As Okay.Okay. Shailaja, MLA, addressed the media in Kozhikode on Tuesday night quickly after the declaration of the candidates’ record of the CPI(M) for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, one of many main questions posed to her was on the impression of the T.P. Chandrasekharan homicide case on the elections.
“That case is before the [Kerala High] Court. The court verdict is important in this, and the guilty should be punished. Neither we nor the people of Vadakara want to rake it up during a Parliament election where serious political issues are being discussed. M.V. Govindan, CPI(M) State secretary, has already clarified that the party would abide by the court verdict,” she stated.
Political observers, nonetheless, really feel that her candidature itself is a sign of the CPI(M)’s try and wrest the seat, as soon as a Left stronghold, again from the Congress, which has electorally benefited from the previous’s alleged involvement in political violence.
Vadakara has a historical past of electing candidates with socialist leanings, and leaders equivalent to Okay.B. Menon, A.V. Raghavan, and Arangil Sreedharan represented the seat until 1971. Thereafter, Okay.P. Unnikrishnan, who represented the Congress, Congress(U), and Congress(S), throughout varied events, had an unbroken tenure from there until 1996. It was O. Bharathan, senior commerce union chief, who defeated Mr. Unnikrishnan that yr to convey the seat to the CPI(M) fold. From 1996 to 2009, Vadakara had been represented by social gathering nominees within the Lok Sabha.
P. Sathidevi, incumbent MP, tasted defeat by the hands of Congress chief Mullappally Ramachandran in 2009, a yr after Chandrasekharan, a preferred CPI(M) chief in Onchiyam, broke away from the social gathering and shaped the Revolutionary Marxist Occasion (RMP). Chandrasekharan himself was a candidate in that election. On Might 4, 2012, Chandrasekharan was murdered, and senior CPI(M) leaders had been arraigned within the case.
The controversy round political murders and the involvement of the CPI(M) in it contributed in no small measure to the defeat of social gathering candidates A.N. Shamseer and P. Jayarajan, respectively, in subsequent Lok Sabha elections in 2014 and 2019. Although Mr. Shamseer managed to scale back the margin of loss to round 3,000 votes in 2014, Mr. Jayarajan, perceived by political rivals as a mastermind of political violence, misplaced to Okay. Muraleedharan by 84,663 votes. The RMP is now formally supporting the United Democratic Entrance too. The CPI(M) feels that Ms. Shailaja will be capable of overcome the jinx in Vadakara by means of her reputation that cuts throughout varied sections of society, together with ladies voters.
Ms. Shailaja had been an MLA for the Koothuparamba Meeting seat, which is a part of the Vadakara Lok Sabha constituency, twice, and her monitor file as Well being Minister has endeared her to a lot of individuals. Her margin of victory within the 2021 Meeting polls (60,963 votes) attests to that reality. It stays to be seen if the technique will work out on the hustings.