In stark contrast to his omnipresence on television, P V Anvar — Nilambur’s pugnacious MLA for the past nine years — is conspicuously absent from hoardings and posters, even five days after announcing his byelection bid. For someone once dubbed the 'King Bee' for spearheading CPM's swarm of cyber-trolls against detractors, the lack of visual presence on the ground is striking.

On Wednesday evening, 60 flex boards were delivered to his Nilambur office. But the label identifying him as the Trinamool Congress candidate had been spray-painted black — his nomination under the party banner was rejected for lacking the required 10 signatures.

Though he has contested several elections as an Independent — from Eranad in 2011, Wayanad in 2014, and Nilambur in 2016 and 2021 — this is perhaps the first time he stands without even a shadow of support, overt or covert, from the CPM.

A former Congressman and K Karunakaran loyalist, Anvar entered this byelection as a truly independent candidate, after the Congress decisively shut the doors of the UDF on him.

Former MP and Left stalwart TK Hamza didn't mince words: "He ran on the CPM’s steam. That’s over. No Left vote will go to candidates on the other side.” While Nilambur may see a four-cornered campaign, the real contest is between the CPM's M Swaraj and the Congress's Aryadan Shoukath, he said.

But Nilambur is no straightforward contest of cadre strength. With a sizable bloc of floating voters who respond more to perception than party, this is a contest shaped by narrative. Anvar, a master of cornering the floating voters, estimates 50,000 fence-sitters in the constituency.

"This time, Anvar won’t even get 5,000 of them," said Raju P Nair, Congress spokesperson and leader from Tripunithura. "Shoukath or Swaraj may win. But Anvar will certainly be the biggest loser.”

While the LDF and UDF believe Anvar will only chip away marginally, they hope he hurts the other side more.

BJP remains on the fringe
The BJP, which has fielded Adv Mohan George, a former Kerala Congress leader, is eyeing the 11 per cent Christian vote and raising the issue of man-animal conflict to appeal to settlers from Travancore.

But in Nilambur, where 44 per cent of the electorate is Muslim and 45 per cent Hindu, and inter-religious interdependence runs deep, there's not yet space for the BJP's brand of politics. In the 158 wards across eight local bodies in the Nilambur Assembly segment, the BJP has only one elected representative -- a councillor from Kovilakathumuri ward in the Nilambur municipality.

In 2015–2020, the party had a single member in Edakkara panchayat in the assembly segment; in 2010–2015, it had none.

In the 2021 Assembly election, its best booth-wise performance was a mere 4.3 per cent at the booth in Government Higher Secondary School, Moothedam (panchayat). In the 2024 Lok Sabha byelection, it secured 7.6 per cent at a booth in Mishkathul Uloom Sunni Madrasa, Mylampara—its highest to date.

The SDPI, too, holds a minor but consistent presence, with around 2 per cent vote share.

The Anvar Enigma
Anvar claims he can corner a large chunk of the 50,000 floating votes and cut into the IUML’s 20,000-strong vote base -- in one of the few Malappuram constituencies where the Congress dominates the Muslim League. But UDF’s media in-charge Raju P Nair remains sceptical: "At best, Anvar may get between 2,500 and 5,000 floating votes."

Backed by the LDF, Anvar defeated Shoukath by a margin of 11,504 votes in 2016. That year, the UDF's vote share dipped sharply by 7.81 percentage points to 40.83 per cent.

In 2021, Congress fielded the late VV Prakash, who regained 4.5 points of the lost share. Despite a strong Left wave across Kerala, Anvar scraped through with a margin of just 2,700 votes. Locals whisper that it wasn't the IUML, but Shoukath, who undermined Prakash's chances in that race. "This time, the stakes are too high for personal grievances to outweigh party goals," said an aide of Shoukath.

After filing his nomination, Anvar visited the home of Smitha, Prakash’s widow -- a move many saw as a calculated attempt to confuse loyalties. Earlier, Prakash's daughter VV Nandana had posted a cryptic message when Shoukath's name was doing the rounds: "The memories of my father are stronger than the man who lived."

But Smitha firmly closed the door on Anvar's outreach. "Our family will die as Congress workers," she said after his visit.

How Anvar helped the CPM grow
Hamza dismissed the idea that Anvar could consolidate anti-incumbency sentiment. "In 2016, he came to LDF alone -- not even a driver was with him. He drove his car to Nilambur. He won on the strength of the LDF. Now he's alone again."

But that narrative doesn’t tell the full story. In the 2015 local body elections, 23 of 158 councillors in Nilambur's eight local bodies were Independents, most backed by the LDF. In 2020, under Anvar’s leadership, the LDF captured Nilambur municipality and panchayats like Amarambalam and Chungathara. Of the 33 municipal seats, LDF won 23 -- flipping a Congress bastion. More importantly, the CPM could finally field candidates under its own symbol -- something it had long struggled to do in parts of Nilambur.

E A Suku, former CPM leader and president of Vazhikkadavu panchayat (2015–2020), said: "In 2015, we had 23 Independents. In 2020, there were only five -- and just two of them were LDF-backed."

Suku, now aligned with Anvar, quit the CPM after the party failed to act on allegations Anvar raised against ADGP M R Ajith Kumar and SP Sujith Das. "When the party ignored his allegations, I sensed there was truth in them," he said.

Today, the LDF controls 80 of the 158 local body wards; the UDF holds 76. But in terms of local bodies, UDF controls five of the eight.

"For all that Anvar did for the LDF, he ended up poorer," said Shuhaib M K, Anvar's private secretary for nine years. He blamed Shoukath for the closure of Anvar's water theme park -- the Nature Tourism Village -- in Kozhikode's Koodaranji, which was earning around Rs 1 lakh per day. Anvar's rift with Pinarayi's CPM is just two years old. But the enmity with the Aryadan family runs deeper — stretching back generations. "If Anvar is going down," Shuhaib said, responding to a 'hypothetical question', "only he knows whether he'd rather sink with Shoukath or Swaraj".