MALAPPURAM: As the district Congress leadership is yet to review the performance of the party in the Assembly elections officially, there are widespread allegations that the Indian Union Muslim League has not reciprocated to the support it extended to the Congress. The allegations are the loudest in Nilambur where the sitting MLA and six-time winner from the constituency Arayadan Mohammed faced a tough competition ending up with the least lead in his victories so far in the history.
Though delimitation has made changes to the Nilambur constituency, around 14,000 newly-added votes were supposed to stay with the UDF. But the Congress candidate failed to bag them, points out political observers.
However, district congress leadership declined to comment saying that it is difficult to make a conclusion just with primary account. “We will hold a review meeting after the oath taking ceremony, and then we will look into the issue,” said Malappuram DCC president E Mohammed Kunhi on Monday.
In 2006, Aryadan managed to bag 18070-vote lead, which shrunk to just 5598 in this election. Though he was not lagging in any of the panchayats in the constituency during the counting, the lead was very thin.
In Nilambur municipality, which has almost 5000 votes for UDF, as claimed by the front before the elections, only 1300 votes were cast in favour of Aryadan.
Similarly, Amaramabalam which has showed pro-UDF trends in the past is reportedly having 2000 to 2500 votes lead for UDF, but the veteran leader got only 500 votes lead from here.
However, the dip in the lead cannot entirely be blamed only on undercurrent of the IUML votes, feel many voters in the constituency.
‘‘Nilambur is the only Municipal headquarters in the district without access to a by-pass. Basic facilities like bus stand, and the proposed mini civil station are yet to be materialised despite representing the constituency for more than 25 years,” said a voter.
However, many observers feel that the undercurrent of Muslim league votes and consolidation of Christian votes to the independent candidate supported by LDF along with the developmental issues would have eroded the margin of victory for Aryadan in Nilambur constituency.