The tale of the tailor of Punnapra

Malampuzha: What is Velikakathu Shankaran Achuthanandan afraid of?

With only days to go before the April 29 polls, is the 82-year-old chief ministerial aspirant afraid to sully his carefully built up image of Marxist conscience keeper and hurt his chances of realising a lifetime's ambition?

Over the last five years the tailor from Punnapra who prides himself on his lack of worldly possessions, he has only two sets of clothes, has projected himself as the archetypal Marxist dialectic as opposed to the likes of Pinarayi Vijayan, demonstrably more adept at setting up what is believed to be a Rs30 billion (Dh2.5 billion) Marxist party-owned business empire.

The former trade unionist has carved out this hugely popular man of the people, Robin Hood-like persona, redressing wrongs and exposing corruption, that is now bordering on manic zeal as he takes on one leader after the other, filing court cases against most of them.

The misdemeanours range from the sale of sandalwood trees by a forest minister, the acquisition of protected forest land by the same minister through front operatives, closing down the Coca-Cola factory ? and now the biggie Dubai Internet City's agreement with the Oommen Chandy government to set up a 'Smart City' on 300 acres of prime land.

The invidious pressure not to allow anything or anyone to dent his image, begins the moment one meets his press secretary Shahjehan.

"Are you a Malayali, do you speak Malayalam?" he asks, followed by an impenetrable explanation of the difficulty generated by the enormous media interest. "Saghaav [Comrade] VS doesn't like talking in English. He hates being disturbed when he's having breakfast. Maybe he can meet you at lunch".

The rented house, temporary campaign headquarters on a narrow street in adjoining Palakkad's Chandranagar is an untidy, spider-web ridden mass of dhoti-clad apparatchiks. Unlike most politicians in the state, the car that VS uses is an Ambassador of some vintage; his obvious poverty a badge of honour.

Shahjehan sees our air-conditioned rented car, and orders our hapless driver to stay well behind the five car convoy, made up of a lead announcement vehicle, an open Mahindra Jeep, made up to look like the BJP's chariot from where VS addresses the gatherings, two ambassador cars and a police jeep.

"He's being watched constantly, every move examined, we don't want anyone to think he owns such a car," says Shahjehan, inadvertently letting on through his nervousness that the battle for the chief minister of a future Marxist-led Left government is still on, just as much as the debate within, of where the party is headed on liberalisation and foreign direct investment.

Given the VS-Pinarayi bad blood, there's speculation the party politburo in Delhi could bring in a third player like Ramachandra Pillai into the game.

Through the campaign in Malampuzha's Pudussery and Walayar, there are others who come with a constant stream of messages.

Some are solicitous, offering water as temperatures soar. Others rudely ask me to take off my dark glasses... There is more to come.

While we wait for their multi-course lunch to end, one of VS's close aides says we'll have to wait for the interview until after the campaign is over late at night. Seeing us prepare to leave, VS himself suggests we wait. He arranges for us to climb aboard his mock chariot and talk to him between campaign stops.

VS is in his element, fielding questions with his legendary gift of repartee. But then the officious MP Krishnadas gets into the act. It's not a request, it's an unexpected order to get off the rath. There's an exchange of words and pushing and shoving.

What triggered the bully? Did VS know and deliberately turn a blind eye to the harassment much as he is alleged to have done to the violent demonstrations in his support when he was denied the nomination?

Are these the lumpen elements who will run Kerala for the next five years?

More than VS, should Kerala, set to change governments, be afraid?

'Smart City will be gone'

Meanwhile, if the Left parties do sweep this election, the deal with Dubai Internet City to build a Smart City will be off the agenda.

"It will be scrapped," says V.S. Achuthanandan, the surprisingly slight man who's become a byword for Marxist activism in this sliver of a state. "It must be reworked to our satisfaction, to suit Kerala's needs. I'll make Kunjhalikutty [the former industries minister] run."

The second phase will be to pressure the central government to up import subsidies, protect Kerala's farm produce, he said in an exclusive interview as we trundle through narrow roads that cut across the constituency's famed farm land. "I'm not anti-development, I'm anti exploitation of the people's resources. I'm not anti-IT, I'm against giving away 300 acres of prime land to a foreign company that we are not even sure can generate employment. The deal with Dubai Internet City says 30,000 jobs in ten years, and if that doesn't happen, they have an exit clause for a pittance, for less than Rs6,000. We've spent Rs800 million from the public exchequer to build an IT park, and we're just giving it away. In return for what? Renting out office space? Less than ten per cent is IT related. It's a real estate deal, the biggest land scam in the name of IT."

The deal says anyone who wants to build anything within a two km radius of Smart City must apply for prior permission. "This is wrong." Not least, he says because Kerala has the highest number of educated unemployed at 450,000, most of whom are engineers, doctors or computer professionals.

V.S. takes his crusade against corrupt politicians very seriously. "I was the one who exposed K.M. Mani, who was cutting down sandalwood trees and selling it, who was using 'benami' operators to encroach on forest land, who doesn't care that forest dwellers are committing suicide. It was me, I am the one who took him to court.

"I showed the people the truth behind the NDA government's sale of the government-owned hotel during the Antony government to Gulfar Mohammad Ali, the illegal sale of encroached property to Capt Nair. And now this Smart City."

"As for being a 'vikasana virodhi' [anti-development] tell me what development has the Congress government done? They've closed hundreds of small scale industrial factories, hundreds and thousands are unemployed. We are for industry, but it has to be the right type of industry." As we exit the campaign, the people who'd greeted him with a traditional but very un-Marxist arati [ritual blessing] are still crowding around him, cheering when he asks them to "bury the Congress, dig a hole six feet deep and cover them so that they cannot emerge."

He's 82, but scenting power, he's rejuvenated, showing no signs of wilting as we do in the searing heat as he criss-crosses this hilly constituency made up mostly of Tamils from across the border.