Assembly polls: BJP’s Kerala unit discusses preliminary list of candidates
THE Kerala BJP leadership has stepped up Assembly election preparations, drawing up a preliminary short list for 35 constituencies.
The probable list, shaped at their state election committee meeting, will now be forwarded to the central leadership, with three names considered for each seat.
While some constituencies may still see changes, key faces are already positioning themselves on the ground.
State president Rajeev Chandrasekhar is set to contest from Nemom, the party's stronghold in recent memory.
Union Minister V. Muraleedharan is likely to contest for Kazhakkoottam, while former state chief K. Surendran has been steered towards Manjeswaram after internal discussions.
Elsewhere, Shobha Surendran, M.T. Suresh, C. Krishnakumar, actor G. Krishnakumar, R. Sreelekha, Karamana Jayan are among the names that surfaced at the meeting for the 35 seats.
The broader electoral arithmetic, however, underscores the scale of the task ahead.
The BJP's only Assembly win in Kerala's 140-member house came in 2016, when veteran leader O. Rajagopal captured Nemom.
In 2021, the seat swung to the CPI(M), with the Congress relegated to third place.
Vote-share trends present a mixed picture.
The BJP secured 12.41 per cent in the 2021 Assembly polls, rising sharply to 19.24 per cent in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, boosted by actor Suresh Gopi’s surprise win in Thrissur.
Yet momentum proved uneven as in the December local body polls, though the BJP wrested the Thiruvananthapuram Corporation for the first time, its statewide vote share dipped to 14.71 per cent.
Against this backdrop, the leadership is treading cautiously on formal announcements, aiming for coordinated declarations alongside other poll-bound states.
With allies Bharath Dharma Jana Sena (BDJS) and Twenty20 pressing seat demands, negotiations will follow internal assessments.
For the BJP, the shortlist marks an organisational push, but translating incremental vote gains into assembly seats remains the central challenge, as at the 2021 Assembly polls the BJP candidates managed to get runner-up place in just eight seats.
