Who’s afraid of Dr Thomas Isaac?

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Former finance minister Thomas Isaac has been leading a contented life, pursuing his pet passions of reading, economics, decentralised planning, waste disposal at source, organic cultivation and palliative care till the other day when expelled CPM ideologue M.P. Parameswaran recommended him for CPM’s next CM candidate.

Party cadre, once associated with Mr Parames-waran in Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad, doubted his waning faculties for the faux pas while ot-hers thought he was being utopian to think the CPM would lend any ser-iousness to his suggestion.

But his supporters point out that he had already sought to debunk CPM praxis and stood for the people the-mselves picking up their CM candidates than leaving that option to the parties. He thought Dr Isaac fitted the bill for the top job as he understood the nuances of the new economic order.  

What enraged even Dr Isaac’s sympathisers wa-s Mr Parameswaran rubbishing politburo member Pinarayi Vijayan and Opposition leader V.S. Achuthanandan as being unfit to lead in the changing times.

The party was livid. In a circular it asked the cadre not to attend the 80th birthday celebrations of Mr Parames-waran in Thrissur. Dr Isaac was quick to dump Mr Parameswaran’s suggestion as ridiculous an-d clarify his stand on an unsolicited intervention.

Dr Isaac had never faced charges of indiscipline but this was not his first major embarrassment. He was attacked, though not by party men, for collaborating with anthropologist Ric-hard Franke of Montclair State University and wife Barbara Chasin, both accused of being CIA agents and snooping in on Kerala. Dr Isaac was in charge of the local development initiative “People’s plan campaign”, launched  back in 1996.

A section of comrades does not like him for being less doctrinaire and see him as a wan-nabe politician, ready to depart from party catechism. As the finance minister he stressed governance over party considerations.

Was it not the Kannur strongman, E.P. Jayarajan, who formed a rival trader and merchant outfit and challenged Dr Isaac’s tax collection drive while he was the FM?  

Dr Isaac has carved out a niche for himself among various sections of society. He conducts himself with elan and dresses trendy though the commissars frown on his dress sense.

He engages the middle class and the intelligentsia. But these sections do not engage in street battles like Mr Achuthanandan’s supporters, whose street rallies forced CPM to reverse/alter its decisions in the two previous Assembly polls.

 

 

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