At a time when the opposition Congress in Kerala is struggling to tackle the internal crisis, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s state leadership on Wednesday asserted that the upcoming Assembly elections would be a direct fight between the party and the ruling CPI(M). BJP state president K. Surendran said that the Congress will not be even in the picture during the elections due in April-May.
"The fight is between the BJP and the CPI(M); the Congress does not have any role to play in the coming elections that will usher in a 'Congress-Mukt Kerala',” Surendran told news agency IANS. He said the BJP had already prepared a roadmap for the polls.
Surendran, however, denied that the BJP has a soft corner for the CPI(M).
BJP state general secretary A.N. Radhakrishnan, too, claimed that the Congress party will be pushed to third position in many constituencies. According to IANS, the party state unit has categorised the seats into 'A plus', 'A' and 'B' categories, and seats that do not offer any victory hope.
In the 140-member house, the BJP has got just one seat. Though they could successfully make inroads in many parts of the state, once dominated by either the LDF or the UDF, the saffron front was yet to gain the trust or confidence of the minority communities completely in the state.
In the recently held local body polls, the BJP-NDA improved its tally and added more number of seats to its credit, but they could not display a stellar performance as they had claimed during the time of campaigning.
The failure of some of its major leaders and the loss of many sitting seats also took the sheen off their performance at the local body polls, which was generally considered a pointer to the assembly elections.