Thiruvananthapuram: Veteran trade union leader and three-time MLA, Anathalavattom Anandan has died. He was 86.

Anandan was the state president of CPM's trade union, CITU.

Anandan became a member of the communist party in 1956 at the age of 19. When the party split into CPM and CPI in 1964, he stuck with the former.

He represented the Attingal constituency in the state assembly on three occasions.

After becoming a state committee member of the CPM in 1985, Anandan was elevated to the state secretariat of the party in 2008.

Anandan was born on April 22, 1937, in the village of Chilakkoor at Varkala in the Thiruvananthapuram district.

He made his political entry in 1954 by participating in a coir workers' protest demanding a hike of 'one ana' in wages.

That strike led by the Travancore Coir Workers Union was the first of many Anandan waged for the working-class people. He was jailed on several occasions for protesting.

Anandan was the president of Coirfed for 12 years and later became the vice-chairman of Coir Board.

He first contested for an Assembly seat in 1987 and won. However, he failed to retain the Attingal seat in 1991, losing by 316 votes to Congress' T Sharathchandraprasad. Five years later, Attingal backed him and he returned to the Assembly after defeating Vakkom Purushothaman. His final stint in the Assembly was in the 2006 polls when he won by a margin of 11,208 against C Mohanachandran.

Between 2006 and 2011, Anandan was the Chief Whip of the party. He leaves his wife Laila and children Jeeva Anandan and Mahesh Anandan.