The BJP is on a damage-control mode in Palakkad and Thrissur after internal protests forced last-minute changes to its candidate lineup for the upcoming local body polls. Tension first erupted in the Thrissur corporation after protests by party workers forced the BJP to backtrack on its earlier announcement for the Kuttankulangara division. The candidature of V Aathira, the sitting Punkunnam ward councillor and BJP district vice-president, was withdrawn despite her prominence within the local unit. The decision came even though she had been publicly projected as a possible mayoral choice in meetings attended by Union Minister Suresh Gopi.

Replacing Aathira, the party leadership, at the very last moment, fielded an RSS nominee. The new candidate for Kuttankulangara is M Sreevidhya.

Reacting to her removal from the fray, Aathira told Onmanorama that she stepped aside of her own will. "I stepped aside from contesting of my own will; no one asked me to step aside. From the beginning itself, I had said that I would not be contesting.” She added that her decision was due to “official reasons” and that she had already informed the party she would not be available during the elections.

Party leaders, too, maintained this version of events. “The decision to step aside was entirely her own. The party has no role in it. She has her personal reasons,” said BJP Thrissur City President Justin Jacob.

Aathira had secured 1,571 votes, defeating UDF’s Valsala Babu Raj, who finished with 988. A clear lead of 583 votes had cemented her as one of the party’s most promising faces in the corporation. Aathira was shifted to the nearby Kuttankulangara division, a seat reserved for women this time. But her reassignment reportedly triggered deep resentment among some local workers. It is understood that a faction within the party even intervened in her campaign, stating that they did not want her positioned as the mayoral candidate.

Kuttankulangara is a key ward for the BJP. In the previous polls, the party suffered a setback when senior leader B Gopalakrishnan, widely seen as the BJP’s mayoral face, lost to UDF's Suresh by a margin of 191 votes. With the mayor’s post now reserved for women, Aathira was believed to be a strong contender if the party secured a majority.

A similar crisis unfolded in Ottapalam, where the BJP pulled its candidate at the last moment. In the Palappuram ward, which was facing fierce rebel threats, the party replaced senior leader S Gangadharan with newcomer Vijayachandran.

Gangadharan, a councillor for the past 25 years, cited health reasons for the withdrawal. “I withdrew from the contest of my own accord because of health concerns,” he told Onmanorama.

He first entered the Ottapalam municipality in 2000 as an LDF-backed independent before joining the BJP in 2005. Since then, he has consistently won elections, contesting either as an independent or as a BJP official candidate across multiple wards in Palappuram.

Just a week earlier, Gangadharan was formally announced as the BJP candidate at the election convention. But after the announcement, a faction of ward workers expressed strong dissatisfaction and warned that they would field a rebel candidate if the decision were not reconsidered.

Caught between an unhappy senior leader and an agitated youth faction, the BJP opted for a third option: introduce a completely new face. The newcomer replaced both Gangadharan and the youth leader, who was preparing to contest as an independent.