The release of the candidate list in Kerala has started to upset the Congress (and also the Congress-led United Democratic Front) apple cart. Dissents are pouring in. The most serious of them is from AICC spokesperson Shama Mohammed, a vocal mouthpiece of ‘Congress First Family’. Despite her continued and sincere ‘service’ for more than a couple of years, the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) has not offered her a party ticket for the Lok Sabha elections. She has expressed her dissatisfaction and discontent in Congress’s action of fielding only one woman candidate even after the passing of Women’s Reservation Bill. Shama Mohammed says women constitute 51 per cent of the Kerala population. She says, therefore, Congress leaders should give them deserving space while finalising the candidate list. Her other complaint is about poor consideration of minorities in the list of candidates.
Shama Mohammed further said that women should be fielded in ‘winnable’ seats; Remya Haridas, sitting MP at Alathoor constituency, Palakkad, got the seat because it is a reservation seat. Otherwise, she would have been dropped. Shama Mohammed said that her leader, Rahul Gandhi, had called for women representation in politics; Kerala leaders should listen to him. She reminded that Congress had fielded two women candidates in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. But, this time, the tally was reduced to one. It pushed her into the worst sort of disappointment.
Shama Mohammed referred to the statement Rahul Gandhi made while addressing the Mahila Congress programme in Kerala that 50 per cent of the country’s Chief Ministers would be women within ten years; she pointed out that BJP has fielded three women, this time, to fight Lok Sabha elections and LDF two. She said minority Muslims should be given deserving representation in the Malabar region. The mere statement that ‘there is another party for them’ (Indian Union Muslim League {IUML} for Muslims) in the region would not help.
Obviously, Shama Mohammed’s statement comes a day after the Congress announced the list of 16 candidates. ‘AICC spokesperson’, however, said that she was not complaining, but, requesting for more representation for women. Shama Mohammed said that if Congress do not give enough reservations to women, women supporters of the party would vote for parties which give more party tickets to them (women).
Shama Mohammed said that she has got family links in Mahe and Thalasserry, the places very close to Vadakara Lok Sabha constituency where Congress has fielded Shafi Parambil, Youth Congress leader and current MLA from Palakkad assembly constituency. Her dissatisfaction was evident in her statement that a ‘minority candidate’ (obviously she means herself) from the nearby places could have been selected.
Shama Mohammed’s outburst is the latest election-oriented issue Congress faces in Kerala. Kerala has started to witness an exodus from Congress to BJP. A few months before, Anil Antony, son of Congress veteran A K Antony, three-time CM and former Defence Minister, left Congress and is now BJP national secretary and Lok Sabha candidate from Kerala. C Raghunath, former Kannur District Congress Committee general secretary, recently left the party and joined BJP; Raghunath is now the BJP candidate from the Kannur Lok Sabha constituency. Raghunath contested against CM Pinarayi Vijayan in the 2021 assembly elections. Then came Padmaja Venugopal, daughter of late K Karunakaran, the senior most Congress leader in the country in the 1990s and four-time CM of the state. She left Congress and joined BJP. Karunakaran was a powerful kingmaker and was the man behind the elevation of P V Narasimha Rao as the Prime Minister. Shama Mohammed’s complaint should be viewed in light of the aforementioned developments.
But, KPCC president K Sudhakaran MP, Lok Sabha candidate from Kannur Lok Sabha constituency, rejected Shama Mohammed’s complaint, stating that she is ‘nobody’ in the party. He asked the media persons to ask her about her complaint. The latest developments indicate that election activities turn insults to Congress’s injuries.
