In Kerala, online citizen campaigns are catching political parties off guard

Ahead of next month’s assembly election, political parties in Kerala have been extensively campaigning on social media in their bid to lure tech-savvy voters. In some cases, however, the move appears to have backfired.

While one Facebook group has come forward to field a candidate against a Congress leader who has been fighting elections for more than three decades, another has raised a banner of revolt against mainstream parties for not giving adequate representation to women.

In the first case, the decision to enter the fray in the Irikkur assembly segment in Kannur district was the culmination of a campaign under the banner of “Irikkur: Who will bell the cat?” It was targeted against the candidature of KC Joseph, the sitting legislator and Minister for Rural Development and Culture.

The group was created after Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee president VM Sudheeran proposed the name of general secretary Advocate Sajeev Joseph in place of the minister. The group attracted several followers who lent their support to Sajeev.

But when Sajeev refused to stand against Joseph, the group arrived at consensus to field a candidate of its own. They found a volunteer in Shaji Kuriakose, who has in the past spearheaded several crusades against corruption and political nepotism.

Gaining attention

According to Kuriakose, the mainstream parties are not ready to change their ways even as youngsters are shying away from politics. He said that the state will not be able to progress so long as the old generation of politicians continues to cling on to power.

“We need youths with ideas and vision to drive the state to the path of progress,” Kuriakose said in a post on the group’s Facebook page. “It is not about the number of votes or victory in the election. If the youth get this message, I will consider this battle my victory.”

The initiative has elicited a good response so far, with more than 13,000 followers, according to group administrator Rakesh ER. He said that 2,000 of these were voters in Irikkur. Rakesh said he was confident that their candidate would be able to put up a good show as there was a great deal of resentment against the sitting legislator.

Kuriakose said that the people of Irikkur were frustrated with Joseph as he did not spend much time with them. He said that the minister, who hails from Kottayam and is a close aide of Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, had instead been dividing his time between his native and the state capital, Thiruvananthapuram.

“The people of Irikkur, who are facing numerous problems, had to go either to Kottayam or Thiruvananthapuram to see their representative,” said Kuriakose. “They want to end this game. They need a representative who will focus on the development of the constituency.

Joseph is losing favour among his party workers as well. Posters against him had appeared in several parts of the constituency even before his name was finalised. While state unit chief Sudheeran had strongly opposed Joseph’s candidature, he yielded after the Congress high command cleared his name under pressure from the chief minister.

However, other rebels remain undeterred. PK Ragesh, who has been challenging the party after winning a seat in the Kannur Municipal Corporation as a rebel, has threatened to a field a nominee at Irikkur. While the party has suspended Ragesh and two of his followers, efforts are on to field at least two more rebels in Kannur district, in addition to the Irikkur seat.

Missing women

Even as the Congress continues its battle against the rebels, a couple of women’s groups have compounded the party’s headache by launching a campaign against the raw deal meted out to women in the selection of candidates.

While one group has confined their protests against inadequate representation of women to just a statement, the other has called on the women and their supporters to show their dissent by choosing the None of the Above option in the polling booth.

The group, which comprises prominent women activists such as Deedi Damodaran, M Sulfath, NV Vinaya and Sudha Manjeri, has already launched an online campaign to drum up support for NOTA.

They have also decided to take out rallies, using the slogan: “If you are not ready to field 50% women candidates, we are not ready to vote. Our vote is for NOTA.”

Though no party is free from blame on this count, the Congress and its allies will bear the brunt should the campaign succeed. Only eight women figure in the party’s list of 140 candidates. Its allies in the United Democratic Front do not even have one woman among their 57 candidates.

While the Left Democratic Front, led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), has fielded 17 women and the Bharatiya Janata Party has fielded 12, women activists are not happy as most of these candidates have been fielded in constituencies where the chances of winning are low.

Changing mindsets

Sakhi Resource Centre, a women’s forum, said in a statement they expected the CPI(M) to allot at least 30% seats to women, as the party had been advocating gender equality. The statement further appealed to women to raise their voices against the discrimination.

The other group, Women’s Collective for Gender Justice, said the poor representation of women was a strong indication of the unwillingness of political organisations to accept gender equality. A statement issued by M Sulfath said it was wrong to hope that the parties would change their approach.

“The male-dominated political parties are deliberately trying to keep the women away from power,” read the statement. “Though the women outnumber men in population and constitute around 70% of the electorate in Kerala, their representation in the assembly was always below 5%.”

Sulfath pointed out that there had never been more than one woman minister in the state government, and at least two governments had no women representation at all. This clearly shows that the political parties were not ready to give women their due, she said.

Pointing out that the Election Commission's NOTA provision was the best tool to fight injustice, Sulfath has appealed to women to make the best use of it in the coming election.