Kasaragod: Hours before polling, BJP leader and Manjeshwar candidate K Surendran released a list of 32 “sensitive” booths and urged the Election Commission to deploy paramilitary forces to prevent alleged bogus voting by the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML).

“Fake identity cards are being collected. Women in burqas will be used for bogus voting,” Surendran alleged at Kaikamba on Wednesday. His list spans six booths in Manjeshwar panchayat, eight in Vorkady, 12 in Mangalpady and six in Kumbla, all areas considered IUML strongholds.

Yet, the selection raised questions: in polling stations with multiple booths, only one or two were flagged, without explaining what would prevent the IUML from casting bogus votes in the others.

At GVHSS Kunjathur (Manjeshwar), which has four booths, only booth no. 4 was named as a target of IUML. At the Government LP School in Kunjathur, which has two booths, only booth no. 8 was flagged. At St Joseph AUP School, Kaliyoor (Vorkady), two of three booths (Nos. 42 and 43) were singled out. At Government High School, Uppala (Mangalpady), only booths 77 and 78 were listed out of four.

Surendran alleged that IUML workers had collected voter slips of overseas voters who had not returned home, and that Booth Level Officers (BLOs) sympathetic to the Muslim League were complicit.

His principal rival and incumbent MLA A K M Ashraf dismissed the charges as a familiar script. He recalled that after losing by 89 votes in 2016, Surendran had moved the High Court with similar allegations, only to withdraw the petition when several people he had listed as “dead” appeared in court to prove otherwise. “The poor people of Manjeshwar have not forgotten being dragged to the court in Kochi,” Ashraf said.

He also pointed to a recent complaint during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, where a voter’s citizenship was questioned by the BJP. The District Electoral Officer found the claim baseless and ordered registration of a case against the BJP district secretary for filing a false complaint. “Such allegations, raised at the final stage, only signal an impending defeat,” Ashraf said, adding that voters would respond through the ballot.

BJP’s arithmetic and its limits
Behind the rhetoric lies a numerical contest, one that the BJP believes still offers a narrow opening. BJP communication in-charge in Manjeshwar, Suvarna Prasad, said there are around 80 sensitive booths in Manjeshwar. “Surendran named 32, but trouble could arise in at least 45,” he said.

The party’s optimism rests partly on migration patterns. Of the 2.3 lakh voters in the constituency, around 30,000 are estimated to be abroad, of which the majority are UDF supporters, Prasad said. The UDF, however, puts the number at 22,000. Both estimates are significantly higher than the Election Commission’s figures, which show the highest number of overseas voters in any constituency at 16,002 in the Kuttiady segment of Kozhikode district.

“Manjeshwar could be the only constituency in India where nearly 80% of Hindus vote for the BJP. Today, it is 81%. If we can push that to 85%, we have a chance,” Prasad said.

Muslim voting is less consolidated, with only 65% to 70% backing the IUML. Yet, the absolute numbers favour the IUML. Of the 2.3 lakh voters in the constituency, 1.3 lakh are Muslims, 93,000 are Hindus, and around 7,000 are Christians.

Turnout typically ranges between 75% and 77%.

Even assuming an 85% turnout among Hindus, the total would be about 79,050 votes, much lower than the 83,000 recorded in the 2021 election. This points to a higher number of deletions and fewer additions of Hindu voters during the SIR process. To be sure, in 2021, Muslim turnout also stood at 83,000, making the contest tight.

Back to the calculation. If the BJP manages to secure 85% of these votes, as targeted by the party, its tally from Hindu voters would be roughly 67,200 votes, a modest improvement from 2021, when the BJP got 65,013 votes.

Now consider the UDF’s baseline, as outlined by Congress leader Harshad Vorkady: if 1 lakh Muslim voters turn out and 70% back the IUML, that alone yields 70,000 votes. Add around 4,000 votes from Christians and at least 4,000 Hindu votes, and Ashraf would be comfortably placed at around 78,000.

“The BJP simply does not have the numbers to top this,” Harshad argued. “And much of this is because of the SIR and the fear of disenfranchisement. I have been tracking elections in Manjeshwar since 1987, when Cherkalam Abdulla won for the first time. This is the first time Muslims are asking us to register their names and help locate their booths. Until last time, we had to bring them to the booths,” he said.

BJP leaders, too, acknowledge a structural disadvantage. “People are moving to Mangaluru for jobs and education and not returning. Many are Hindus,” Suvarna Prasad said. That reflected in the deletions from voter rolls.

Amid this, the LDF retains a steady vote base of around 23%, with a significant share coming from Muslim voters, making the community in Manjeshwar politically more diverse than a simple consolidation narrative suggests.

The BJP is banking on this diversity to finally break through in Manjeshwar, a constituency that has eluded it since 1987, when it first emerged as the principal challenger.