand alliance between BJP and Hindu community outfits is going to work in their favour because such a situation could lead to the consolidation of minorities as was proved in the Aruvikkara Assembly by-poll.