KERALA BYPOLLS

Analysis | Expected results, unexpected implications for CPM, Cong & BJP

On the face of it, nothing has changed after the byelection results in Kerala. The Congress has held on to its seats -- Wayanad Lok Sabha and Palakkad Assembly -- and the CPM has firmly held on to its stronghold, Chelakkara.

The BJP remains number two, as usual, in Palakkad, and in keeping with the BJP's habit of incrementally increasing its vote share, the party has vastly improved its showing in Chelakkara; its vote share has shot up nearly 5 per cent to 21.49 per cent.

But the reality is, all the three fronts got their calculations wrong. The Congress expected voters to demonstrate a strong anti-government sentiment, which it could then project as an indication of what the Kerala electorate has in mind for 2026 Assembly polls. U R Pradeep's big win in Chelakkara will now have sobered the Congress up.

The CPM went into the byelection determined to prove that it was the Congress that had an unholy alliance with the BJP. The party was desperate to shake off the growing perception -- fanned by ADGP Ajith Kumar's unannounced closed-door meetings with RSS leaders, the top cop's suspicious role in the disruption of the Thrissur Pooram and Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan's reluctance to act against him -- that the BJP has CPM leaders, especially the Chief Minister, at gunpoint.

The Palakkad byelection offered CPM the big chance to rubbish the Congress narrative that it was doing the BJP's bidding and advance its counter-argument that Shafi Parambil was pulled out of Palakkad and fielded in Vadakara Lok Sabha seat in the general elections to hand over Palakkad on a platter to the BJP.

Dr P Sarin, till then a strident anti-CPM voice, was chosen as the LDF's Palakkad candidate mainly because he amplified this Congress-BJP backdoor pact. The CPM presented him as the insider, the whistleblower, who exposed the sordid bigotry-spiked political machinations of the Congress.

As it turned out, the CPM and its candidate, Sarin, failed big time to persuade the voters. It was Congress's Rahul Mamkoottathil who gave the BJP its most embarrassing political defeat in the last decade. He won with a record margin of 18,840 votes.

Even CPM insiders concede that Rahul's victory is the biggest political triumph of the byelections as it prevented the BJP from entering the Assembly.

And coming close on the heels of a historic win in Thrissur Lok Sabha, the BJP had framed its projected win in Palakkad as the natural next step in its sure-footed onward march in Kerala. C Krishnakumar's loss was so definitive that it almost seemed ridiculous for the BJP to claim Palakkad as its backyard. It also showed that the party's near-win performance in 2021 was solely on account of the candidature of an iconic figure like 'Metroman' E Sreedharan.

Intra-party squabbles could also have played a role in the BJP's massive slide. The discontent over the denial of ticket to Sobha Surendran, the attack on the house of her close associate and former BJP councillor S P Achuthanandan by Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha workers considered close to BJP state president K Surendran, the forced resignation of Priya Ajayan as municipality chairperson have all sundered unity in Palakkad BJP.

Nonetheless, Rahul's win was so resounding that the impact of such inner-party squabbles on the verdict could have been just marginal. It looked like the voters were intent on a Congress victory.

In fact, even while battling the BJP, the CPM had also tried to eat into the Congress votes in Palakkad. The Congress survived this, too, and with aplomb.

In Palakkad, there were two sides to the CPM strategy. One, it tried to appeal to the majority Hindu community. This was mainly sought to be achieved through Dr P Sarin whose academic qualifications, it was felt, would make him a more acceptable LDF candidate than the usual CPM candidates.

The Hindu voters were sought to be seduced by what the UDF called a dubious strategy. By lambasting the Muslim League, by hitching the League to Jamaat e Islami, a fringe Muslim organisation. Through this JeI association the CPM was trying to imply that the League has transformed into an extreme version of itself.

The CPM's 'Operation Hindu Votes' was not productive. Sarin just managed to retain the CPM votes in the municipality area. If in 2021, the CPM cornered 21.1per cent of the votes in the municipality area, this time Sarin took 21.6% of the town votes, an insignificant increase.

The other side of the CPM strategy was to confuse Muslim voters. It put out ads in dailies that cater to Muslim readers demonising Sandeep Varier, the former BJP spokesperson who switched over to the Congress. The objective was to sow in Muslim voters' disaffection for the Congress for rolling out the red carpet for a former RSS loudmouth who held extreme and toxic right wing views.

This second strategy backfired. It looks like the Muslim community was even more determined to vote for the 'hand' symbol. In Pirayiri panchayat, which is widely said to be predominantly Muslim, Congress increased its lead by 2000 votes.

As a result, despite the CPM's attempts to eat into its votes, the Congress could ward off the BJP threat. And in the Chelakkara victory, the CPM had a moral. There, at seven public rallies, the Chief Minister spoke only of development. There, he shunned polarising talk.

And in Wayanad, it was a virtual walk over for Congress's Priyanka Gandhi. Though the voting percentage fell by 8per cent points, Priyanka still managed to corner a bigger victory margin than her brother. If Rahul Gandhi's victory margin in early 2024 was 3.64 lakh, his sister's was 4.10 lakh. 

She also reclaimed for Congress the vote share Rahul Gandhi had amassed in 2019, the first time he contested in Wayanad. Then, Rahul's vote share was 64.94 per cent. Now, with 64.99 per cent, Priyanka has restored it for the Congress.

The CPI was no formidable force without much help from the CPM. In 2014, when Sathyan Mokeri gave Congress's M I Shanavas a mighty scare, the CPM was fully behind him. Not this time. The BJP did put up a spirited fight, but its young candidate, Navya Haridas, was left to fend for itself. The BJP apparatus was fully concentrated in Palakkad. 

Still, Navya managed to mop up over 1 lakh votes, a feat only the BJP state president K Surendran had achieved. But in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, when Surendran was the BJP's Wayanad candidate, he had the full force of the BJP machinery behind him.