Dance by 15 women candidates in Anthoor seeking votes goes viral

The Anthoor municipality in Kannur, often in the news as a strong bastion of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)], where the ruling Left Democratic Front has previously swept all seats, many of them unopposed, is back in the spotlight for an entirely different reason now.

A campaign dance by 15 women candidates of the Left Democratic Front has taken the social media by storm, gathering thousands of views and reactions within minutes of it being posted.

These candidates came together to perform an Oppana set to the tune of a Mappila song as part of seeking votes. The clip quickly registered half a lakh views, with tens of thousands liking it, and emerged as one of the most widely watched campaign materials in the region.

Photo session

“The reel going viral was unexpected,” said Ashok Kumar C., area committee member of the CPI(M), who proposed the idea, when 29 women candidates came together for a photo session. “I randomly asked the candidates if they would be interested in dancing a few steps, which could be used for online campaign. About 15 of them came forward and within a few minutes they choreographed the steps and uploaded them on the social media,” he said.

An LDF candidate Omana Muralidharan said that they had fun doing the shoot, but the video going viral within a few minutes was unexpected. She expressed happiness that the reach of the video could help them in campaigning.

Anthoor, where the United Democratic Front could not field candidates in several wards and five women were elected unopposed, has had no formal Opposition since its formation in 2015. Notably, three of the women featured in the video are among those who have been elected unopposed.