In a rare show of camaraderie, Kerala chief minister Oommen Chandy and Opposition leader V S Achuthanandan together met prime minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday. The unprecedented message that came out was that the Congress-led UDF and CPM-led LDF could indeed join hands for the cause of the state, which had had otherwise got used to witnessing the two fronts at each other’s throats on issues and non-issues alike. Never willing to lose any chance to cast BJP as enemy number one, Modi’s trademark business-like approach would’ve played a significant role in getting the Kerala leaders to go calling on him in a renewed bid to find relief to issues such as a downbeat rubber plantation sector.
That the state leaders too meant business was evident as the issues addressed included the drastic fall in natural rubber procurement price, directly affecting about 11 lakh growers, with a plea to ban NR imports and also bring in other policy. Among the other issues taken up, the lone area with a distinct political footprint was the joint plea for Modi’s personal intervention to prevail upon Tamil Nadu to maintain the Mullaperiyar dam water level at 136 feet, and to get the neighbouring state to agree to a new dam.
The united team took the initiative to another level by by broaching critical areas such as the deteriorating fiscal scenario and the continued neglect by the Railways in scripting the state’s development when they met finance minister Arun Jaitley and railway minister Suresh Prabhu. The new-found mantra of having Kerala leaders talking business found a resonance from Delhi when the finance minister promised that all issues bogging down the ambitious Vizhinjam port project would soon be resolved. For the leaders from Kerala, often reconciled to indifference from the the central government even when politically sympathetic parties have been at the helm, the empathetic response of the NDA government led by the BJP could only have been a welcome change. Surely, the takeaway from this for Kerala can only be that it pays to build political consensus. Now, it is time to wait for results.
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