Kerala Assembly elections: Small is not beautiful when polls are close by

Kochi: The demand raised by small political parties for the number of seats is taken as an indication Congress and CPM leadership in Kerala will vouch that small is certainly not beautiful. The combined vote share of the 10 smaller political parties belonging to both the United Democratic Front and Left Democratic Front is less than 10 per cent of the total polled votes in the 2011 assembly elections. Still, the number of seats demanded by these parties is much higher than their capacity to garner votes.

The Janata Dal (secular) led by Mathew T Thomas, a constituent of the LDF, has contested five seats in the 2011 assembly elections and won 1.52 per cent of the total polled votes. The party is now demanding for eight seats saying that it managed to win four out of the five seats it contested. Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) in the LDF winning two out of the four seats it contested with 1.24 per cent of the votes also wanted to double the number of seats the party wanted to contest.

The Congress-led UDF is also faced with similar demands from the smaller constituents of the alliance. The Socialist Janata Dal now emerged as Janata Dal United with vote share of 1.65 per cent and two sitting MLAs are also demanding at least seven seats to contest in the elections. The Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) now part of the UDF is also asking for a minimum of six seats compared with four seats contested in the previous elections. Kerala Congress (Jacob) another small party jockeying for more seats despite its ability to command less than one per cent of the total polled votes. CMP lead by CP John is the only smaller entity in UDF which seemed to be content with the single seat promised to it by the UDF leadership.