B.R.P.Bhaskar
Tehelka
With the Left Democratic Front’s term drawing to a close, Kerala is in election mode. The first sign of the poll season was a foundation laying spree. Then came a surer sign: a sex scandal. Many of the projects for which foundation stones are laid are not new. The sex scandal, too, is not new.
For three decades, the LDF, led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), and the United Democratic Front, led by the Congress, have been voted to office in the state in alternate elections. As such, it is now the UDF’s turn. Having done well in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections and, rather unexpectedly, in last year’s panchayat poll too, the UDF was brimming with confidence. Having been drubbed in two successive elections and having lost two allies, the Janata Dal (S) and the Kerala Congress (Joseph), the CPI (M) was seeking to refurbish its image damaged by the differing signals sent out by Chief Minister and state party secretary throughout the life of this government.
Suddenly, a sex scandal that refuses to die darkened the political landscape, casting gloom over the entire UDF camp. The ice cream parlour case, as it is known, was one of half a dozen sex scandals that broke in the 1990s, in which the names of several VIPs cropped up. Its central character is P. K. Kunhalikutty, general secretary of the Indian Union Muslim League, the second largest constituent of the UDF. He was not among the accused in the case but he had to bow out of the last UDF government as one of the victims named him in a television interview.
Getting wind of another television bomb being readied by his detractors, Kunhalikutty announced at a news conference that K.A. Rauf, husband of his wife’s younger sister, was preparing a video to blackmail him and posing a threat to his life. When he was Industry Minister, Rauf had figured in media reports as a fixer. He admitted having shown him favours and vowed not to yield to blackmail again. Rauf appeared before television cameras immediately and confessed to his role in bribing girls to keep Kunhalikutty’s name out of their testimony. Malayalam news channel Indiavision aired a report which, it said, it had been working on for four months, based on information provided by Rauf. It included secretly filmed sequences in which a former government prosecutor refers to bribing of two judges who had handled issues relating the parlour case in the high court. The ex-prosecutor disowned the statement and the ex-judges denied the allegation.
The LDF quickly moved in to cash in on the fallout. The police registered cases on the basis of the media reports, the government explored the possibility of reopening of the parlour case in the light of the new revelations, and party leaders made it the main talking point.
The UDF was in disarray. It was Indiavision, which had first telecast the interview which cost Kunhalikutty his ministership in 2004. Its chairman, M. K. Muneer, who too is an IUML leader and former minister, distanced himself from the reports damaging to his senior colleague saying he does not interfere in the freedom of the editorial department and was unaware of what it was doing. Some elements in the UDF may not be unhappy over the developments as they can be used to rein in the IUML. Muslims in the northern parts having been slow in taking to family planning, the community’s population had registered considerable growth, leading to an increase in the number of Assembly seats from the region. As the dominant party of the region, IUML has a strong claim to the additional seats.
Sex scandals have been talked about at every election in the past 15 years. However, they have not impeded the swing of pendulum so far. Also, which front is in power and which front the VIP suspects belong to have made little difference to the handling of the cases.
Showing posts with label Muslim League. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Muslim League. Show all posts
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Monday, November 22, 2010
Congress in Kerala may be exulting too soon
B.R.P.Bhaskar
IANS
A landslide victory in last month's local elections has heightened the United Democratic Front's (UDF) hopes of returning to power in Kerala in next year's assembly elections but the Congress, which heads the alliance, may be exulting too soon. Its position is not as rosy as it imagines.
The credit for the UDF victory belongs not so much to the Congress as to its allies who helped consolidate minority support behind the UDF after the Communist Party of India- Marxist (CPI-M), which heads the rival Left Democratic Front (LDF), antagonised Muslims and Christians.
Kerala had created history in 1957 by voting the undivided Communist Party to office. It created history again in 1959 by staging a 'liberation struggle', which provided the centre with the excuse to dismiss the Communist government while it enjoyed majority support in the assembly.
