Kochi, May 2

His political acumen came to the fore as Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan led the ruling LDF to a thumping win over the Opposition UDF in the Assembly poll, bucking an over four-decade-old trend of power alternating between two fronts.

A powerful administrator, Vijayan had rolled out a set of development and welfare measures to enable a spectacular comeback for the LDF from its drubbing in the 2019 Lok Sabha poll, when it lost 19 out of the 20 seats. By pushing development and welfare policies, the Vijayan-led government also came out of the shadow cast by the gold smuggling case and scandals related to that. — PTI