'Erred in Taliparamba, Payyannur candidate selection': CPM leader Puthalath Dinesan opens up on party's Assembly poll defeat

A month after the CPM state committee reportedly enforced inclusion of glaring flaws in the party's Kerala Assembly election review report, CPM Central Committee member Puthalath Dinesan has now come clean on key factors that led to the CPM's crushing defeat in the 2026 Assembly elections.

CPM's tally plummeted from 62 to 26 seats in the recent assembly elections in Kerala.

During the election review, the state committee demanded three corrections in the report - lapses in candidate selection in Taliparamba, not slamming SNDP Chairman Vellappally Natesan for his communal remarks and lenient stand on A Padmakumar, who was arrested in connection with the Sabarimala gold scam.

The party had dissed demands for a change in leadership at the helm, despite low-rung meetings collectively calling for an overhaul.

In a Facebook post, Dinesan said both grassroots-level missteps and lapses during the election campaign had contributed to the defeat. He cited the controversial candidate selection process in Kannur, which had faced strong opposition from party workers, as one of the factors behind the party's poor performance.

"The decisions on candidate selection in Payyannur and Taliparamba, despite the controversies surrounding them, proved to be counterproductive," Dinesan wrote.

He also said that although the party had expressed its disagreement with SNDP Yogam General Secretary Vellappally Natesan's anti-Muslim remarks, its failure to publicly and unequivocally condemn the statements had allowed political rivals to spread misinformation.

Dinesan further said the party's handling of issues such as the Sabarimala gold theft case and the Ayyappa Sangamam may also have affected its electoral prospects. While there was nothing inherently wrong with organising events such as the Ayyappa Sangamam, he said rival parties had successfully portrayed it as a government-sponsored programme.

"Furthermore, the reading of a message from Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, who has an RSS background, at the conference was also inappropriate," Dinesan said.

He also criticised certain statements made by party leaders during the election campaign, saying they had contributed to the electoral setback. He added that the campaign slogan failed to resonate with the public in the way previous slogans had.

According to Dinesan, the party also failed to effectively communicate the key ideas outlined in its election manifesto. He further said the CPM had failed to engage closely with the public, while criticising several party units for not adequately understanding public sentiment.

Despite the setback, Dinesan said the CPM's expanded state committee was working to strengthen the party's organisational structure and address the shortcomings that had emerged. He said the party planned to formulate action plans after extensive discussions across all organisational levels and careful consideration of feedback received from both within the party and the public.

"The party has consistently progressed by identifying and correcting the shortcomings encountered at every stage. In this new phase, it is adopting an approach of analysing issues from the global level to the branch level and moving forward accordingly," he said, adding that the party was transitioning to a new organisational approach that incorporates feedback from both its internal structure and the wider public.