The local election vote was 'liberation' by other means. All the forces which had joined hands in 1959 to oust the Communists from power came together again to end their reign over local bodies. The only exception was the Nair Service Society, the forward Hindu community's organization, which now officially follows a policy of equidistance from the two fronts.
In the local elections of 2004, the LDF had secured control of all five city corporations, 12 of the 14 district panchayats, a large majority of the municipalities and block panchayats and two-thirds of the village panchayats. This year, for the first time, the UDF seized control of a majority of local bodies at all levels with the exception of city corporations, where the LDF was able to retain a slender 3-2 lead.
The LDF victory in the 2006 assembly poll came as a hat-trick after successive wins in the Lok Sabha and local elections. In the past three decades, people have voted the LDF and the UDF to power in the state alternately. After successive drubbings in Lok Sabha and local elections, the LDF now faces the possibility of a reverse hat-trick.
The local elections victory has boosted the image of the state Congress leadership, now firmly in the hands of Leader of Opposition Oommen Chandy and Pradesh Congress Committee president Ramesh Chennithala.
For decades, the party had witnessed continuous infighting between an 'I' faction, named for Indira Gandhi, and an 'A' faction, named for A.K. Antony. Oommen Chandy inherited the 'A' faction when Antony moved to the centre. Ramesh Chennithala, a former protege of K. Karunakaran, gathered around him the remnants of the 'I' faction when the veteran walked out of the party, peeved with his neglect by the high command. With Sonia Gandhi backing them to the hilt, the Chandy-Chennithala 'jodi' established a condominium.
Karunakaran, 92, is back in the party but too old and weak to challenge the duo, whose clout is evident from the way they have delayed the return of his son and former state Congress president K. Muraleedharan. He had left the party with Karunakaran but did not return with him. When he finally expressed readiness to return Chandy and Chennithala reacted coolly and the high command did not want to go against their wishes.
While the Chandy-Chennithala combine is in an unassailable position within the Congress, the party's position in the UDF has weakened. The party's electoral performance under them pales into insignificance beside the strides made by its partners, the Indian Union Muslim League and the Kerala Congress (Mani).
The League is in a position to wield power on its own in many local bodies in its stronghold, the Muslim-majority Malappuram district, which happens to be the most populous one in the state. Unable to agree on the division of seats, the Congress and the League had opposed each other in some parts of the district. The League trounced the Congress in those areas. That puts the League in a commanding position.
In areas with a concentration of Christians, the Kerala Congress similarly outperformed the Congress. Its leader, K.M. Mani, had once described the party as one that "splits as it grows, and grows as it splits". He recently strengthened it by wooing back the breakaway factions led by P.J. Joseph and P.C. George, which were in the LDF during the last assembly elections and had helped it attract Christian votes.
Across the state, the UDF polled 15.65 lakh votes more than the LDF. Malappuram alone contributed a lead of more than four lakhs. Kottayam and Ernakulam districts, which have significant Christian populations, provided a lead of more than three lakhs.
The Church, which runs many schools and colleges, was annoyed with the LDF government's education policy. It reportedly played a role in the merger of the Kerala Congress factions. The CPI-M distanced itself from its former Muslim supporters since the Lok Sabha results showed that the association with some of them had cost it many votes. The bid to make up the loss of minority votes by appealing to majority sentiments did not succeed.
The change of government in the state every five years has been made possible by a swing of the pendulum in the southern districts of Thiruvananthapuram, Kollam and Alappuzha. As the minority parties command little influence in the region, elections there are a direct trial of strength between the CPI-M and the Congress. The LDF's lead of about 80,000 votes over the UDF in these districts is something the Congress has to worry about.
IANS
A landslide victory in last month's local elections has heightened the United Democratic Front's (UDF) hopes of returning to power in Kerala in next year's assembly elections but the Congress, which heads the alliance, may be exulting too soon. Its position is not as rosy as it imagines.
