Encouraged by the response PM Narendra Modi received during his recent visit to Kerala, the BJP leadership is now planning to intensify its outreach in the state. Like BJP central leadership did in the run-up to the elections in some northeastern states and Goa, many top BJP central leaders, including Union ministers, would be involved in the BJP’s upcoming mass mobilisation plans in Kerala, which will further increase from August, post-monsoon, towards the 2024 general elections, leaders involved in the planning said.

While they indicated that Modi would be making more visits to Kerala in the coming months, the next immediate high-profile visit being planned is that of Defence Minister Rajnath Singh to attend party programmes, including an ex-servicemen’s conference. Home Minister Amit Shah visited Kerala before Modi’s trip.

While the BJP is evidently working to open its account in Kerala in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the party is banking a lot on the perceived connect, which the party believes PM Modi has established with key social segments of Kerala.

Prakash Javadekar, BJP in-charge of Kerala, told ET: “The popular response to Modi Ji during his two-day visit to Kerala was superb, especially from the youth. While he launched many development projects, equally significant was the positive and productive meeting Modi Ji held with senior representatives of churches of almost all denominations”.

While BJP’s additional attempts to woo sections of the Kerala Christian population is now evident, party circles point out multiple factors forming the backdrop — PM Modi visiting Vatican and inviting the Pope to visit India; the renewal of BJP’s (and allies’) electoral mandate in Goa, Nagaland and Meghalaya with significant Christian population; PM’s visit to Delhi’s Sacred Heart Cathedral on Easter Day; Kerala BJP’s outreach with Christian families during the previous Christmas and Easter and subsequently inviting many Christians to the families of BJP workers on Vishu. Even as sections of the Christians, alongside Congress and the Left, question the BJP’s outreach to the community, yet amid this, a new party, NPP, too was launched in the Christian belt, triggering buzz of tacit backing to it from the BJP and sections of Church leaders. “There are more surprise developments and inductions in store,” claimed a BJP leader.

In the BJP’s assessment, many social welfare schemes of the Modi government established a connect with Kerala society, including the Christians, especially the distribution of free Covid vaccines that was benefited by an estimated “80%” of the Kerala population, “the 52 lakh beneficiaries” of Mudra loans and “31 lakh families” who have received ₹26,000 each in 13 monthly instalments so far from the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi.

The BJP brass feel there “is a realistic assessment” in Kerala now that “the Modi government is here to stay well beyond 2024”, and therefore, large sections of Kerala society, including Christians, now want to remain beneficiaries of the welfare and infrastructure planks of the Modi government.The CPM’s intensified efforts under the second Pinarayi Vijayan government to carve out a support base among the Muslims, and the Congress-led UDF’s exertion to hold on to this base, also plays out in BJP’s plans. “The Kerala CPM is going out of the way to woo the Muslim sections, even by cooperating with the SDPI (the political outfit of the banned PFI) and the Congress is desperate to hold on to its Muslim vote-back. In this LDF-UDF competitive appeasement of the Muslim vote-bank, many sections, especially the Ezhavas and Christians, are being left out”, argued Javadekar.

What is not often said publicly but whispered is the fact that sections of Kerala’s Christian community, with a significant overseas population, are also wary of radical Muslim outfits and their conflicts on the global stage with symbols of the Christian establishment.

It is also in the backdrop of this BJP outreach that the UDF and LDF upped their opposition to the contentious movie ‘Kerala Story’ even as the BJP is keeping a hands-off posture while making it a test case for “freedom of expression”. As the LDF and UDF thrash the movie’s claim that about “32,000” Kerala women, including Christians, were lured away by the ISIS, Kerala BJP chief K Surendran posed a counter: “If their issue is about the numbers, then let CM Pinarayi Vijayan state what exactly are the number of women from Kerala recruited by ISIS and lured by Love Jihad. Let the CM either say there were no such incidents or else place his numbers so that we can discuss it”.