KOCHI: Two constituencies where the BJP-BDJS combine would decide the outcome in Ernakulam district were considered Tripunithura and Paravoor, where Hindu vote consolidation in favour of the combine was expected. BJP secured 29,843 votes in Tripunithura while in Paravur BDJS got 28,097 votes, both in third place.
However, in Paravoor KPCC vice-president V D Satheesan almost doubled his majority to 20634 votes from last time’s 11349 votes while K Babu lost to M Swaraj of CPM by over 4467 votes in Tripunithura from last time’s majority of 15778 votes. This has baffled political analysts some of whom feel that new voters may have gone in favour of Satheesan while in Tripunithura these votes may have gone against Babu due to his sullied image after the bar bribe controversy.
Paravur had new voters numbering 8117 while Tripunithura there were 9217 voters. BJP has been able to secure 15,000 votes of Congress from last Assembly elections of which nearly 5000 votes would be that of new voters.
BJP has been gradually increasing its vote base in Tripunithura in the last few elections. While in 2011, its votes share has been 4942 votes in 2011, in the 2014 Parliament elections it went up to 16,500 votes while in the 2015 local body elections this went up further to 23,800 votes.
The Ezhava votes in Tripunithura constitute 37 percent of the electorate while of Nairs it is 19 percent. Dalits are 12 percent while Christians are 12.4 percent. Muslims are 7 percent while other Hindus constitute 10.7 percent. Both Babu and Thuravoor Viswambharan are both Ezhavas while Swaraj is a Nair.
In Paravoor the winner V D Satheesan says that the Congress local leadership failed to tackle the threat from BJP-BDJS combine in two places. “The RSS leadership had some time back targeted Paravur, Tripunithura and Kodungallur municipalities for taking control. The local Congress leadership failed to notice this in Tripunithura and Kodungallur following which they consolidated there, but I worked very hard and could stem them in Paravur. This helped Congress to consolidate here,” Satheesan told DC.
“Moreover the recent controversies over the assets of temples and the tug of war with Vellappalli Natesan enabled me to establish my credentials. Basically the majority community has a secular mind and that came to my support in addition to the support of minorities,” said Satheesan.
In last Assembly election, BJP got 3934 votes in Paravur. In this election, the total votes came to 1,90,000 of which Muslims are 16 percent, Chrisitans 30 percent, Ezhavas 24 percent, Nairs 10 percent, Dalits 12 percent and others 8 percent.
