Communist Party of India fears losing its last remaining bastions to Congress
Shubhadeep Choudhury
New Delhi, July 18
The Communist Party of India (CPI) fears losing some of its last remaining bastions to its INDIA bloc partner Congress rather than its sworn enemy Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
The CPI’s fear of disappearing into obscurity has got a fresh fillip in the wake of Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi’s decision to contest from Wayanad, the Lok Sabha seat in Kerala vacated by her brother Rahul Gandhi.
A constituent of Kerala’s ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF), the CPI traditionally contests four of the state’s 20 Lok Sabha seats—Thiruvananthapuram, Thrissur, Mavelikara and Wayanad.
Presence of high-profile Congress leader Shashi Tharoor in Thiruvananthapuram has effectively sealed the fate of CPI in the constituency. Thiruvananthapuram has been voting for Tharoor ever since he first contested from the seat in 2009.
The CPI has lost in Thrissur and Mavelikara as well in the last General Election, but the party hopes to make a comeback in these seats. Wayanad and Thiruvananthapuram pose a much more difficult challenge because of the stature of Congress leaders contesting from these seats.
The CPI is aware that Priyanka Gandhi is eying Wayanad for a long haul and not as a jumping pad to enter the Lok Sabha. “The Congress’s strategy is to project Rahul Gandhi as the face of the party in northern India and Priyanka for playing a similar role in southern states”, P Sandosh Kumar, Rajya Sabha MP and member of the CPI National Executive, said.
“Rahul will never take on the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in Bihar or Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) in Jharkhand. He will take on the Left parties which seem to be the second-most important enemy of the Congress after the BJP”, Kumar said.
The CPI contested 30 seats across the country in the last General Election and won two (both in Tamil Nadu). In states, such as Manipur and Telangana, it did not field any candidate despite having a decent support base because it did not want to put a hurdle before other INDIA bloc candidates.
In Kerala, where the BJP is a marginal force, Left parties, including the CPI, fielded candidates in all 20 seats despite the presence of Congress candidates.
In the bypoll slated to be held in Wayanad, the CPI will again field a candidate. However, it will not be Annie Raja, who fought against Rahul in the 2024 General Election and lost by a margin of over 3.6 lakh votes. CPI Kerala leadership is of the view that it will be inappropriate to field Annie Raja, wife of party general secretary D Raja, again because victory of Priyanka in the contest is a certainty.
“We are searching for a candidate who will put up a stiff challenge to Priyanka in Wayanad and also give a boost to the party’s prospects in the assembly elections that are going to follow”, Sandosh Kumar said.
