A politically charged atmosphere seemed to prevail in Kerala with Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and Governor Arif Mohammed Khan going head to head against each other in separate and somewhat combative press conferences in Kollam and Malappuram, respectively, on December 18 (Monday).
In Kollam, Mr. Vijayan said the Kerala Government would move the Prime Minister and the President to “rein in Mr. Khan from vitiating the State’s peaceful atmosphere by resorting to provocative acts.”
Almost simultaneously in Malappuram, Mr. Khan upped the ante in his stridently recriminatory stand-off with the Kerala Government by stating that “intimidatory tactics by the very person who is responsible for scores of political murders in Kannur” would not cow him into subservient silence.
(The tit-for-tat often seemed to border on the personal, with Mr Vijayan accusing Mr. Khan of sporting a “peculiar mindset” that “nobody except Union Minister V. Muraleedharan could accommodate.” Mr. Vijayan alleged that both persons were patently anti-Kerala.)
Mr. Khan said he would venture into the street without police protection. “The Chief Minister has instructed SFI (Students’ Federation of India) activists not to come near me. He knows the consequences if they (SFI) touch me,” Mr. Khan said.
Mr. Khan said he had written to the State Police Chief to withdraw his security cover. “The State’s law enforcement is among the best in the country. However, the Chief Minister has hobbled the police from acting in a fair and politically non-partisan manner”, he alleged. Mr. Khan said he would visit markets without police protection and dared the SFI to impede him.
SC order
Mr. Khan said the Supreme Court order “upholding his prerogative” as Chancellor to appoint Vice-Chancellor in the Kannur University case had upset the State government. He said that as Chancellor, he was oath-bound to protect the autonomy of varsities from extraneous political influences. He warned Vice-Chancellors from acting as stooges of any political entity.
Raj Bhavan communique
On Sunday, Raj Bhavan appeared to set the stage for the Chief Minister-Governor stand-off by issuing a press release that accused Mr. Vijayan of inciting SFI activists to place posters defaming the Chancellor on the Calicut University campus where Mr. Khan has been camping since Saturday.
The somewhat ominously worded communique that “such deliberate actions of the Chief Minister precipitate the breakdown of Constitutional machinery” seemed to precipitate a new nadir in the already fraught Raj Bhavan-Kerala Government relations.
Left Democratic Front (LDF) convener E.P. Jayarajan noted that the “threatening communique” stopped short of articulating that the perceived situation could create the circumstance for the Governor to recommend the Presidential imposition of a State emergency under Article 356 of the Constitution. He sought the recall of Mr. Khan as Governor.
CM’s broadside
Mr. Vijayan’s broadside against Mr. Khan came against the backdrop of the SFI intensifying its protest on college campuses across Kerala against the Chancellor for allegedly stacking the Senates of State-funded varsities with Sangh Parivar nominees.
He slammed Mr. Khan for “terming protesting students criminals and rascals and calling the people of Kannur bloody”.
Mr. Vijayan accused Mr. Khan of attempting to provoke violence by physically charging at students protesting peacefully against the latter’s attempt to saffronise Kerala’s higher education sector.
He alleged that Mr. Khan had wilfully glossed over the storied history of the peoples’ struggles against feudalism and colonialism in Kannur district.
“Kerala is a peaceful State. Mr. Khan is disturbing the public peace by resorting to provocative acts. The Centre should restrain him from overstepping his Constitutional bounds and acting in an extrajudicial manner by attempting to take the law into his own hands”, Mr. Vijayan said.
Thalassery riots
He said Mr. Khan’s derogatory comments about Kannur smacked of the “RSS’s hatred” for the district.
The RSS had tried to forge a Hindu majoritarian mindset in Kerala in the early 1970s by fomenting communal riots in Thalassery. The CPI(M) foiled the bid. Its activists martyred themselves to protect minority religious institutions, he said.
“Mr. Khan has no clue that the progressive history of the Left movement in Kerala was forged in the crucible of struggle against colonialism, feudalism and communalism”, Mr. Vijayan said.
The Chief Minister said the RSS was venting its hate against secular Kerala where it could gain no traction by using the gubernatorial office as a political front.
CM slams Opposition Leader
He also said Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan played second fiddle to the Sangh Parivar’s political aspirations in the State. “Mr. Satheesan was on the same page as BJP leaders when denigrating the State and impeding its welfare and development”, Mr. Vijayan said.
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He said the political line of the BJP and the Congress often dovetailed in Kerala.
Mr. Satheesan, meanwhile, said Mr. Khan and Mr. Vijayan shared a “politically symbiotic relationship” in Kozhikode.
They were pretending to be imaginary foes and resorting to shadowboxing to divert public attention from the shortcomings of the Central and the State governments. The Centre and the State should abandon such theatrics and focus on fending off what seemed to be a surge in COVID-19 infections, said Mr. Satheesan.
