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.

New group equation in Congress

BRP Bhaskar
Gulf Today

Factionalism has reappeared in Kerala’s Congress party which had presented a semblance of unity in the recent past with Leader of the Opposition Oommen Chandy and Pradesh Congress president Ramesh Chennithala operating like Siamese twins.

Oommen Chandy inherited the leadership of the Congress (A) faction along with the chief minister’s post when AK Antony moved to Delhi to join the Central Cabinet in 2004. Ramesh Chennithala was a protégé of Congress (I) leader K Karunakaran but had broken away from him and emerged as a group leader in his own right.

After Karunakaran’s exit from the party with his son and former Pradesh Congress president K Muraleedharan and Vayalar Ravi’s entry in the Central Cabinet, there was no one to challenge to the Chandy-Chennithala duo, which enjoyed the patronage of party president Sonia Gandhi. As a result factionalism subsided.

Karunakaran returned to the Congress after a brief sojourn in Sharad Pawar’s National Congress Party, but Muraleedharan is still waiting to be readmitted. Chandy and Chennithala are in no hurry to let him in. They don’t want his readmission to be considered until his six-year suspension is over.

There was a time when the Congress in Kerala elected its office-bearers through a transparent process. As factionalism became intense, rival groups enrolled bogus members, leading to bitter disputes over the rolls and elections became impossible. The central leadership then nominated office-bearers, as in other states.

Although Sonia Gandhi is said to be keen to restore the democratic process, the exercise now under way falls short of full-scale elections. The party is now experimenting with a form of guided democracy.

For the youth and student bodies of the party, Rajiv Gandhi, who is general secretary of the All India Congress Committee, devised a system of elections in which there are no losers. There is an open contest between two candidates. Te one who gets the largest number of votes becomes the president and the runner-up is accommodated as vice-president.

Office-bearers of the Congress party at different levels are being decided through consensus building. There is a tacit understanding not to disturb existing arrangements.

As the process got under way in the state, word spread that Oommen Chandy and Ramesh Chennithala had struck a deal to maintain the status quo. This means Chandy will be the chief minister if the Congress-led UDF emerges victorious in the next Assembly elections, as is expected, and Chennithala will remain PCC president. This led to heartburn in some erstwhile faction leaders.

Later there was speculation that Chennithala may make a bid for the chief minister’s post with the backing of the Nair Service Society, which speaks in the name of the forward Nair community. This raised hackles in the Chandy camp. The party is keen to placate the NSS leadership which has expressed dissatisfaction at the absence of a Nair acceptable to it in the Central Cabinet.

According to reports in the local media, under the emerging consensus Oommen Chandy’s Congress (A) faction will head the party unit in seven of the 14 districts. The reconstructed Congress (I) faction under Chennithala will get six districts. One district will go to Karunakaran’s nominee.

The ‘A’ faction, it is said, will get at least half of the 280 seats in the Pradesh Congress Committee, the ‘I’ faction about 115 and the Karunakaran rump about 15. That leaves just about 10 places for leaders who have stayed away from factional games.

The new group equation places the Congress at a disadvantage in the context of the realignment of caste and religious forces now under way.

There has been a consolidation of Christian sectarianism with the merger of the PJ Joseph faction of the Kerala Congress, which was until recently an LDF constituent, in the KM Mani faction, a UDF constituent, and The Indian Union Muslim League, another UDF constituent, is working for a consolidation of Muslim groups, taking advantage of the alienation of Muslim bodies which were aligned with the LDF.

That leaves the Congress in keen competition with the Communist Party of India-Marxist for the Hindu vote. The CPI-M has already made a pitch for it by talking of the growth of Muslim and Christian communalism and glossing over the growth of Hindu communalism. Karunakaran has warned that the new equation may not help the party in the panchayat elections due this year and the Assembly elections to follow next year. –Gulf Today, June 21, 2010