After it was roundly trounced in the recent local body polls, the Congress party has decided to bring back its electoral mojo displayed in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, for the upcoming Assembly elections.
An All India Congress Committee-monitored meeting of leaders, including Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president Mullappally Ramachandran, in Kozhikode on Thursday will chalk out the party’s poll strategy for six districts of north Kerala.
Newly appointed AICC secretary in charge of Kerala P.V. Mohan will take part in the meeting. This follows the visit of AICC general secretary Tariq Anwar to the State.
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No legislator
Pre-eminently, the focus will be on Congress profile which has been getting blurred with each passing Assembly elections in Malabar region. In the 2016 polls, the party nominees won just six out of the 60 seats in north Kerala. Pathetically, the Congress party has no legislator in Kasaragod and Kozhikode districts for the last three terms.
At the same time, its dominant partner, the Indian Union Muslim League logged 17 and 19 seats in 2016 and 2011 elections respectively, making it a bigger player in coalition politics in Malabar.
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Nevertheless, in the Lok Sabha polls, the Congress party has been winning hands down the seats in Kozhikode, Vadakara and Wayanad thrice consecutively.
In 2019, the entry of the Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in Wayanad constituency triggered a ripple effect in Malabar with party candidates winning Kannur and Kasaragod parliamentary seats too.
Lack of effective leadership at the district level, factional feuds, bad choice of candidates, back-stabbing and mud-slinging have been attributed to the party getting hammered in the Assembly polls.
Mullappally’s leadership
Ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, an element of serendipity worked for the Congress party after the appointment of Mr. Ramachandran, a native of Vadakara in Kozhikode, as KPCC president in 2018.
As an undisputed choice and close to the AICC leadership, he became the right man in the wrong job just so to balance group, caste and religious equations in the party.
Veteran Congress leader C.K. Govindan Nair was the last KPCC president from Malabar region, way back in 1964.
Now, it remains to be seen whether Mr. Ramachandran can break the Malabar jinx of the Congress in the coming Assembly elections.
After the exit of the LJD and the Jose K. Mani faction of the Kerala Congress (M) , the Congress is likely to bargain and contest more seats such as in Perambra and Thiruvambady, and also in the Vadakara Assembly segment in Kozhikode district.