Come April and Thrissur, famous for its Pooram, is on a festive high. This time, the festival ardour together with the election spirit have brewed a heady concoction.
In the 2016 Assembly polls, the electorate in the district presented an emphatic victory to the Left Democratic Front (LDF) with 12 of the 13 seats. Also, the front lost by just 43 votes in the Wadakkanchery constituency to the Congress candidate Anil Akkara. In return, the district received three Ministers with key portfolios as well as the post of the chief whip.
Just a week to the 2021 elections now, the LDF is expecting to gain domination in the district again, though it does not seem to be very sure of a repeat of 2016.
The United Democratic Front (UDF), on the other hand, is on a no-holds-barred campaign to wrest back its bastions. Some young and new faces in more than a dozen constituencies have injected freshness to the UDF’s list of candidates this time.
The thumbing victory that the Congress’s T.N. Prathapan registered from all the 13 Assembly constituencies in the 2019 Lok Sabha election boosts its confidence. However, the district proved unpredictable once again by favouring the LDF in the local body elections last year.
Meanwhile, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) is all set to consolidate its vote share. A triangular fight is sure at least in Thrissur and Manalur, where the NDA has fielded star candidate Suresh Gopi and State leader A.N. Radhakrishnan respectively.
A host of issues
There are 77 contestants in all in the 13 constituencies in the district, which include one Minister and a few sitting MLAs. Two Ministers – V.S. Sunil Kumar and Prof. C. Raveendranath – however are not in the fray this time.
Right from basic amenities such as drinking water and waste management, a host of other issues, including LIFE Mission Project, national highway development, controversial deep-sea fishing deal, unemployment and the recent attack on nuns in Uttar Pradesh, are poll issues here.
Five constituencies — Wadakkanchery, Thrissur, Kunnamkulam, Guruvayur and Irinjalakuda — in the district witness tight competition this time. Sitting MLA Anil Akkara of the UDF is facing LDF’s youth leader Xavier Chittilappilly in Wadakkanchery. Perhaps the eye of the storm of the LIFE Mission controversy, victory here is important for both the fronts. NDA’s Ullas Babu is an active presence in the constituency.
At Kunnamkulam, Minister A.C. Moideen is facing tight fight from UDF’s K. Jayasankar. Thrissur, a traditional UDF stronghold, turned Left in the last election. UDF’s Padmaja Venugopal, who was defeated by Agriculture Minister V.S. Sunil Kumar last time, however, is quite confident now. But the LDF, represented by P. Balachandran, is riding high on the development projects implemented by the Agriculture Minister.
At Guruvayur, where the NDA has no candidate, both the LDF and the UDF are eyeing the 25,000-odd votes the BJP secured in the last Assembly election. Here, the BJP has decided to back Dileep Nair of the Democratic Social Justice Party.
Irinjalakuda, where Prof. R. Bindu, Principal in charge of the Sree Kerala Varma College and wife of CPI(M) secretary A. Vijayaraghavan, is contesting against Kerala Congress’s Thomas Unniyadan, a three-time MLA from the constituency, is another segment facing pitched battle. Presence of NDA candidate Jacob Thomas, former Director General of Police, too makes the battle interesting here.
The deep-sea fishing deal is expected to be an influential issue in at least four coastal constituencies such as Guruvayur, Nattika, Kaipamangalam and Kodungalloor. Presence of over 41% minority electorate (24% Christian and 17% Muslim) may prove to be a decisive factor in the final verdict.
