Thiruvananthapuram: The infamous Congress-League-BJP experiment in Vadakara Lok Sabha polls 1991 is a source of perennial embarrassment to the UDF though both Congress and the BJP are now sworn rivals who cannot brook even a remote electoral adjustment.
The architect of the ‘Ko-Le-B’ tie-up, as it is known in local parlance, was the wily K. Karunakaran. The high-profile contests were in Vatakara Lok Sabha seat and Beypore Assembly segment, though a tacit understanding prevailed in several other Assembly seats.
But the move came a cropper. Mr K. P. Unnikrishnan, who left the Congress to form the Indian Socialist Congress in the aftermath of the Bofors expose, defeated UDF candidate M. Ratna Singh, a former advocate general. Mr Unnikrishnan had the full backing of the LDF. In Beypore, CPM’s T. K. Hamza defeated BJP-backed independent candidate K. Madhavankutty, a former principal at various government medical colleges.
The experiment was supposedly a win-win, scripted by Karunakaran with the help of the then BJP organising general secretary, Mr P. P. Mukundan. It was an opportunistic understanding as the BJP was desperately awaiting an opportunity to avenge the CPM.
“We wanted somehow to ensure the defeat of the CPM, which was eliminating our cadre”, said Mr Mukundan, justifying the “understanding”.
Back in 2019, he dismissed as “puerile” CPM state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan’s latest charge of an understanding between Congress and BJP to support Mr Kummanam Rajasekharan in Thiruvananthapuram in return for help in five other constituencies.
“How can the CPM accuse us of a tacit understanding with the Congress when they are in the open embrace of the Congress outside Kerala? It is CPM which had backed the Congress to ensure our defeat in select seats in Malabar”, he said.
The CPM’s pet taunt at the Congress is that its leaders could convert to BJP anytime and why vote Congress.
The taunt sticks. Mr Tom Vadakken overnight switched to the saffron camp, claiming he was only reading from a script as the party AICC spokesman.
Maharashtra Opposition leader Vikhe Patil’s plan to skip the campaign in the constituency where his son is the BJP candidate.
The CPM too has its quota of embarrassments, though of a lesser variety. Union Minister of State for Tourism K. J. Alphons had made his Assembly debut from Kanjirapally, courtesy of the LDF. Former Union Minister P. C. Thomas, now part of the NDA, had a brief interlude in the LDF camp.
But the five-time Congress MP, Mr K. V. Thomas’ ambivalence instead of a straight answer when asked whether he would accept BJP offers exposes the lack of ideological commitment in a section of Congress leaders. He would only say “I had not thought about it” when reporters asked him whether he would accept the offer. Why wasn’t it a categorical denial, which came the next day following overtures from the high command?
Says political analyst K. Venu: “It is true that a section of Congress men lacks the ideological commitment. They see politics as any other business and it does not matter which side one belongs to as long as the going is good. The party needs to take a firm stand against rank opportunists or they will corrode its ideological base”.
