By John Mary

Thiruvananthapuram: If the threat of bogus voting has been a sore point in the run-up to the by-election in Kerala’s northern town of Kannur, rival political fronts are getting ready to face a rash of election petitions once the dust settles down on the poll arena.

Kannur has been the most discussed constituency but along with it, Ernakulam and Alappuzha are also facing by-elections on Saturday. The debate was on governance and local development issues in Ernakulam and Alappuzha, but in Kannur the main debate was over the voter list.

As the cadres sweated it out in the Malabar heat, ruling CPM-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) and the Opposition Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) relied on top leaders to clinch the month-long campaign.

While Defence Minister A K Antony and Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi addressed rallies in all three constituencies, the CPM confined itself to State leaders. Party general secretary Prakash Karat and politburo member Sitaram Yechury were not in the loop, an implicit admission by the CPM that even they wouldn’t be able to alter the electoral outcome in the sitting seats of the Congress.

But the CPM believes that it has done its best to take the battle into the Congress camp in Kannur, by getting some 5,000 such voters eliminated on the basis of a meticulous enumeration of the voter list by the party well ahead of the by-election.

CPM Kannur district secretary P Sasi said most of those whose names were dropped from the list were pro-Congress “bogus” voters.

Congress nurses a grouse against the local Commission officials for incorporating 9,000-odd fresh voters in the electoral rolls since the Lok Sabha elections in April. The party believes the vast majority of them have been either CPM activists or sympathisers.

In the 113,000-strong constituency, the Congress had a 23,000 majority in the Lok Sabha election. With the additions and deletions, the CPM believes it has levelled the ground in its favour.

Knowing well that the Election Commission would not defer the polls once the final voter list was notified, the Congress took its complaint on the bogus voters to the Central Election Commission, putting in focus “CPM’s move to derail free and fair elections” in Kannur.

What’s at stake for the CPM is its honour, though Kannur has elected a Communist but once in its 52-year electoral history. It’s scared at the prospect of A P Abdulla Kutty, expelled from the party, winning hands down.

For the Congress, the fight is to show that it’s still in command in its traditional bastion.

THE PENINSULA