The BJP-led NDA pulled off a win for the first time in the Thiruvananthapuram Municipal Corporation election, where the incumbent CPI(M)-led LDF has ruled for the last 45 years.
The outcome of the local body elections in Kerala Saturday also saw the Congress-led UDF, the principal Opposition, making a comeback, winning or leading in four out of six corporations, 54 of 86 municipalities, 79 of 152 block panchayats, and 504 out of 941 gram panchayats.
In the 101-ward Thiruvananthapuram civic body, where voting was held for 100 seats, the NDA bagged 50 seats as against the LDF’s 29 and UDF’s 19, with two seats going to Independents. While both the Congress and the Left are part of the Opposition INDIA alliance at the national level, their
joining hands against the NDA is unlikely in Kerala, where they have been arch rivals.
Clinching the corporation in the state capital would boost the BJP’s confidence as it is stepping up its preparations to contest the upcoming Assembly elections from urban constituencies like Nemom, Vattiyoorkavu and Kazhakkoottam — which fall in areas under the Thiruvananthapuram civic body — where the party had led in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Senior Congress MP Shashi Tharoor had retained his Thiruvananthapuram parliamentary seat in 2024 by defeating the BJP’s Rajeev Chandrasekhar, even though the BJP had then secured its first win in the Lok Sabha polls in Kerala by winning the Thrissur seat, where its nominee Suresh Gopi emerged as the victor.
Nemom was the first Assembly seat in the state which had elected a BJP legislator, O Rajagopal, in the 2016 elections.
The state capital has had a strong Hindutva vote bank since the 1980s. In the recent elections, the BJP has been steadily improving its performance in this civic body region. In the 2010 elections here, BJP had got only six councillors elected. In 2015, the BJP improved its tally to 35, which came down to 34 in 2020 with the party still emerging as the principal Opposition.
After he was appointed the state BJP president, Rajeev Chandrasekhar focused on this corporation and brought out a development agenda under the slogan “vikasita Thiruvananthapuram’’, while highlighting “lapses” in the Left-run civic body. The party also started the grassroots level interventions a long time before the polls and unveiled an election manifesto for the Thiruvananthapuram corporation poll, proposing a roadmap for the development of the capital.
The BJP also tapped into the Hindu sentiments against the alleged involvement of the Left leaders in the “theft” of gold from certain artefacts in the Sabarimala temple. When the CPI(M) raked up the rape cases against the expelled Congress MLA Rahul Mamkootathil, the BJP said it was the CPI(M)’s “tactic” to distract attention from this gold theft scandal. The BJP fielded senior party leaders for grassroots level campaigns for the NDA candidates. The party also promised that if it wins the Thiruvananthapuram corporation, it would bring Prime Minister Narendra Modi to declare the development plan of the state capital within 45 days. The BJP also sought to expose alleged corruption in the Thiruvananthapuram corporation led by Arya Rajendran, who was the youngest mayor in the country in 2020. Along with development, the BJP also pledged a “corruption-free civic body” too.
However, the BJP could not make inroads in local bodies in other urban or rural belts in Kerala. The party could win only two municipal bodies – in temple town Thrippunithura and Palakkad which the party has been ruling for the last one decade. At the same time, the party lost the Pandalam municipality, which it had won in 2020 in the wake of agitation against the entry of young women in Sabarimala temple.
In the Thrissur corporation, which figured high on the BJP’s agenda after Suresh Gopi’s win in the Lok Sabha seat, the party failed to make much gains. In 2020, the BJP had won six of 55 seats in this civic body, which it could increase to only eight this time.
The Congress, which has been in Opposition in the state since 2016, got an upper hand over the CPI(M) in the local body elections, which the UDF has been looking to fuel its campaign for the upcoming Assembly elections. Of 941 gram panchayats, where the LDF usually maintained a significant edge in recent elections, the UDF has gained a victory or lead in 504 bodies. The UDF has wrested several local bodies in Kollam, a traditional stronghold of the Left, and gained ground in central Kerala without the support of the regional Christian party Kerala Congress.
In north Kerala, the IUML, a UDF ally, has ensured a near sweep for the alliance in Malappuram apart from helping it to make gains in Kozhikode and Kasaragod.
