Thiruvananthapuram, March 9 (IANS) With the Kerala Assembly elections drawing closer, the focus of political activity has temporarily shifted from the state to the national Capital, as senior leaders of the Congress and the BJP head to Delhi for crucial discussions with their central leaderships on candidate selection and seat-sharing arrangements.
Kerala has a 140 member Legislative Assembly and in the 2021 elections, the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) secured a decisive mandate, winning 99 seats, while the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) managed 41 seats.
The BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which had opened its account in the state in 2016, failed to retain its lone seat in the 2021 polls.
Determined to reverse that setback, the BJP leadership is making an all out effort to secure representation in the Assembly this time.
The party’s state leaders have already reached Delhi, where the first round of discussions with the national leadership is scheduled for Monday evening.
A second round of meetings is expected on Tuesday.
Party sources indicate that the deliberations will focus on constituency level assessments, candidate selection and alliance dynamics.
By the end of the consultations, the state leadership hopes to release the party’s first list of candidates, likely covering around 50 constituencies.
Parallelly, the Congress leadership from Kerala is also travelling to Delhi to hold consultations with the party high command.
The discussions are expected to centre on the distribution of seats among UDF allies as well as the identification of winnable candidates in key constituencies.
In the 2021 Assembly elections, the Congress contested 93 seats as part of the UDF arrangement but managed to win only 22, leaving the remaining seats to its coalition partners.
With the party aiming to regain political ground in the state, the upcoming meetings in Delhi are expected to play a critical role in shaping its electoral strategy.
As the election season gathers momentum, the decisions taken in the national Capital over the next two days could set the tone for Kerala’s political battle in the months ahead.
However for the CPI(M), all the key selections take place in Kerala itself and it’s only a formality when the national leadership gives the green signal and this is expected in the coming weeks.
