EDITORIAL

Antony’s Ignominious Exit

A K Antony has resigned from the chief ministership of Kerala. He has been replaced by Oomen Chandy. Antony’s exit has come three years and three months after the Congress-led UDF won 100 out of 140 seats in the 2001 assembly elections. Despite having such a massive majority, the chief minister was forced to step down, having lost credibility with the people and his own allies within the UDF. The resignation comes in the wake of the worst ever defeat suffered by the Congress in the Lok Sabha elections where the Congress could not win even a single seat.

Antony’s exit follows the rejection of the policies being pursued by the UDF government, which have inflicted a serious crisis in Kerala society. Rural distress has led to the shocking spectacle of suicides by farmers in the state, an unprecedented event in Kerala. In Wayanad district alone, over 100 farmers committed suicide in the past one year. Lakhs of workers in the traditional industries like coir, cashew and handloom have lost their livelihood. The UDF government’s appeasement of caste and communal lobbies has led to growth of communal and casteist forces. The same lobbies have been liberally handed out professional colleges and education has become a commercialised commodity.  The suicide of a young dalit girl student highlighted the gross inequities of the higher educational system. The students and the youth have been conducting a powerful movement against the educational policies of the Antony government.

Factionalism within the Congress achieved new heights with four formally organised factions fighting it out for the spoils of office and the Antony versus Karunakaran battle crowning this nauseating spectacle. The contradiction of a chief minister lauded for his clean image and of a corrupt government presided over by him where every partner and caste and communal group demanded and got their pound of flesh, became too much for the people to stomach. They meted out severe punishment to the UDF in May 2004.

The Congress high command has stepped in with its usual formula of replacing Antony with a new face. Antony may be rehabilitated with a post at the centre. But there is no sign that the opportunist combination which is the UDF will change course under the new chief minister. There is no talk whatsoever of a change in policies. What Kerala needs is an abandonment of the destructive policies pursued by the Antony government. Unless the state government concentrates its energies to increase public investment in infrastructure and agriculture, revive traditional industries and streamline the public sector undertakings, Kerala’s economy cannot be developed on a sound footing. Employment generation, strengthening the public distribution system and restoring the primacy of public education and health systems should be on the agenda. The Antony government’s policies were contrary to these goals.

Having frittered away the last three years, the UDF government under the new chief minister will be seen as just a holding operation till the assembly elections in 2006.