Aruvikkara bypoll: Whose win is it anyway?

Minutes after the results of the Aruvikkara bypoll were announced, Indian National Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi tweeted his congratulatory message to Congressman K S Sabarinathan, the winner who rode a supposedly sympathy wave to pip strong rivals and become the MLA. The tweet, more than just conveying a message of congrats, pictured the elation and relief of the top level of India’s oldest party.

Congratulations to K.S Sabarinadhan on winning the #Aruvikkara by-poll: Rahul Gandhi @Oommen_Chandy @VMSudheeran @KeralaPCC1 @INCIndia

— Office of RG (@OfficeOfRG) June 30, 2015

Prior to the elections and during the course of campaigning, the party’s Kerala unit had been putting up a brave front by exhorting supporters and the media to rest assured that the party candidate would post a win in Aruvikkara. If you have bothered to look deeper inside, the innards of the Congress circles weren’t going easy about the outcome. With the Congress-led United Democratic Front  (UDF) down and almost out, thanks to slew of problems that had been haunting them, it wasn’t easy to stay relieved as the counting started this morning.

From issues ranging from wine, women to internal pin pricks and rampant corruption, the UDF had been going through much trouble over the past few years.  The troubles had been eroding the earth beneath the party’s feet, and the by-election was a tough hurdle to cross. The popularity of the Chief Minister and his cabinet colleagues was on the wane, and the social media rubbed salt to their wounds by painting a clear picture of absolutely zero development in a constituency that had last time sent a Congress man to the Assembly.

Media ire apart, the UDF campaign was too tame compared with what the rival parties had brought in. But then, when the results came out the UDF candidate posted a convincing win. What more did the Congress want? The elation and the relief just came out in the form of a tweet from none other than the man who has been dreaming to lead the party before the people completely write them off.

For Sabarinathan, who polled 56448 votes, the victory is just a route open to the Kerala Legislative Assembly.  But for the party that swore by him, it has come about as a face saver in times of absolute crisis.

Even as the UDF camp erupted with joy, elsewhere, the Bharatiya Janata Party also switched to celebration mode. The defeat of its veteran could have come as slap across the face for them, but the saffron brigade has some good numbers to show this time. The number of votes polled by O Rajagopal, though he finished third, can never be written off.

The BJP candidate’s 34,145 votes, when seen against the party’s tally of 7,694 votes in 2011, is nothing short of stunning. Buoyed by the party’s ascend to Parliament in the last Lok Sabha polls, saffron sympathisers in the tiny nook in Kerala did not want to stay idle and so triggered a surge. Though the state had made it a habit to keep the BJP at arm’s length always, the people in Aruvikkara showed that the party needs to be pulled into the same bracket inhabited by the big two – the Congress and the CPI (M).

As the poll fever raged in Aruvikkara, the Congress had its bag full of negativity to tussle with, while the CPI(M) and its allies that form the Left Democratic Front, were seen as an organization that was moving away from the common man. Whatever they tried to do did not go well with the man on the street.  The votes that fell into the BJP kitty need to be seen as giving a fairly good foothold in Kerala to the party that had been all along trying to make a presence.  To what extent, however, only time will tell!

The CPI(M) led LDF, who fielded veteran M Vijayakumar as a sure shot winner, had been confidence personified all these days. From bringing in war horse  V S Achuthanandan to don the battle fatigues, to banking too much on the ruling UDF government’s misdeeds so as to post a convincing win, the CPI(M) did everything possible to make Vijayakumar Aruvikkara’s messiah. But, little did they know that the Hindu votes that would have been theirs in such contests, got split this time around and headed elsewhere.  Ask a voter out there in Aruvikkara, and he wouldn’t bat an eyelid as he testifies that the reds happen to be nowhere close to the people’s hearts anymore. While some term the phenomenon as sheer arrogance by the comrades, some call it a non-committal attitude from the top brass.

Now, with victory coming their way, what Rahul G, Oommen Chandy and the scores of Congressmen and women fail to realize is that it isn’t the Congress or the UDF that has won. It isn’t K S Sabarinathan’s charisma too that has proved a reason for his win.  Is it that the hapless voter just went ahead and voted for a son who was launched to take on his father’s mantle? May be that too could be seen just as another hypothesis!

What’s more relevant are the NOTA votes –  a cool 1430 in number –  that have a tale to narrate. And, that indeed, deserves some attention at the moment, and may be for more years to come.

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