Kerela polls: V D Satheesan Says even left fellow travellers back UDF

Opposition leader V D Satheesan Says UDF today is not only a confederation of various parties but a broader political platform of social groups, opinion makers and even Left fellow travellers.What was the long-term plan you had in mind to strengthen Congress when you took over as opposition leader?We faced the second straight defeat in assembly polls in 2021, which left our entire leaders as well as rank and file demoralised. My task was to bring UDF back to power. All leaders cooperated with me and we formed a good team. Groups are not dominating the party anymore. When we chose candidates, winnability formed the primary yardstick. In Congress, we do not declare our chief minister candidate in advance. AICC follows a procedure to do it after the elections get over. CPM at the moment has only one leader — Pinarayi Vijayan. He is dictating everything. But I have not seen so many rebels in the history of CPM in Kerala. They are everywhere — in Thiruvananthapuram, Alappuzha, Palakkad and Kannur. There is a huge erosion in CPM votes too. You have been saying that UDF will win 100-plus seats. Can we have a break-up?We will get more seats in Malabar this time. We will win 45 to 50 seats in the six districts. We will sweep Idukki and Pathanamthitta. My predictions for local body elections were correct. We will get more seats in the assembly elections because anti-incumbency will be a major factor unlike in the local body polls, the results of which are determined more by personal influences.From 2005, so many social groups left our side. When I took over as opposition leader, we did a political analysis on what happened in the last 20 years. UDF today is not only a confederation of various political parties but also a broader platform of social groups, opinion makers, influencers and even Left fellow-travellers. The communist party which is ruling Kerala is not Left. They are not communists, they are extreme right. We are the Nehruvian Left. I have been claiming this for a long time. Around 90% of the Left fellow travellers are with the UDF now.There is a concern expressed, particularly by Christian community, that if Indian Union Muslim League, which is part of the UDF gets more seats, they may pressurise the govt for more cabinet berths?It's a good question. This is a CPM narrative. One fine morning, Panakkad Sayyid Sadiq Ali Shihab Thangal made a statement that there are thousand reasons for IUML to continue with UDF and there is not even a single reason to go with LDF. The next day onwards, CPM said Muslim League is all communal. If the Muslim League is weakened or there is no Muslim League, minority extreme outfits will take over its space. The present reality is that Muslim League is fighting with extreme forces.What is your USP to remain as an MLA in North Paravur constituency?I have been representing this constituency for the last 25 years. My margin has been increasing every time. I consider my constituency as my family. After every elections, people from all parties come to me and I help them. They are very kind to me and very loving.Who is your model in politics?Oomen Chandy has been a good model for me. I learned from him not to use bad words. For the last six months, CPM has been attacking me personally. Their cybercell centre has been making and sharing 20 cards and 10 videos against me every day. I do not raise baseless allegations. Jamaat-e-Islami was with CPM for four decades. When the chief minister claimed that he did not have any relation with Jamaat-e-Islami, I produced a video clip where he, as CPM state secretary, was seen welcoming that outfit. After he became the chief minister, Pinarayi Vijayan went to the Mascot Hotel and held a meeting with RSS leaders. The middleman was that spiritual personality, Sri M. I asked him on the floor of the assembly directly, "You had a closed-door discussion with RSS leaders. Are you denying?" He said nothing. He kept mum.How do you rate Pinarayi Vijayan as a leader?He is a senior leader, no doubt. But he is a dictator. His second term as chief minister has been a disaster and his team was very bad. Be it in business, politics or wherever, the selection of team members shows your leadership quality. We have to build a team.Will you be able to have a sustainable model of development in case UDF returns to power?The LDF govt brought the SilverLine (semi-high-speed rail) project, which would have been an environmental disaster. We will allow only projects that are environment-friendly. Climate change factors will be a determining component when we declare a project. You know that we have been fighting as green MLAs for so many years. UDF is very clear. We need development projects.What about finance, your pet subject?It is definitely a challenge. But there are so many faults on the part of both CPM and the govt. I will tell you one example. GST was introduced. GST is a consumer point tax. Kerala is a consumer state. Kerala would have been the number one beneficiary of GST. But unfortunately, this govt has not restructured tax administration. I have been demanding in the assembly for the last five years to restructure tax administration. Our tax growth was below 10%. I hope that if we restructure the tax administration system, within one year we will achieve more than 30% tax growth.We need good finance management. We have to take stringent actions to prevent treasury leakage. We have to stimulate the economy through investments, through various ventures, programmes and many other things. We are going to introduce a global job watchtower with experts. They will observe what is happening in the job world. Corresponding to that, we will restructure the curriculum here. We will introduce new courses in artificial intelligence, biogenetics, machine learning, etc. Wherever there are job opportunities, we have to start corresponding courses. One needs to get a job on completing studies. Otherwise, we have to support the job aspirants to start a startup. You may be a management expert, but may not have any idea about technical side. We will provide such candidates with a techno-mentor. We hope to start more than 10,000 start-ups, ventures and MSMIs within one or two years. That will stimulate the economy. We have a reverse remittance. More than five million people are from other states. They are sending money outside. So siphoning of the huge amount is happening. Reverse remittance is happening in a big way.You are also one of the most well-read politicians in Kerala.Whenever I am travelling, I catch up with my reading. I make it a point to read for at least one hour before sleeping.Who is your favourite author?Orhan Pamuk is my favourite writer. I have read all his books. I particularly loved his novels My Name Is Red, Snow, Istanbul and Night of The Plague.