Since last week, Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan and the Left Democratic Front (LDF) have been going at each other over the appointment of CPI(M) leader KK Ragesh’s wife Priya Verghese as an associate professor at Kannur University. Ragesh is the private secretary to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and the governor has raised questions of impropriety. Khan, who is the university’s chancellor on account of his position, on August 17 stayed Varghese’s appointment in the university’s Department of Malayalam over alleged violation of norms and favouritism and issued a show-cause notice to Vice-Chancellor Gopinath Ravindran. Earlier this week, the High Court, in an interim order, stayed Verghese’s appointment and impleaded the University Grants Commission (UGC) on a plea filed against the appointment and sought a reply from the governor. This episode has placed the focus on the 52-year-old Ragesh who has received unstinted support from the CPI(M). The party has backed one of its most promising leaders even at the cost of escalating tension with Khan. Ragesh was the Left’s face during the protests against the now-repealed three central farm laws. At the time, he was the joint secretary of the All Indian Kisan Sabha and the Karshaka Sangham’s state president. He took a break from the farmers’ struggle only to vote in the Kerala local body elections, which were held in December 2020, in Kannur. Ragesh was also a member of the Rajya Sabha and during his time in the Upper House of Parliament, he argued for the repeal of the laws. In September 2020, he was one of the Rajya Sabha members suspended during a debate on the farm Bills. Rise up the ranks Ragesh hails from the CPI(M) citadel of Kannur and rose up the party ranks as a close confidant of current Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan. During the factional feud between Vijayan and former CM VS Achuthanandan in the 2000s, Ragesh was one of the leaders who kept the youth brigade in the party on Vijayan’s side. In the last two Assembly elections, Ragesh was closely associated with Vijayan’s campaign in his constituency Dharmadam in Kannur. Ragesh who served in the state and national leadership of the Students’ Federation of India (SFI), the students’ wing of CPI(M), unsuccessfully contested the Lok Sabha polls from Kannur in 2009. Three years later, Ragesh’s name figured in connection with the murder of CPI(M) rebel T P Chandrasekharan who had left the party in 2008 to float the Revolutionary Marxist Party. The CPI(M) leader was named as an accused for allegedly harbouring some of the culprits involved in the murder. The following year, the High Court stayed proceedings against Ragesh who was then a member of the CPI(M) state committee. In 2014, the CPI(M) leader was the party’s poll manager and helped its candidate PK Srimathi wrest the constituency from the Congress. The following year, the party nominated him to the Rajya Sabha. On the metrics of attendance, number of debates, number of questions and private bills, Ragesh rated above the national and state averages.