The credit for the UDF victory belongs not so much to the Congress as to its allies who helped consolidate minority support behind the UDF after the Communist Party of India- Marxist (CPI-M), which heads the rival Left Democratic Front (LDF), antagonised Muslims and Christians.
Kerala had created history in 1957 by voting the undivided Communist Party to office. It created history again in 1959 by staging a 'liberation struggle', which provided the centre with the excuse to dismiss the Communist government while it enjoyed majority support in the assembly.
The local election vote was 'liberation' by other means. All the forces which had joined hands in 1959 to oust the Communists from power came together again to end their reign over local bodies. The only exception was the Nair Service Society, the forward Hindu community's organization, which now officially follows a policy of equidistance from the two fronts.
In the local elections of 2004, the LDF had secured control of all five city corporations, 12 of the 14 district panchayats, a large majority of the municipalities and block panchayats and two-thirds of the village panchayats. This year, for the first time, the UDF seized control of a majority of local bodies at all levels with the exception of city corporations, where the LDF was able to retain a slender 3-2 lead.
The LDF victory in the 2006 assembly poll came as a hat-trick after successive wins in the Lok Sabha and local elections. In the past three decades, people have voted the LDF and the UDF to power in the state alternately. After successive drubbings in Lok Sabha and local elections, the LDF now faces the possibility of a reverse hat-trick.
The local elections victory has boosted the image of the state Congress leadership, now firmly in the hands of Leader of Opposition Oommen Chandy and Pradesh Congress Committee president Ramesh Chennithala.
For decades, the party had witnessed continuous infighting between an 'I' faction, named for Indira Gandhi, and an 'A' faction, named for A.K. Antony. Oommen Chandy inherited the 'A' faction when Antony moved to the centre. Ramesh Chennithala, a former protege of K. Karunakaran, gathered around him the remnants of the 'I' faction when the veteran walked out of the party, peeved with his neglect by the high command. With Sonia Gandhi backing them to the hilt, the Chandy-Chennithala 'jodi' established a condominium.
Karunakaran, 92, is back in the party but too old and weak to challenge the duo, whose clout is evident from the way they have delayed the return of his son and former state Congress president K. Muraleedharan. He had left the party with Karunakaran but did not return with him. When he finally expressed readiness to return Chandy and Chennithala reacted coolly and the high command did not want to go against their wishes.
While the Chandy-Chennithala combine is in an unassailable position within the Congress, the party's position in the UDF has weakened. The party's electoral performance under them pales into insignificance beside the strides made by its partners, the Indian Union Muslim League and the Kerala Congress (Mani).
The League is in a position to wield power on its own in many local bodies in its stronghold, the Muslim-majority Malappuram district, which happens to be the most populous one in the state. Unable to agree on the division of seats, the Congress and the League had opposed each other in some parts of the district. The League trounced the Congress in those areas. That puts the League in a commanding position.
In areas with a concentration of Christians, the Kerala Congress similarly outperformed the Congress. Its leader, K.M. Mani, had once described the party as one that "splits as it grows, and grows as it splits". He recently strengthened it by wooing back the breakaway factions led by P.J. Joseph and P.C. George, which were in the LDF during the last assembly elections and had helped it attract Christian votes.
Across the state, the UDF polled 15.65 lakh votes more than the LDF. Malappuram alone contributed a lead of more than four lakhs. Kottayam and Ernakulam districts, which have significant Christian populations, provided a lead of more than three lakhs.
The Church, which runs many schools and colleges, was annoyed with the LDF government's education policy. It reportedly played a role in the merger of the Kerala Congress factions. The CPI-M distanced itself from its former Muslim supporters since the Lok Sabha results showed that the association with some of them had cost it many votes. The bid to make up the loss of minority votes by appealing to majority sentiments did not succeed.
