Wayanad’s tryst with history

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was re-elected from the Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency in the general elections held in April 2024. But he relinquished the seat to retain the Congress’ traditional stronghold Rae Bareli. The constituency was in the news two months later when two massive landslides snuffed out hundreds of lives in the upper reaches of the hill district. With the Congress fielding Priyanka Gandhi Vadra from the constituency for the byelection, the region is back in the limelight, reports Abdul Latheef Naha

The Congress flag fluttered in the air as Anokhe Lal Tiwari waved it from a motely crowd that had gathered at Pozhuthana Bazaar, near Vythiri, in Wayanad to listen to Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.   

The Nehru cap that the middle-aged man wore matched with his white kurta-pyjama and the large shawl around his neck. It was evident from his clothing that he hailed from north India. As soon as the meeting got over, people in small groups collected around Tiwari just as they surrounded Congress leader and writer Shashi Tharoor. The people wanted selfies with both.  

Tiwari, a Hindi-speaking fan of the Gandhis from Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh, obliged and moved to the next corner meeting. Tiwari is among a handful of Congress supporters camping and campaigning in Wayanad. Tiwari gets noticed wherever he goes. He had walked along Rahul Gandhi from Kanyakumari to Kashmir as part of the Bharat Jodo Yatra.  

“I will be in Wayanad until Priyanka is elected,” he says in Hindi.  

Devastated by massive landslides in end-July, Wayanad is limping back to normalcy. But it’s back in the national spotlight now for an entirely different reason altogether. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s electoral debut in the byelection to the Lok Sabha constituency has catapulted it into the limelight.

Political observers are drawing parallels between Wayanad and Rae Bareli, the Gandhi family’s traditional stronghold in Uttar Pradesh, from where Indira Gandhi was first elected in 1967. “If she gets elected from Wayanad, she will be in Parliament with her mother Sonia Gandhi, a Rajya Sabha MP, and her brother Rahul Gandhi, who is a member of the Lok Sabha – a rare occasion of three from the Gandhi family being in Parliament at the same time,” says a party supporter.  

The polling is on November 13.  

Early this year, in the general elections, the constituency had re-elected Rahul Gandhi, but he relinquished the seat to retain the family stronghold, Rae Bareli. The move, and Priyanka’s candidature from Wayanad, sparked debates about the resurgence of the dynastic politics.

When Wayanad elected Rahul Gandhi to the Lok Sabha in 2019, his majority was 4.31 lakh votes. It dropped to 3.64 lakh votes in 2024. Wayanad had witnessed an unusually high polling percentage (80.37%) when Rahul contested for the first time in 2019.  The polling percentage recorded in the constituency in 2009, 2014, and 2024, hovered around 73 to 74%. 

The Congress and its supporters are excited as Priyanka attracts zealous crowds in corner meetings attended by her in the constituency. “I’m sure she will hit a record. Her majority will cross five lakh. We are aiming at six lakh actually,” Usman Parakott, an ardent Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) supporter from Ambilery near Kalpetta, exudes confidence.

This constituency is unique because it covers three Assembly segments in Wayanad district (Mananthavady, Sulthan Bathery and Kalpetta), three more in Malappuram district (Wandoor, Nilambur and Ernad) and one in Kozhikode district (Thiruvambady). 

Taking on the Congress scion in Wayanad is Communist Party of India’s (CPI) seasoned leader Sathyan Mokeri, who warns that it will not be a cakewalk for Priyanka. Mokeri, 71, unassuming and demure, has strong connections with the people at the grassroots. The man who represented Nadapuram in the Kerala Assembly three times has a solid reason to be confident in his fight.

When he took on the Congress’ M.I. Shanavas in Wayanad in 2014, Mokeri had given the United Democratic Front (UDF) a run for its money. It was by a thin margin of 20,870 votes that Shanavas reached the Lok Sabha in 2014. “I’m more confident this time, especially because of my connection with the farmers,” says Mokeri.  

However, he knows only too well that Priyanka is not Shanavas. Mokeri as well as the Left Democratic Front (LDF) maintains that the Congress is committing a political gaffe by fielding Priyanka in Wayanad “when she should have taken on the fascist forces in the north”.

The Congress, Mokeri says, has failed to address major political issues as well as the key problems of Wayanad and its people. “It is still relying heavily on family and political lineage. Wayanad wants a change,” he argues, pointing to the drop in Rahul Gandhi’s vote share in 2024.   Rahul’s vote share dipped from 64.94% in 2019 to 59.69% in 2024.  

“It’s an indication of Rahul Gandhi’s dwindling popularity. He did nothing for Wayanad in the past five years. Did he raise a single problem of Wayanad in Parliament? Now that he has quit Wayanad, he is bringing in his sister. We want an MP who takes up our problems,” says A.K. Mubaris, an LDF worker from Varadimoola, near Mananthavady.  

