It’s the 18th day since CM Pinarayi Vijayan hit the roads, literally, for the Nava Kerala Sadas, along with his cabinet colleagues, when TNIE boarded the special bus from Thriprayar in Thrissur for a 40-minute interview till the next stop at Ollur. Showing no sign of fatigue, the CM was quite energetic, replying to all the questions posed to him quietly but with clarity. He spoke about the standoff with the governor, his ideas for development, and his three pet projects.
Congress’s refusal to accommodate other non-BJP parties during seat sharing was the prime reason for its poll debacle in the Hindi heartland, said Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan.
“It was created by all the parties that oppose BJP to defeat the saffron party. The aim was to protect secularism and to safeguard the Constitution. However, Congress failed to recognise this,” he said.
The Congress tried to replicate the BJP strategy of Hindutva politics, which proved to be a disaster.
“The BJP can’t be beaten in its Hindutva game, and the ideal strategy was to channel all anti-BJP votes into one basket,” he said, pointing out that all the anti-BJP votes in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chattisgarh outnumbered the votes BJP secured. However, all is not yet lost for the secular bloc.
“We believe there’s enough time to formulate a winning strategy against the BJP,” Pinarayi said.
During the 40-minute journey, the CM also answered a range of questions, including Rahul Gandhi's contesting from Wayanad, his government’s development plans, the speculation of the IUML’s entry to the LDF - which he outrightly ruled out - and the tussle with Governor Arif Mohammed Khan.
Excerpts.
The governor has referred four bills to the President. What’s your next move?
Well, the governor may want the bills to lie there before the President forever. I believe that the President will study the bills and make a decision because they contain what’s beneficial to the state and its people. The President may need time to study these bills. But after some time, if there’s no decision coming forth, we may consider approaching the President directly.
After Congress’ poll rout, there’s a feeling that Rahul Gandhi should vacate Wayanad and contest from north India.
If Congress’ objective is to fight and defeat the BJP, then they should try and win against the BJP. It’s the LDF, not BJP, which is the main opponent here. Contesting against the LDF is not by any chance comparable to fighting the BJP. They should think about it.
The Nava Kerala Sadas is compared to Oommen Chandy’s ‘Janasamparka Paripady or the ‘Mass Contact’ programme though there is a big difference. Your thoughts
This is the most unfortunate narrative. The exact purpose of the Nava Kerala Sadas is deliberately suppressed by the media. Nava Kerala Sadas is not like any programme held in our state in the past. Our country has not witnessed a similar programme. Kerala has come up to this stage. From here, we need to go further. So, the objective is to put up before the people our plans and proposals to achieve this objective. However, we face some obstacles in our march forward. These hurdles are created by the Union government. We wanted to present these two things before the people through the Sadas — where Kerala has reached and how to go from here for building a new Kerala, and the uncooperative stance by the Union government towards the state.
So, what about the complaints redressal?
When a minister goes to a place, people would come and submit various complaints. In this case, all ministers are present, and people will come forward with various complaints and submissions. So, we thought why not allow them to submit their complaints, and issues. These submissions will be cleared in a time-bound manner. But, Nava Kerala Sadas’s main purpose is not that.
There’s controversy over the Union government’s demand to provide branding for houses provided through housing projects, including LIFE Mission. What’s the solution?
These are areas where the Kerala government has fundamental differences with the Union government. This is not a question of placing any name board outside a house. For LIFE Mission, we provide houses for the poor. Here, the state government gives Rs 4 lakh. We have given about 3.5 lakh houses so far. Of this, only a minuscule number has received central funding.
The Union government provides Rs 70,000 in villages and Rs 1.5 lakh in cities. Since no one can construct a house at Rs 70,000, what we told the Union government was that we would bring all these schemes together under LIFE. We told them that we are planning to construct Rs 4 lakh-worth houses, and their contribution will be added. The central government is now saying that these houses should be branded in such and such manner. We are against this. The name board outside gives the beneficiaries the impression that these houses are not theirs. That’s questioning their dignity.
What’s the status of our SilverLine rail project?
SilverLine is a railway line. And, for SilverLine to become a reality, we need the Union government’s approval. The state can’t implement the project by itself. Some forces that have narrow vested interests have through the BJP influenced the Union government to block the project. So, the Union government changed its earlier stance and has now taken an uncooperative stance for SilverLine. However, we believe that they cannot continue this approach forever. Our approach is to wait for them to change their stance to implement the SilverLine project.
Meanwhile, E Sreedharan put up a proposal. Are you considering that proposal?
As I said earlier, they have to decide on that. Our proposal is before the Union government. The Railways has asked the Southern Railway to study the proposal. We have not abandoned the project. The Union government should study Sreedharan’s proposal if they desire to.
What’s the relevance of SilverLine after the introduction of Vande Bharat trains?
The relevance of SilverLine has increased after the introduction of Vande Bharat. Everyone has accepted that we need speed trains, but that trains should not create trouble for passengers in other trains.
The proposed Cabinet reshuffle after two-and-half-years. What’s the status?
There’s no big issue there. LDF will decide as per the earlier agreement. After the Nava Kerala Sadas, LDF will meet and decide on the matter.
There are speculations about changes in portfolios of other ministers too?
No, there will not be any other changes.
The speculations about Muslim League joining LDF is going on for some time now. What’s the truth?
These are just speculations by some media houses who fear about the stability of the UDF. Without the League, there’s no UDF. In reality, the League has made it clear time and again that it would not leave UDF. As far as we are concerned, we consider the League as the main ally in the UDF. We don’t have any need to bring League or any other party to the LDF fold as our base is expanding organically.
If I were to ask you to name your three pet projects for the next two-and-half-years, what would that be?
There are several projects that Kerala is implementing. If you take big projects, one is the GIFT City project. Graphene is another focus area for us. It’s considered a wonder material. The third focus area is green hydrogen.