APromises gone astray
Santosh Kumar
Pinarayi Vijayan
Wednesday, April 5,
2017, was not just
another day in
Kerala or the
nation's history.
That day Kerala
was all set to celebrate the 60th
anniversary of the coming to power
of the first democratically elected
communist government in the world.
It was on 5 April 1957 that the EMS
Namboodiripad government was
sworn in. It is indeed an irony of
history that Kerala is now ruled by a
Left Democratic Front government
headed by a hardcore Marxist chief
minister, though Pinarayi Vijayan is
no EMS Namboodiripad. Instead of
celebrations what a stunned Kerala witnessed was the brutalisation of a
mother who had come with her
family to the DGP's office in the state
capital Thiruvananthapuram, seeking
justice for the murder of her teenage
son.
Mahija's son Jishnu Pranoy, a first
year student of a self-financed
engineering college in Thrissur, the
cultural capital of Kerala, was found
dead in his hostel room on January 6.
Jishnu Pranoy and his mother Mahija
Police tried to write off the death as
suicide "out of depression". But from
day one Mahija was certain that her
son would not have committed
suicide and insisted that Jishnu was
murdered. Slowly and surely, facts
came to light to prove that the teenager was indeed done to death
by the college authorities for raising
his voice against the injustices
practiced by them.
Even after 90 days, during which
Mahija had approached everyone
including the chief minister who also
holds the home portfolio and had
handpicked his DGP when he came
to power, Pinarayi's police is playing
truant, with a proper investigation
yet to begin and the killers of Jishnu
roaming around freely, many of
them securing anticipatory bail. This
is when the aggrieved mother
decided to sit on an indefinite dharna
with her family in front of the DGP's
office till the culprits were brought to
book. All of Kerala was following her
tragic story and what they saw on TV
channels was horrifying; a mother's
trauma reinforced by the police of a
Left Front government.
Despite growing public outrage
and dissenting voices within the
party and the Front, chief minister
Vijayan is unfazed, defending his
otherwise indefensible police to the
core. True to its tradition, the party too has rallied behind Vijayan saying
the police are right in doing what
they did and as is its wont declaring
that "everyone else is wrong".
VS Achuthanandan
It shows how much the ruling
party has lost touch with their socalled
masses. Any government's first
year is an
opportunity for
the ruling party to
score grace
marks. Instead
this government
has been
stumbling from
one controversy
to another in just
ten months in
power.
Two ministers
had to quit, one
for blatant nepotism and another for
alleged "lewd talk" over the phone
with a woman. The CPM and the
other major partner in the Front, CPI,
are at loggerheads on almost every
issue including the Mahija one.
The controversy over forcible land
acquisition in the hill resort of
Munnar is set to explode. It has
become very clear with whom the government of the day stands ~
encroachers, small or big. Veteran
CPM leader VS Achuthanandan is
gearing up for an open fight with the government in Kerala, reopening old
wounds within the party.
The death of Jishnu Pranoy has
prised open the links between the
goons who run private institutions in
the guise of educationists and
various political parties, with the CPM
no exception. It is with horror that
an average Malayali who takes pride
in Kerala's education system came to
know of the existence of "torture
chambers" inside those colleges. It
was a revelation which launched a
chain of student protests across the
state which has petered out with the
government taking no concrete
action whatsoever.
It will be like that till another
Jishnu happens for everyone knows
that it is the education mafia that fills
the coffers of major political players.
Narayanan Nair and his communist
family continue to run the Law
Academy in Thiruvananthapuram
after over two months of turmoil. No
one is going to touch him or his
prime property in the capital.
A Vigilance Commissioner brought in with much fanfare to eradicate
corruption is out, so corruption stays
put. A government which came to
power promising to safeguard women and children is practically
forced to hang its head in shame.
The death of Jishnu Pranoy
has prised open the links
between the goons who
run private institutions in
the guise of educationists
and various political
parties, with the CPM no
exception. It is with
horror that an average
Malayali who takes pride
in Kerala's education
system came to know of
the existence of "torture
chambers" inside those
colleges.
Not a day passes in the state without
incidents of wanton violence against
them. While the government blames
the police squarely for inaction,
Pinarayi's DGP continues as if
nothing has happened and
everything is hunky dory.
It is a pity that even after 60 years
it has not dawned upon the
communists that they indeed did not
win the election in 1957, but it is the
Congress which lost it. It would be
wise for them to study why the
Congress lost then and again in 2016.
That is the best the party can do for
the present if they have to run the
government with Pinarayi Vijayan in
charge.
Kerala, which voted
enthusiastically for the Left Front
government hoping for better days,
wants CM Vijayan to change his
autocratic ways, say sorry to Mahija
and set things right at the earliest.
But hardly do they know that Vijayan
is no chief minister, he is still the
secretary of a bureaucratic
communist party.