“Sathyan Mokeri has his own charisma in the CPI. He is quiet, straightforward and gentle. It is true that he reduced the UDF margin in 2014 greatly, but his prospects are doubtful against a national figure,” says M. Abdul Nazar, educationist and manager of Goodwill English School, Pookkottumpadam in Nilambur, part of the Lok Sabha constituency. 

But Valli, a Paniya tribal woman from Muthanga in south Wayanad, vouches her support for Mokeri. “Not being a VIP is a great advantage for him, as he will be with us and he can understand our problems much better than an outsider,” she stresses.

Mokeri’s campaign style is unostentatious. But he reaches every nook and cranny of Wayanad, a large part of which has forest cover. Human-animal conflict is one of the major issues being raised by the people of Wayanad. So are the restrictions on night travel to the bordering State of Karnataka.

“With the Congress in power in Karnataka, Rahul could have easily addressed the issue of night travel ban by that State. But he did nothing,” alleges Mokeri. “Wayanad even missed an MP in Parliament when the Chooralmala and Mundakkai disaster struck on July 30,” he says. 

Wayanad’s backwardness, according to the LDF, has largely been due to the absence of a dedicated MP who can focus on the development of the constituency. “No UDF MP from here, including Rahul Gandhi, cared for Wayanad. A serious politician like Sathyan Mokeri can,” says Ammu Koloth, a homemaker from Chaliyar. 

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Navya Haridas, 39, a former councillor of the Kozhikode municipal Corporation, is vociferous against the Congress and the LDF. As the Kerala State general secretary of the Mahila Morcha, she infuses a fresh energy in the BJP camps in Wayanad. 

The BJP has consistently increased its vote share in Wayanad since 2009. From a meagre 3.85% in 2009, the party’s vote share rose to 8.83% in 2014, and further to 13% in 2024. It was BJP State president K. Surendran who put up the party’s best show so far when he secured 13% votes (1.41 lakh) against Rahul and LDF’s Annie Raja in 2024.  

There is energy in Navya’s campaign. She, too, holds Rahul responsible for the unresolved problems of Wayanad. She throws light on the dire need for improved healthcare and agricultural support for the region. “Wayanad’s health facilities are woefully inadequate. Our only government medical college is insufficient, and farmers are struggling to protect their means of livelihood from wild animal attacks,” she says. 

BJP leader Rajeev Chandrasekhar accuses Rahul of betraying the people of Wayanad. “Why did he hide it from the people of Wayanad that he was going to contest from Rae Bareli as well? He betrayed them, and thrust this byelection upon them,” Chandrasekhar says, adding that neither Rahul nor Priyanka knows anything about the problems of Wayanad.  

The BJP targets not only the Congress, but it trains its guns on both the UDF led by the Congress and the LDF in which the CPI is the second largest constituent. “They are two sides of the same coin,” is the refrain. Both, the BJP alleges, are fostering minority communalism in Wayanad as well, and are stumbling blocks to Central funds reaching Wayanad.  

The Congress is taking no chances and has remodelled its electioneering by arranging more corner meetings for Priyanka in the seven Assembly segments of the Lok Sabha constituency.

Raising many issues against both the Central and State governments, she promises to stand by the people of Wayanad and fight for them in the street and in Parliament. She criticises the Centre for politicising the disaster that struck Wayanad on July 30 and for allegedly refusing aid to the victims. She lashes out at the BJP’s “politics of hatred and divisiveness”. 

“Rahul initiated several projects in Wayanad, such as smart anganwadis, school buses, efforts to establish a medical college, and the welfare of plantation workers,” she says, and vows to work for strengthening the agricultural sector, enhancing food processing, marketing agricultural products, and developing projects to boost tourism.  

Philomena, in her mid-50s, was teary-eyed as she watched Priyanka speak at Pozhuthana about her emotional bond with her two children. “I couldn’t stop crying. She has come here all the way leaving behind her family. I see Indira Gandhi in her. Her looks, her dress, her hairstyle, her mannerisms, and everything,” says Philomena, who went for the meeting with her husband.  

There are many like Philomena who make such a comparison. Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme worker Sarojini T., NRI businessman Nasaruddeen T.P., his relatives Sufaira and Arifa, autorickshaw driver V.K. Jamsheer, tribal Asha worker V.K. Sudha and schoolteacher Amin Faisal are among them.  

The Congress hopes that Priyanka’s candidature in Wayanad will galvanise the party rank and file in the State which will stand it in good stead in the Palakkad and Chelakkara Assembly byelections as well.  

The challenges faced by Wayanad, known for its natural beauty, agricultural preferences and tourism potential, are unique. “No matter who gets elected, the region is in dire need of a dedicated leader who can address these challenges,” says Nazar, educationist. 

Published - November 07, 2024 07:51 pm IST