VD Satheesan, senior Congress leader and six-time Congress MLA, on Thursday was named as the new chief minister of Kerala, ending 10 days of marathon deliberations after the United Democratic Front’s sweeping Assembly election victory. The three main contenders for the post of chief minister were Satheesan, KC Venugopal and Ramesh Chennithala. The announcement came a day after former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi met Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge for about 40 minutes, after which the Congress stated that all deliberations and discussions by the high command are complete.
A decision on the next Kerala chief minister had been pending since May 4 when the Congress-led UDF bagged 102 seats out of the 140, which is more than a two-thirds majority. The party's central leadership held wider consultations as the uncertainty continued for days even after party observers Maken and Wasnik met Congress MLAs and gathered their views. The party leadership had also held discussions with the three main contenders for the post and KPCC president Sunny Joseph.
The Congress has 63 MLAs in the 140-member Kerala Assembly. Its allies Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) has 22, Kerala Congress (KEC) has eight and the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) three. The Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), one of the UDF’s most influential allies, openly supported Satheesan. At the same time, the Congress central leadership was weighing organisational equations, caste-community optics, Delhi influence and long-term national strategy before taking a final call.
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