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“How many kilometres from Washington DC to Miami beach?” is a cult line from a Malayalam comedy film released in 1986 starring Mohanlal and directed by Priyadarshan. The film and most of its slapstick scenes and dialogues elicit rip roaring laughter even today, cutting across generations of Malayalis.
However, the question which is posited today is “How many kilometres from Patna to Thiruvananthapuram?” These are early days post the election results in Bihar but the tremors are resounding in far flung Kerala which is poised to head for assemble elections in 2026.
Kerala has around 2.78cr voters of which 1.44cr are women and 1.34cr men. 18% of the voters are below the age of 30, another 20% are between 30 and 40 years of age. In other words, 38% of the voters are below 40 years of age. The rest of the distribution is around 40% between 40 and 60 years and around 22% above 60 years of age. The state has a track record of alternating its affection every 5 years between the Left Democratic Front (LDF) and United Democratic Front (UDF) with predictable regularity, except in 2021 with the Pinarayi Vijayan led LDF seizing a rare consecutive victory.
The LDF is comprised primarily of Communist Party of India (Marxist), Communist Party of India and Kerala Congress (Mani). The main constituents of UDF are Indian National Congress, Indian Union Muslim League, Kerala Congress and Revolutionary Socialist Party. The NDA is spearheaded in the state by Bharatiya Janata Pary and Bharath Dharma Jana Sena. While there are many other smaller parties that are part of all these alliances, only parties which have contested at least 5 seats out of 140 in the previous assembly election have been named here. The religious demographics of the state are roughly 55% Hindu, 27% Muslim & 18% Christian population
So here are 7 implications for Kerala 2026 from Bihar election results, framed in terms of the biblical seven deadly sins.
- Pride: The stakes have become significantly higher for Indian National Congress making it a do or die election for them. Given that previously Rahul Gandhi and now Priyanka Vadra owe their parliamentary seats to this state and the fact that the state has 14 sitting MPs from INC, anything less than a resounding victory would be unpalatable. Even more so, considering the fact that the LDF government would be battling a two-term anti-incumbency.
- Greed: Seat sharing arrangements, especially for UDF, would be a nightmare. Track record in recent elections shows INC dragging down alliance partners and this would embolden other parties to seek a larger number of seats. Even partners who contested a couple of seats in the previous election would be keen to significantly increase their tally.
- Gluttony: Genetically modified seeds of polarization and counter polarization will be sown and nurtured by all stakeholders – Left, Right and Center
- Lust: Election campaigning will focus on personal predilections and baseless innuendos. Manifesto and ideology will take a back seat. The reaction to news reports pertaining to a sitting MLA from Palakkad, a failed candidate from Ernakulam and a councilor from Thiruvananthapuram provide early warning signals of the shape of things to come.
- Envy: This will undoubtedly be the most expensive election Kerala has ever seen thus far. All alliances have upped their marketing spends across print, electronic and digital media. Action which was hitherto above the line in Kerala will percolate below the line as seen in other states.
- Wrath: Localised violent outbursts especially in the northern part of Kerala used to be the norm rather than exception, many decades back. After a prolonged period of calm, undercurrents are visible of agitations getting out of hand. This will probably be the election with skirmishes spilling over, some of them violently so.
- Sloth: In spite of the brouhaha being created this time that Kerala will tilt a little more towards the nationalist developmental agenda, at the end of the day it will boil down to booth level strategy and execution for which organisation strength of the cadres makes all the difference. Far from being triangular, once again the bipolar narrative will hold steadfast.
By the way, the gibberish answer delivered passionately in the film Mazha Peyyunnu Maddalam Kottunnu by Mohanlal who is a driver, in response to the question posed by his ex-schoolmate, Srinivasan, who has returned after higher education from USA is “Hahaha! I am the answer…Kilometres and kilometres. In these days of degenerating decency of Miami beach to Washington DC when diplomacy and duplicity become interchangeable from complicated America to America!”
If deciphering that line is crazy, rest assured deciphering Kerala politics is crazier.