Kerala: BJP leader P.K. Krishnadas's open invitation to CPI(M)'s P.P. Divya causes unease in his own party

Reports say that the resentment is strongest among leaders who joined the protests against Divya when the case was in the news. They see the invitation as being at odds with the party's stand.

What Divya has done

Divya has not announced that she is leaving the CPI(M) or that she intends to join another party. She posted a note on social media that signalled a distance from the party. It recounted a Buddhist parable in which the Buddha asks his disciples whether it is right to keep carrying a raft after it has helped them to cross a river. She did not describe the post as a declaration of political separation. At the time of the reports, she had also not responded directly to the BJP leader's remarks.

Divya was the president of the Kannur District Panchayat when the controversy broke, and the CPI(M) removed her from her posts after it. Some reports mention that the party has taken action against her over the case, but the details of the present action have not been given in the reports on Krishnadas's remark.

The background is the death of Naveen Babu, the Additional District Magistrate in Kannur, who was found dead in October 2024, a day or so after a farewell event at which Divya made public allegations against him. A court linked the case of abetment of suicide to her public allegations. Divya was arrested and remanded to 14 days' judicial custody, and the case caused a major political row, with the BJP and the Congress both campaigning against the CPI(M) over the way it handled it. Those facts are drawn from earlier coverage, and the criminal case is a matter for the courts.

The saying that Krishnadas used refers to the Arakkal Beevi, the title of the woman head of the Arakkal royal family of Kannur, one of the best-known houses of north Malabar. The idea behind it is that a match needs more than one party's consent. By choosing that phrase, he left the impression that the BJP had not decided, but he did not rule it out, which is what angered his colleagues.

Kerala's political contest has been mostly between the Left and the Congress-led front, and the BJP has been trying for years to widen its base. A prominent former CPI(M) leader would help the party to say that it can attract people from the Left. But Divya's name is tied to a case that the BJP itself used to attack the CPI(M), and taking her in would invite the charge that it forgets its own protests when a defector is useful.

There is a second point. The comments of a single leader do not constitute a decision of the party. The BJP's state leadership has the final say on who is admitted, and it will have to decide whether to distance itself from the remark. The unease reported in the party shows that many of its leaders think the party should.

For the CPI(M), the episode is a reminder that the party is dealing with a former district-level leader who has a following in Kannur and who is no longer under its control. What Divya does next, whether she stays and accepts discipline, leaves quietly or moves to another party, will decide how much the matter weighs on the Left in the district.