Even as all eyes stayed glued to the twists and turns in the counting of votes and political parleys in Karnataka on Tuesday evening, a tweet by Kerala Tourism seemingly stole the limelight. The since-deleted tweet, which invited all Karnataka MLAs to unwind at the “safe” and beautiful resorts of Kerala, appeared to be tongue-in-cheek at first glance.
However, it may not just have been merely a marketing strategy to sell Kerala's beaches and hills in Karnataka, a state which made 'resort' politics a staple in India's history. Kerala Tourism is a government-run organisation and Kerala currently happens to have a Left Democratic Front (LDF) government led by the CPI(M), and with the JD(S) as a small partner.
The high possibility of resort politics in Karnataka remains even as the JD(S) officially denies it, with media reports on Wednesday claiming the party may send its MLAs to Kochi to prevent them from being 'poached' by the BJP. Both the Congress and JD(S) have accused the BJP of approaching their MLAs.
The need for a 'friendly' government to host MLAs matters particularly as police security may be necessary and the Congress seemingly has few options to offer on that front, with just three far-flung states in its control. Ironically, a resort in Bengaluru hosted Congress MLAs from Gujarat in the run-up to a bitterly fought Rajya Sabha election in 2017.
The CPI(M) in its recent party congress in Hyderabad had agreed to—after much dispute among leaders—to work toward a 'political understanding' with the Congress to defeat the BJP. CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury, on Tuesday published a series of tweets arguing why the JD(S)-Congress deserved to form the government in Karnataka given their combined numbers.
On paper the JD(S)-Congress in Karnataka have a majority. Noone else does. They should be allowed to prove it on the floor of the House. See the reasoned decision of President KR Narayanan in 1998 that favoured the BJP then. Surely, the BJP would agree to the same principle now? pic.twitter.com/ut6cTU3XhQ
— Sitaram Yechury (@SitaramYechury) May 15, 2018
The CPI(M), not surprisingly, is tight-lipped about the possibility of hosting (read protecting) Congress-JD(S) MLAs as the Congress remains its main rival in Kerala.
But the tweets by Kerala Tourism and Yechury may just be a sign of things to come. The word 'safe' in the Kerala Tourism tweet may have deeper political symbolism than most would think!