Will Gandhi siblings mount a frontal attack on LDF in the run-up to Kerala polls?

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Thiruvananthapuram: As Congress and its United Democratic Front (UDF) partners in election-bound Kerala pin great hopes on Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi as star campaigners, the question remains if the siblings would mount a tenacious attack on the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF), instead of wasting their firepower by training all guns at Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the state where the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is not a front-runner. 

In normal circumstances, this would have been an absurd poser as elections pit principal adversaries taking mercilessly on each other. However, despite being an MP from Kerala, Rahul Gandhi has so far discretely refrained from pricking the state government headed by the CPI(M) stalwart Pinarayi Vijayan. 

The reason is not far to seek. The Left, especially the CPI(M), is a national ally of the Congress. The party’s left-of-the centre sections rate the Left as trustworthy and value the partnership greatly. The bond has been further cemented by forging a formal alliance in West Bengal, where the combine will be fighting the Trinamool Congress (TMC) and resurgent BJP.

The political correctness would expect a national party to avoid the embarrassment of being collaborators in one state and bitter opponents in another. When he decided to contest from the Wayanad Lok Sabha seat in 2019 parliament elections, Rahul had prefaced his campaign with the caveat that he would largely spare the Left, even though his nearest rival was from the CPI. 

Projected as the would-be prime minister, he had stuck to his script of spitting fire and brimstone at Modi. No one in the UDF bothered about that as it was a national election where the larger fight was between the BJP and all those opposed to it.  

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During his visits to the state since then, which were few and far between, Gandhi had chosen to be mute on the state-level issues, leaving it to the state leaders to battle it out with the government. But the upcoming assembly polls are an altogether different game. What is at stake for the Congress is its very survival in the state. In the prevailing situation, Kerala is the lone southern state where the Congress stands the chance of gaining the power to lead a government.

After its sterling performance in 2019 parliament polls, the Congress in Kerala appears to have lost much of its steam. It came out severely bruised in the multi-tier civic polls held in December. The party continues to be riddled with intense factionalism, despite interventions and warnings from the central observers to put the house in order ahead of the polls. The party workers on the ground, a demoralized and frustrated lot, still have no clue as to who would be the chief minister in the event of a victory.

The Congress high command has drafted former chief minister Oommen Chandy to be the campaign pivot, even as the opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala has not given up his claim to the top slot. Once a formidable rainbow coalition of various caste-community groups that often halted the mighty Marxists on their track, the UDF is not very strong now. Barring the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), other partners in the UDF are minor players with their influence confined to few pockets. 

The front, however, draws a little comfort from the split in the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) with its prominent figure Mani C Kappan all set to break ranks with the LDF, following differences with the CPI(M) over-allocation of the assembly seat, he holds to the new-found ally Kerala Congress (Mani) faction.

The unfolding scenario makes it obvious that it will be a stupendous task for the UDF to take on the LDF, firmly saddled under the undisputed leadership of Pinarayi Vijayan. The front is already geared up for a tenacious no-holds-barred battle, and reset the state’s record of alternating between the two coalitions every five years.

All these enjoin on the Gandhi siblings to be unsparing on the main adversary when they make their whirlwind tour through the state in the run-up. The local functionaries would have to brief the party icons about the live issues concerning the state and package them as lethal ammunition to attack the adversary. 

Both Rahul and Priyanka are known for their penchant to single out Modi as their target. This tactic would serve an only limited purpose in Kerala. Also, that would further alienate those sections of voters who have a soft corner towards the BJP but remain out-and-out anti-LDF, and aware that the UDF is the best bet to unseat the present government.