The Hindu : Kerala News : UDF wants to break the jinx

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Apr 12, 2004

Kerala

Kerala

UDF wants to break the jinx

By G. Prabhakaran

PALAKKAD, APRIL 11.

The Ottapalam (Reserved) Lok Sabha constituency which the former President, K.R. Narayanan, represented thrice as a Congress candidate is witnessing a keen contest this time as the Congress-led ruling United Democratic Front (UDF) is making a determined bid to wrest its lost seat.

The constituency came into national attention when K.R. Narayanan had won the traditional seat from the CPI(M). But after Mr. Narayanan vacated the seat on becoming the Vice-President of India in the 1993 election, the Congress lost it to the CPI(M).

The constituency was a Left stronghold until Mr. Narayanan entered the fray as a Congress candidate in 1984. In the three successive elections since then, he defeated A.K. Balan once and Lenin Rajendran twice.

But there was a perceptible decline in the margin each time, indicating that the Left had made concerted efforts to win back the seat.

When Mr. Narayanan contested for the third time, his margin was just about 14,000 votes.

It was S. Sivaraman of the CPI(M), who scored the all-time record margin of 1,33,674 votes over the seasoned Congress leader, K.K. Balakrishnan, in 1993 after Mr. Narayanan vacated the seat.

The 1993 poll was fought on the issue of demolition of the Babri Masjid at Ayodhya.

The Muslim community was then agitated over the Congress regime's failure to protect the monument.

There are more than 2 lakh Muslim voters in the constituency.

Till 1977, the constituency was held by CPI(M) nominees - E.K. Imbichi Bava in 1962, C.K. Chakrapani in 1967 and M.K. Krishnan in 1971. But in the 1977 election held in the backdrop of Emergency, K. Kunhambu won the seat for the Congress for the first time defeating C.K. Chakrapani by a margin of 35,731 votes. However, in 1980 A.K. Balan of the CPI(M) wrested the seat from the Congress.

In this election, the Congress had put up a young woman candidate, K.A. Thulasi, hailing from the Chelakkara Assembly constituency, which is part of the Ottapalam Lok Sabha constituency, to take on S. Ajayakumar of the CPI(M) who won the seat three-times consecutively.

In the Congress list sent from Kerala to the party high command, there was only one name for the Ottapalam constituency that was of Ms. Thulasi. Thus she was a unanimous candidate of the party and all the groups in the Congress are working for her victory.

But the Congress infighting, especially the `Muraleedharan factor' in the Wadakkancherry Assembly segment where the Electricity Minister, K. Muraleedharan, is contesting to get entry into the Assembly, his winning the seat could help the chances of Ms. Thulasi.

If the Congress infighting mars the chances of Mr. Muraleedharan, it could also affect the chances of party's Lok Sabha nominee.

This is because the Wadakkancherry Assembly segment of the Ottapalam Lok Sabha constituency used to give huge margin to the Congress in all the previous Lok Sabha elections.

Of the seven Assembly segments four - Thrithala, Pattambi, Ottapalam and Kuzhalmannam - are in Palakkad district and the other three - Chelakkara, Wadakkancherry and Kunnamkulam are in

the neighbouring Thrissur district.

In the last Lok Sabha election, the UDF had a lead of 8,339 votes in Wadakkancherry. They had a lead in Thrithala, Pattambi, Chelakkara, Wadakkancherry and Kunnamkulam over the LDF. But the LDF with its huge margins in Ottapalam and Kuzhalmannam Assembly segments managed to win the seat with a margin of 13,715 votes.

In the last Assembly election, the UDF had won Pattambi, Wadakkancherry and Kunnamkulam segments only and the LDF won Thrithala (SC), Kuzhalmannam (SC), Ottapalam and Chelakkara. Ms. Thulasi had lost the Assembly election with a narrow margin at Chelakkara to the CPI(M) candidate and former Minister, K. Radhakrishnan. Though Ottapalam is highly political in its voting behaviour, the Muslim votes are crucial especially in the Pattambi, Ottapalam and Thrithala Assembly segments.

In the Kunnamkulam and Wadakkancherry Assembly seats, Christian votes hold the key.

Thus the voting behaviour of these two dominant minority groups is crucial in this election.

This backward constituency lacks development in various fields.

It is an agriculture-dominated area with large number of agriculture workers. The drought condition prevailing in the area and the destruction of crops for want of irrigation water are the key issues raised by each candidate.

The sitting MP is claiming that he brought many railway projects like Shoranur model railway station, railway over bridges, Velliyamkal and Ottapalam causeways, etc.

But both his UDF and BJP opponents criticise him for his failure to get any major projects for the district during his three-term tenure.

The BJP is harping on the `feel good factor' under the rule of A.B. Vajpayee. They wanted to strengthen the hands of Mr. Vajpayee by sending MPs from Kerala.

The party has field P.M. Velayudhan for the third time. In the last election, Mr. Velayudhan received 70,851 votes when the CPI(M) nominee, S. Ajayakumar, won the seat defeating the Congress nominee, Pandalam Sudhakaran, by a margin of 13,715 votes.

In this constituency where a woman candidate is in the fray, women voters outnumber men. There are a total of 10,80,453 voters out of which majority 5,73,237 are women voters.

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