Will the BJP open its account in the coming Kerala Assembly election? Let us avoid the million dollar question; the point is BJP has broken all the allegation of being an upper cast anti-muslim political outfit. For the first time, a political party has fielded CK Janu, the most prominent face of the Vanavasi community in the state, in the assembly election.
CK Janu, the legendary leader, who was brutally tortured by the police in the epic struggle by the Vanavasis in 2003, feels cheated by the CPI (M) as they never wanted her to come into the electoral politics. “Once, we all were the strong supporters of the CPI (M). We were used for their struggle, processions, party meetings, but at the end of the day, we got nothing, their eyes were on the votes of the marginalisedvanavasi people”, said Janu in a detailed interview to the Janmabhumi Daily.
The decision to contest with a BJP lead front in Kerala is considered as a slap to the pseudo secularists and activists like Arundhathi Roy who constantly make use of the Vanavasis for their political interests. The CPI (M) lead LDF, which claims to have enacted the Land reforms Bill, turned a blind eye to the real problems of the Adivasis, accuses Janu.
“Now, they are accusing me as fascist”, says Janu. “But hiding the Dalit atrocities of Kerala by both the Left Right fronts are the real fascism. When we talk of Dait issues of Kerala, the CPI (M) deviate the issues by citing atrocities in Cuba and Venezuela. I want to expose this double standard to the marginalised people of the state”, asserts C K Janu.
BadushaThangal, the BJP candidate from Malappuram constituency, receives a peculiar welcome from the Muslim voters. They kiss the hands of the candidate, since it is believed those are the hands of Prophet Muhammad. The title Thangal is supposed to be identified as the descendants of prophet over the centuries in Kerala. Amid the effort by the pseudo secularist to paint the BJP as Anti-Muslim, the ironical part is, one of the descendants of Prophet himself is contesting for the BJP in Malappuram, the one and only Muslim majority district of Kerala.
It came as a surprise to almost all the sects of Islam in Kerala, when BJP managed to field a person from the Thangal family for the assembly elections that too on lotus symbol, while both the Congress led UDF and the CPI (M) led LDF were busy propagating against BJP as a anti-Muslim aprty. As far as the BJP is concerned the best answer to the false propaganda has already been given with the decision to field BadushaThangal as a candidate from Malappuram.
“It was not an easy decision”, said BadushaThangal to the organiser. The extremist elements keep making threatening call to him on a regular basis. “The threatening comes from both the communist and Popular front (the party responsible for the hand chop incident)”, alleges Thangal. But he says the response from the local people is amasing. “Many of them assures vote through phone as they fear to come out openly in support of the BJP”, he added.
For the BJP, there was no ambiguity in naming Badusha Tangal in its first list of candidates. His campaign has hit the bull’s eye, as both the fronts are in a state of confusion. Malappuram , a Indian Union Muslim League bastion, recorded one of the biggest win in assembly elections 2011, with a margin of 44,508 votes. But BadushaThangal believes to break the taboo, as the voters are fed up with the corrupt administration by the present Govt and the violence of politics propagates by the CPI (M).
(Anu Narayanan from
Thodupuzha, Kerala)
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