Thiruvananthapuram: K T Jaleel was a trusted lieutenant of Pinarayi Vijayan and he enjoyed the latter’s support all along the turbulent times he had while facing a series of allegations once he became a minister in the Pinarayi cabinet.
It was quite a surprise for even the party circles when Vijayan, the then party secretary, chose Jaleel to accompany him in the Nava Kerala Yatra in 2009. Apart from Jaleel, who was not even a primary member of the CPM, the members who accompanied Vijayan in the yatra were A Vijayargahavan, E P Jayarajan, M V Govindan and T N Seema two central committee and two state committee members.
Following his ouster from IUML in 2005 after serious differences with the party leader, P K Kunhalikutty, the CPM gave him a ticket to contest in 2006 as an independent. He trounced Kunhalikutty himself in the election and later became the Muslim face of the CPM in Malappuram. He repeated his victories for the CPM in 2011 and 2016 too. Vijayan believed that the entry of Jaleel helped the party gain roots in the district.
Vijayan sprung another surprise in 2016 when Jaleel was inducted into his cabinet much to the dismay of the party leaders and cadres. Though Jaleel was first given the LSG portfolio, he was later made the higher education minister by bifurcating the education portfolio. Usually CPM members are chosen to head the education ministry when LDF comes to power and in Jaleel’s case that convention was broken and a non-CPM member had for the first time handled the key ministry of higher education. Even in the 2021 assembly election, when several ministers and MLAs lost their chance to contest due to the two-term barrier, it was not applicable for Jaleel.
Vijayan was also vociferous in defending Jaleel both inside and outside the assembly whenever he ran into controversies. Be it the mark awarding issue or the import of Quran, the chief minister stood by him. Even his resignation was ruled out when he was questioned by ED on the import of Quran through UAE consulate violating the protocols.
However, when the Lok Ayukta order demanded the ouster of Jaleel from the cabinet, the party decided to act. It was only law minister A K Balan who came forward to support Jaleel. But CPM politburo member M A Baby soon corrected Balan and said the party has not taken any such decision. Baby even went on to say that Jaleel has approached the high court against the Lok Ayukta order on his own interest and the party has nothing to do with it.
This proved beyond doubt that the party is not happy with Jaleel continuing in the cabinet. The think-tanks in the party, including S Ramachandran Pillai, Kodiyeri Balakrishnan and M A Baby, are learnt to have spoken to the chief minister on this. It was after their discussion that the party decided to seek Jaleel’s resignation. The party’s message was conveyed to him by Balakrishnan on Tuesday morning.