The change of government in the state every five years has been made possible by a swing of the pendulum in the southern districts of Thiruvananthapuram, Kollam and Alappuzha. As the minority parties command little influence in the region, elections there are a direct trial of strength between the CPI-M and the Congress. The LDF's lead of about 80,000 votes over the UDF in these districts is something the Congress has to worry about.
Monday, August 3, 2009
Shihab Thangal's demise leaves a void difficult to fill
BRP BHASKAR
Gulf Today
Mohammad Ali Shihab Thangal of Panakkad, who passed away on Saturday, belonged to a rare breed of politicians. He headed the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), Kerala's third largest political party for 34 long years, but never sought an elected office.
Old-timers remember an occasion when he filed nomination papers in an assembly election. That was as cover candidate for CH Mohammad Koya, the party's nominee. Since Koya's papers were in order, he didn't have to contest. He was not in politics at that time anyway.
On another occasion, the Muslim League wanted to send him to parliament. It proposed his name for the Rajya Sabha. The party and the front to which it belonged had sufficient strength in the Assembly to ensure his election. But he and his father, Pookkoya Thangal, who was then president of the League, rejected the suggestion.
Across Kerala's wide political spectrum, either on the right or the left, it is not possible to find another leader who was so totally free from the lure of office.
Believed to be a scion of an Arab family that traces its ancestry to the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH), Shihab Thangal had studied at Al Azhar and Cairo universities and returned home in 1966.
He showed no interest in politics until the party picked him for the president's post on his father's death in 1975. When the IUML was set up in 1948 in Malabar, then a part of the Madras province, there were good reasons for eyebrows to rise quizzically. For one, the organisation's name was similar to that of the All India Muslim League (AIML), which had led the successful campaign for a separate Muslim homeland in the subcontinent. For another, several of its founders had been associated with AIML.
The struggle for power between the Communist Party of India and the non-communist parties after the formation of the Kerala state in 1956 paved the way for the end of the political ostracism that the IUML faced in the early years.
By the time Shihab Thangal assumed the leadership, it was a force to reckon with in state politics, but still carried the stigma of communalism.
More a statesman than a politician, Shihab Thangal, through judicious handling of sensitive issues, steered the League away from the path of communal politics and helped it to gain recognition as part of the secular mainstream.
Instead of dealing with the problems of the Muslim community - it constitutes about a quarter of the population and is the largest single caste/religious group in the state - solely in the narrow context of their faith, he placed them in the broad context of the social, economic and educational backwardness of large sections of the population.
This made it possible to seek solutions for several problems without raising communal animosities. Shihab Thangal faced two major challenges during his long reign as the chief of the League. He faced them, sticking unwaveringly to the Islamic ideal of brotherhood.
First came the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh, by Hindu fanatics to facilitate the construction of a temple dedicated to Ram, who, they believe, was born there in a remote period.
Even as some sections of the community raised shrill cries of revenge, Shihab Thangal asked his followers to ensure that communal harmony was not disrupted.
Then came two rounds of communal violence at the coastal village of Marad. Shihab Thangal exerted his influence to prevent the outbreak from spreading to other areas.
The virulent propaganda unleashed by critics, who alleged that the League was sacrificing the community's interests to enjoy the benefits of power, caused some setbacks to the party. But Shihab Thangal refused to make compromises for short-term gains.
While some parties which flaunt secular names have not been able to shed their communal image, the Muslim League has been able to gain credence as a party that upholds the secular ideal despite the religious tag in its name. The credit for this belongs entirely to Shihab Thangal
He was unique in another respect too. He had an unblemished record in public life. There have been others, too, who have commanded respect as men of integrity but none against whom there was not even a vague allegation of misdemeanour.
The tributes that flowed from all sections of the people on Shihab Thangal's demise are a measure of the regard and respect that he enjoyed cutting across political and religious lines. Truly can it be said that he has left a void that is difficult to fill. – Gulf Today, Sharjah, August 3, 2009.
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