As far as the Nationalist Congress Party of Sharad Pawar is concerned, the impact of the resignation on Wednesday of its affluent strongman Thomas Chandy as Kerala Transports Minister is not confined to the political territory of the State. With his resignation, the party has lost its only Minister in the entire country.
May be for the same reason, the national leadership had made all possible efforts to protect him even when it had become obvious that his resignation was unavoidable. Apart from declaring total support for the tainted leader, it had even gone to the extent of silencing his detractors within the party with a gag order.
The crisis for NCP and Chandy reached its irreversible peak after the CPI, second biggest lDF constituent, stuck to its demand for his resignation and its four Ministers boycotted Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting – in which Chandy participated – by informing the Chief Minister that they were staying away because the tainted NCP strongman was taking part.
“There was no situation that warranted my resignation. Then the Chief Minister us to have a rethink saying that an lDF partner (CPI) had boycotted the Cabinet meeting (because of me). Even then he said that he was not asking me to resign,” Chandy told the media on Wednesday on his way from Thiruvananthapuram to Kochi in the Minister’s State car after quitting the Cabinet.
The NCP is still hoping that the situation may reverse sooner or later in its favour. According to Chandy, the Chief Minister has promised to keep the position of Transport minister vacant and to re-allot it to NCP once he earned a clean chit from the Supreme Court in the encroachment case and got the High Court’s negative references removed.
The NCP thinks that it has another option, still. It hopes that its only other MlA, AK Saseendran, Chandy’s predecessor in Transports ministry who resigned in March over a sex scandal, can return to the Cabinet once an ongoing inquiry in the issue exonerates him. The inquiry panel’s report is expected in December and many think that he may get a clean chit.
“Most probably, that will remain a mere dream for Chandy, Saseendran and the NCP,” said a senior CPI leader. “At present, we are perhaps the only lDF constituent that is opposing the designs of Chandy and others. But if such a proposal comes up formally in the front, that may create a mutiny,” he added.
However, there are observers who think that such a development cannot be ruled out considering the way the Chief Minister had allegedly tried to protect Chandy through the past three months. “We cannot find fault with anybody who argues that Chandy would have gone out of power weeks ago if he did not have Pinarayi’s blessings,” said a senior pro-left journalist.