Kerala local body polls 2025: Central Travancore in focus as Kerala Congress seeks to become a tangible political power

When the Kerala Congress (M) split in 2019, P.J. Joseph wasted no time picking up the pieces. Within weeks, the veteran leader had reassembled a powerful bloc by bringing together every available splinter of the Kerala Congress family.

The Joseph faction went on to rope in big names like P.C. Thomas and K. Francis George ahead of the 2021 Assembly polls, injecting new weight and visibility into the outfit. But with every heavyweight that joined, the party’s structure grew heavier at the top.

Soon emerged the classic Kerala Congress paradox: a problem of plenty at the leadership level. The party responded with an organisational overhaul and a membership drive, culminating in the reappointment of Mr. Joseph as chairperson. Whether that reshuffle actually streamlined the leadership or merely rearranged it remains a hot topic, not just within the party, but across the United Democratic Front (UDF) alliance.

And there’s reason for that curiosity. Even before seat-sharing talks for the local body polls within the UDF could gain traction, the Congress, which is the coalition’s anchor, had begun airing its unease over the Joseph faction’s demands. That tension first surfaced during last year’s Lok Sabha elections, when resentment simmered beneath the surface. The victory of Mr. George in Kottayam managed to soothe nerves for a while, though the undercurrent never truly disappeared.

‘No compromise’

Now, with the local body elections on the horizon, the Joseph faction seems determined to assert itself once again. And Mr. Joseph, true to form, has come out all guns blazing. “No compromise,” he declared to the media, vowing to claim every seat the party deserves and even threatening to go solo if denied.

Behind the rhetoric lies a calculation. Based on the 2020 local body elections, the faction’s vote share stood at 1.99%, which is roughly between three -and-a-half lakh votes, concentrated across the rubber-growing heartlands of central Travancore. Though, five years on, even insiders admit the terrain looks less certain.

“There are no exact figures on our current vote share,” asserts Mr. Thomas, the party’s working chairperson. “But our influence in central Travancore remains intact.”

Still, he concedes that the party, long synonymous with the settler-farmer community, now finds itself navigating a generational shift. The children of those farmers are migrating in droves to the West, and their political loyalties don’t always follow their parents’ footsteps.

“We have managed to maintain strong emotional ties with the Kerala Congress-minded diaspora. But translating that nostalgia into actual votes on the ground is another story,” he adds.

In Malabar

Riding on tough negotiations, the party has managed to hold on to almost the same number of seats it contested last time. Yet, the leadership remains uneasy over what it sees as an unfair share in the settler-farmer bastions of Malabar. Behind the calculated calm, however, lies a stark reality: only a strong showing in the upcoming polls will allow the party to maintain its leverage at the bargaining table.

In other words, performance on the ground is now the currency that will define the influence of the Kerala Congress in the UDF and the next few months will test just how far the party can convert its pedigree into tangible political power.