The Congress party’s long-running inability to settle leadership questions in Kerala has once again come into sharp focus. Even after the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) secured a sweeping mandate in the 2026 Kerala Assembly elections, the party has struggled to announce its chief ministerial face, exposing factional rivalries that have haunted the organisation in the state for decades.
What should have been a moment of triumph for the Congress has instead become a display of internal confusion. More than a week after the UDF crossed the majority mark with over 100 seats, the party leadership in Delhi is still engaged in consultations, lobbying battles and damage control over who should become Kerala’s next Chief Minister.
At the centre of the contest are senior Congress leaders V. D. Satheesan, K. C. Venugopal and Ramesh Chennithala. Each camp believes it has a legitimate claim to the top post. Satheesan’s supporters argue that he led the opposition aggressively against the Left Democratic Front and became the face of the UDF campaign. Venugopal’s camp points to his proximity to the national leadership and his organisational influence within the party. Chennithala’s supporters, meanwhile, see him as an experienced compromise candidate capable of balancing factions.
The delay has become so prolonged that even Congress allies have begun openly expressing frustration. The Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), the UDF’s second-largest constituent, has publicly warned that the indecision is damaging cadre morale and preventing the alliance from properly celebrating its victory. Leaders from the IUML have argued that Kerala’s politically conscious electorate does not appreciate prolonged power struggles after delivering a clear mandate.
What makes the situation particularly embarrassing for the Congress is that Kerala has historically witnessed this pattern repeatedly. Leadership disputes after electoral victories have become almost a tradition within the state unit. From the days of K. Karunakaran and A. K. Antony to the later rivalries involving Oommen Chandy and Ramesh Chennithala, Congress governments in Kerala have often emerged only after intense internal bargaining.
The current standoff reflects a deeper structural problem within the Congress party. Unlike the BJP, which projects a centralised leadership structure, or the CPI(M), which relies on organisational discipline, the Congress in Kerala remains heavily faction-driven. Personal loyalties, caste equations, community balancing and proximity to the high command often matter as much as electoral performance.
The Congress high command now finds itself attempting to avoid alienating any major faction. Reports indicate that senior leaders including Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge have held multiple rounds of consultations, while the All India Congress Committee has even reached out to former Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee chiefs to build consensus.
However, every passing day without a decision risks undermining the very momentum the UDF earned through its landslide victory. Public displays of lobbying, poster wars between rival camps and media leaks have already created the impression that the party is more focused on internal power equations than governance.
The irony is difficult to miss. The Congress managed to defeat a decade-old Left government and return to power in Kerala with one of its strongest mandates in decades, yet it continues to struggle with the one question voters expected it to answer immediately: who will lead the government?
For a party trying to project itself nationally as a serious alternative to the BJP, the Kerala episode once again highlights a recurring weakness — the inability to quickly resolve leadership contests after electoral success. In Kerala, victory has once again been followed not by clarity, but by confusion.
