Kerala Congress was launched in 1964 and faced its first trial with electorate in the very next year.Kottayam District Committee of the party almost in entreaty joined the party.Mathachen Kuruvinakkunnel,president of DCC and a close confident of P.T.Chacko was the fulcrum of the party's formative days.K.M.Mani at that time was one of the DCC secretaries.Although most DCC office bearers who were from Chacko group instantly joined the new party,Mani was carefully weighing his options.He wanted an assurance that Kerala Congress will be fielding him(and not Mathachen)as party candidate from Palai Constituency.He got that assurance and lost no time in jumping on to the bandwagon.Performance of the party was spectacular in 1965 assembly elections.The party bagged 25 assembly seats in the 133 member assembly.Congress got 35,Muslim league which was an ally of KC got 6,CPM 33,CPI3,SSP,RSP,KTP,KSP etc shared the balance.Congress refused to take an un conditional support of KC,others could not manage the numbers,Communists offered support to KC and League which was turned down.The assembly never got formed and president's rule continued.
By 1967,political kaleidoscope underwent major changes.CPM,CPI,Muslim League,SSP,RSP,KTP&KSP formed a7 party united front,Congress and KC took a stand alone posture and the elections gave a sweeping victory to CPM led united front.Congress could manage only 9 seats,its lowest ever tally,KC 5.In 1970,kaleidoscope revolved again,CPI,Muslim League,RSP broke away from CPM,joined hands with Congress and KC,but the ministry did not last long.Again a midterm elections,KC broke away from the allience and fought the elections in alliance with Congress (o)led by Nijalingappa,Morarji,Kamaraj etc.It brougt back CPI-Congress(i) led front to power ,Congress (O) fared miserably,but KC proved its mass base with a strength of 15 seats.It was the peak of its strength.As K.M.Mani later on philosophised,the party had to split with growth,which it did at regular intervals thereafter.But the second part of his philosophy that it grew with splits remained in his and other KC men only.Fact was that each split took away a part of its mass base.
Time came when the party had to find a reason for its existence.P.T.Chacko sentiment started waning as times moved ahead.Strategist in Mani found the cause of Rubber farmers as a potential base for the party.Every fall in Rubber prices was an opportunity for KC.It perfectly jelled well with the party's image as pro farmer party thanks mainly to E.John Jacob,leader of paddy farmers in Kuttanad.Other parties were reluctant to take up pro farmer causes for fear of being branded as pro rich,but the fact was that there was a huge number of small and medium farmers in the state.With the land reforms,the class of large farmers ceased to exist in paddy sector.Large Rubber planters were not affected by the land reforms,but the marginal,small and medium sector of Rubber farmers needed a political party to fight for them.This was why KC continued to exist ever after Bangla Congress,Uthkal Congress and similer outfits that came into existence as break away groups from Congress either disintegrated or merged into larger parties.
Over a period of time,every leader who could muster some support,even to the extent of being the scale turner in one constituency found it profitable to float an outfit of his own rather than being part of a larger mechanism.Polarisation of Kerala politics as left and right fronts helped these groups to survive by joining hands with one of the fronts.Since winning or loosing elections depend on 3to 4 percentile of voters swing,even small groups were accommodated in the fronts..Even the faction led by K.M.Mani will not win a single seat if they contest alone.All other factions will not get back their deposit in any constituancy if they contest alone.But their votes can make UDF loose seats.Mani group can cost some10 seats to UDF.Capability of the strike power of other groups are doubtful,but UDF is unwilling to take a chance due to the precarious balance of votes in Kerala.That is why all KC factions that are at best family run enterprises(except Mani faction,though run by Mani and his son,has some kind of an organisational set up)are still capable of getting their pound of flesh when it comes to power sharing.
But ground realities are changing.The changes are due to a variety of reasons,which I shall deal with in my next posting
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