Micro-level party manifestos in local body elections mark a significant shift in Kerala’s political culture.

Kerala’s local body elections have traditionally centered on the basics — roads, drains, streetlights, and waste management.

However, this time, the three major fronts—the CPM-led LDF, the Congress-led UDF, and the BJP-led NDA—have released manifestos that read less like routine civic checklists and more like ambitious blueprints for parallel futures.

The full-fledged, multi-page poll documents for corporations and districts in particular carry a flood of promises; some practical, some aspirational, and some that wander into the territory of wishful planning.

Dr D Dhanuraj, Chairman of Centre for Public Policy Research (CPPR), in speaking to The New Indian Express, expressed his happiness and praised the sudden surge in detailed manifestos.

“This will help prompt more discussion on decentralised government, and the public will demand such things,”

he is quoted as saying, proposing that global political trends and high-profile campaigns elsewhere may be influencing Kerala’s political tone.

Dhanuraj sees the trend as healthy, explaining that the very presence of detailed manifestos marks a shift toward increased accountability.

“When you promise 100 things and don’t implement even 10%, someone will question you. I see it as the next level of development as we move towards greater decentralisation.”

The electorate has already begun casting its verdict on these big-ticket manifestos. Saturday’s results will reveal which promises resonated and which remained on paper.

Read the full article by The New Indian Express here.

Views expressed by the author are personal and need not reflect or represent the views of the Centre for Public Policy Research.