Thiruvananthapuram: Days after Kerala chief minister Pinaryai Vijayan returned from a European tour, during which he even had the honour of ringing the opening bell at the London Stock Exchange, the veteran communist was left to ruminate on Thursday over the crushing blow for the Left Democratic Front in the Lok Sabha poll.
LSE had given Vijayan the honour to mark the listing of Kerala’s masala bond issuance, to raise funds for its infrastructure development, by ringing its iconic opening bell.
Kerala’s voters, however, gave him no such honour in the polls, with the Communist Party of India Marxist ending up with a face-saving victory in the Alappuzha constituency alone, out of the 20 constituencies in the state.
While the distress in the agricultural sector, lack of jobs for youth, and a series of law and order issues had blunted the Left government’s image, three other things appear to have contributed even more to the electoral setback — the way the government handled the flood of August 2018, the allegation regarding poor dam management during the floods, and the enthusiasm it showed in letting women enter the Sabarimala temple.
Months after the floods, scores of people complained that they had not received even the Rs10,000 that was promised to all flood affected families. Many others felt it was the inept dam management that aggravated the flood situation.
And when women finally managed to enter the Sabarimala temple, it aggrieved a large number of Hindus who thought the government displayed unwarranted enthusiasm in breaking their tradition even though the apex court had given a verdict on those lines.
All of that appeared to have reflected starkly in the polls. The saving grace for the CPM was the single seat of Alappuzha. That meant the CPM was only equal to the Revolutionary Socialist Party and the Kerala Congress (M), which also bagged one seat each.
