Thiruvananthapuram: In a setback to Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, the Kannur unit of the CPI (M) has decided to re-elect the controversial P Jayarajan as district secretary.
Jayarajan has been something of a thorn in the side of the party state leadership controlled by Vijayan and state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan.
Hit by the fraud allegations against Balakrishnan’s son, the top leadership is playing down Jayarajan’s re-election. But it is evident there is no love lost for him.
COMEBACK KID
The manner in which the Kannur strongman emerged on top again is interesting. Just a month ago, Jayarajan’s star seemed to be on the wane as he was publicly censured by the party for “promoting himself over the party”.
But the state leadership has not been entirely wrong. Vijayan and Balakrishnan may both be from Kannur, but Jayarajan is the leader with mass appeal among cadre in the district. Jayarajan’s die-hard fans continue to portray him as a hero, likening him to Krishna and even as future home minister of the Kerala. His initiatives to peddle soft Hindutva and facilitate ‘ghar wapsi’ of former comrades who defected to RSS had met with some success.
The censure against Jayarajan had been a big blow coming ahead of the party’s local-level conferences. But Jayarajan has time and again proven himself a survivor.
Today, the district committee threw its weight behind him wholeheartedly. Of 56 members, a majority supported him.
The state leadership also came in for some sharp criticism for the way it handled Jayarajan’s case. The district unit took pains to point out how Jayarajan was instrumental in strengthening the party’s base in Kannur. There were also sharp words for ‘a state committee member from Kannur’ who orchestrated Jayarajan’s censure. The Home Department and police, under Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, were criticised in the way they have acted in Kannur too.
DID PINARAYI’S STRATEGY FAIL?
Incidentally, Vijayan’s strategy to sideline Jayarajan had also been borne out of political expediency. As the body count in violence between CPM-BJP in Kannur rises, there is a very real fear that the Centre may use it as an excuse to put the state government in the dock.
The chief minister has personally invested in bringing peace, and there was sense that leaders like Jayarajan who took the fight against RSS personally were obstacles in ensuring peace. Jayarajan is seen as an epitome of CPM muscle in Kannur. His right arm was severed and had to be stitched back on after a brutal attack against him by RSS in 1999. In 2017, Jayarajan was booked by the CBI in the 2014 murder of RSS activist Kathiroor Manoj.
It is ironic that it was the state CPM, under Vijayan himself, which once promoted Jayarajan as a living martyr, an image which helped the party in its anti-RSS campaigns. Jayarajan has used both personal charisma and appropriation of Hindu festivals and even yoga camps to increase the party’s hold.
For years, the CPM had been torn between the factions led by the dogmatist Pinarayi Vijayan and populist VS Achuthanandan. The arguments used to sideline and target Achuthanandan were now used against Jayarajan. Achuthanandan is now in virtual retirement and Vijayan the undisputed leader. But seeing how Jayarajan has held his own, one can’t help wonder if at some point history may not come full circle.
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