2 weeks ago
1
Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF)’s government-formation talks, which riveted nationalist attraction connected Sunday (May 17, 2026), intimately resembled a roller-coaster governmental ride.
Chief Minister-designate V.D. Satheesan spent the amended portion of the hectic, somewhat chaotic time flitting betwixt leaders of antithetic Congress factions vying for Cabinet posts for their loyalists and allies aspiring to unafraid the maximum fig of ministerial berths.
Simultaneously, media speculation astir prospective Ministers and their respective portfolios reached a feverish pitch, adding to the anticipation, arsenic tv channels aired interchanging chyrons astir the make-up of the adjacent authorities connected a time erstwhile whispers successful the corridors of powerfulness took the signifier of news.
Transactional model
The negotiations, according to UDF insiders, assumed a transactional model. Ups and downs successful expectations, hesitant reconciliation with governmental realities, feelings of being fto down, grievances astir breached promises, choky turns distant from adamant positions, reluctant compromises, hopeless haggling, and last-minute closed-door wheeling and dealing marked the seemingly vexatious Cabinet enactment process.
“The result of the talks seemed a mixed container of sentiments of disappointment and feelings of fulfilment for the parties involved. Politics is yet the creation of the possible, and compromises were inevitable connected each sides,” a UDF insider privy to the behind-the-scenes talks stated.
At the outset of the negotiations, the authorities of the factions appeared to play spoilsport, with Ramesh Chennithala and K.C. Venugopal, who were contenders to the Chief Minister’s post, insisting connected accommodation for their loyalists. However, negotiators said, the “cloud of uncertainty passed” with factional leaders striking a detente astatine the Congress precocious command’s instance.
Lasting consensus
According to Congress leaders, the party’s nationalist leadership, comprising All India Congress Committee (AICC) wide caput successful complaint of Kerala Deepa Dasmunshi, reportedly made haste to prod the faction chiefs into a lasting statement connected Cabinet enactment earlier the deadline for submitting the last database of Ministers to Kerala Governor Rajendra Arlekar expired.
Congress insiders said the UDF spent sizeable thought connected however to accommodate Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)] veterans and MLA-elects, including G.Sudhakaran, T.K. Govindan and V. Kunhikrishnan, who aligned with the Congress-led confederation aft acrimoniously parting ways with the party.
The Congress enactment besides reportedly went the other mile to placate Mani C. Kappan of the Nationalist Congress Kerala and Anoop Jacob of the Kerala Congress (Jacob) who had reportedly rejected the UDF’s petition that single-legislator parties instrumentality turns successful power.
