Intro: 1,500 party men of Communist Party of India- Marxist (CPM) and from other prominent political parties have joined the Bharatiya Janata Party. This mass migration will set a promising stage for the BJP in upcoming elections of Kerala.
What started as a small rivulet, prior to the Lok Sabha Elections 2014, has developed into a major flood with thousands of cadres of Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) holding top posts in local committees flocking to Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). During the past six months, almost, in all the fourteen districts, flow to BJP from CPM has started. The CPM is a dead party with a failed ideology, the vast majority Hindu cadres, of CPM, have taken the natural route to the nationalist and resurgent BJP. As many as 1,500 persons from various prominent political parties joined the State BJP at the ‘Navasangamam’ convention on October 22.
To stem the outflow, especially, in its stronghold of Kannur, CPM masterminded the savage butchery of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) Sharirik Pramukh, E Manoj in Kathiroor of Kannur district. But this has not deterred CPM cadres from flowing to BJP. On the day of Indian auspicious festival Deepavali, 1,500 cadres of CPM joined BJP in Palakkad in the ‘Navasangamam’ and were welcomed by BJP leaders CK Padmanabhan, K Surendran and Sobha Surendran.
BJP national committee member CK Padmanabhan welcomed the new members. Addressing the convention, Padmanabhan said that the turncoats were being welcomed whole-heartedly, but added that no promises had been made to them.
To escape from the hegemony of the Kannur lobby of CPM, led by Pinarayi Vijayan, Kodiyeri Balakrishnan and P Jayarajan who believes in murder politics and false methods, committed cadres of CPM in Kannur and other districts are flocking to BJP, even from CPM controlled ‘Party Villages’. The majority of the defectors belong to the CPM. CPM former branch secretary TN Prabhakaran, who had previously served as the vice-president of the Mannarkkad Rural Cooperative Bank, is one of the noted leaders who joined the saffron party.
CPM is the richest party having assets worth more than 10,000 crore with mafia interests in land, sand, granite industry and commercial interests in Ben-Ami in the Gulf. It is no more, pro-working class, forcing its cadres to flock to BJP. The flooding is continuing from Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), Students Federation of India (SFI), and Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) to Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) respectively.
The rattled CPM is even organising Ganesh Pujas and Krishna Jayanti processions to prevent its bulk Hindu cadres from going to BJP. It has granted permission to its cadres to go to temples. The Party is also convinced on the fact that the Congress is on the way to graveyard of Indian politics and that the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi are the promise of the present and future.
Congress workers are also flocking to BJP. Since the Congress in Kerala is pro-Christian and pro-Muslim, due to its tie-up with Muslim League and Kerala Congress.
BJP has been able to gather more than 20 lakh votes in Lok Sabha polls 2014 in the northern districts of Kerala and majorly gained votes in CPM-dominated areas. Its vote share has gone up from 6.4 per cent of 2009 to 10.8 per cent. Now, the stage is set for BJP making massive inroads in the 2015 local body polls and 2016 Assembly polls. What started as a Modi wave is now a Modi tsunami.
—S Chandrasekhar from Thiruvananthapuram
