The results of the assembly elections have left the political dynasties battered and mauled especially in the opposition which fielded children from 15 political families and 11 of them lost the elections, while the LDF which pitted 10 wards of the political families, has lost only three children of the political families and seven of them won the elections.
From K Muraleedharan in Nemom to Jose k Mani in Pala, voters seem to have decimated mainly the influential political families that called the shots in Kerala’s politics over the years. A closer look shows that dynasts in the LDF are relatively safer, while those in the Opposition had to face the wrath of people and the severe damage was in the opposition benches. In two seats – Nemom and Palakkad, the UDF candidates of two political families were pushed to third place.
In Kerala, the dynastic politics cannot be discussed without touching the family of former late chief minister K Karunakaran. His two wards lost the elections and Padmaja Venugopal lost out to CPI candidate P Balachandran by a wafer thin margin of 946 votes in Thrissur, while K Muraleedharan came at the third position in the highly spirited triangular contest in Nemom. The most stunning defeat was KC(M)’s Jose K Mani in Pala where he lost out to Mani C Kappan and interestingly Kappan was also from a political family. Jose K Mani was the front runner for one of the plum minister posts in the LDF.
In Chavara as well, Shibu Baby John of UDF lost to new entrant Sujith Vijayan, who is also from a political family, by a margin of 1,521 votes. Among the wards of political families, Anoop Jacob in Piravom registered a thumping victory over his rival by a margin of 25,364 votes, followed by V R Sunil Kumar of CPI with a winning margin of 23,893 votes in Kodungallur. The most severe drubbing was suffered by Sumesh K Achuthan in Chittur by a margin of 35,146 votes and he was followed by P M Niyas K Sadirikoya in Beypore (29,017) and Babu Divakaran in Eravipuram (28,121)