THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The BJP is pinning hopes on its candidate C Krishna Kumar and its organisational strength in the Palakkad constituency where the state leadership calculates it has a good chance of victory. The leadership thinks that the traditional saffron fort would eventually elect its candidate amid the infight in UDF and LDF.
For the BJP, Shafi’s shift to Vadakara and voices of dissent coming from Congress in addition to rising indifferences within the CPM have come as a blessing. The BJP which has a strong cadre base and vote bank in Palakkad has been consolidating its position after each assembly and Lok Sabha election.
The leadership also brushes aside the statements by the UDF and LDF that it was because of E Sreedharan’s candidature that the BJP put up a strong fight in 2021. “It is a false assumption that the voters of Palakkad vote for personality,” an RSS leader told TNIE. “They always voted for their choice of politics. If not, how did BJP finish second in 2016 and 2021 assembly elections? This is a constituency in which BJP- RSS has grown in strength,” he said.
BJP also recognises that the revolt in the UDF and P Sarin’s shift to the LDF would help the Congress unite its rank and file. However, the leadership feels the votes Sreedharan garnered last time from UDF and LDF would not go back.
“Those votes were polled to BJP as part of voters’ political decision and affinity towards the party’s declared position on different issues,” a state office-bearer of BJP said on condition of anonymity. “We had won the municipality twice. Community-wise, with the exit of Shafi, the votes in Kalpathi and urban areas will be with us,” he said. The BJP is campaigning on the development agenda of the Modi government by projecting the industrial corridor and IIT.
The RSS will highlight issues like Wakf Board, RSS leader Sreenivasan’s killing, and the unification of Muslim minority votes.