New Delhi: As the top leadership of Bharatiya Janata Party, Congress and Janata Dal (Secular) huddle to stake claim to forming the government in Karnataka, Kerala has come up with a novel way of engaging the other MLAs of the parties. In an open invitation, the tourism department in God’s own country has thrown its resorts open to the MLAs to relax.
Taking to Twitter, Kerala Tourism started the ‘resort politics’, which basically means the trend of moving MLAs to resorts and undisclosed locations to prevent them from defecting. “After the rough and tumble of the #KarnatakaVerdict, we invite all MLAs to unwind at the safe and beautiful resorts of God’s Own country. #ComeoUtAndPlay,” the tweet said.
The tweet has gathered 4200 retweets and 6500 likes within an hour after it went public.
The post came just hours after Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan asked the JD(S) and the Congress to form government. Resort politics is not new in India and the first instance of such a move goes back to 1983 when Karnataka Chief Minister Ramakrishna Hedge ‘protected’ his MLAs from Congress. A year later, NT Rama Rao-led Telugu Desam Party was hit by an internal tussle, he sent all their MLAs to Bangalore and then Delhi. Similar instances have happened in 1995 when Chandrababu Naidu moved his MLAs and again in 2002 when then Maharashtra CM Vilasrao Deshmukh sent his MLAs to Mysore.
Just last year, Sasikala, in the face of a possible defection of her team to O Panneerselvam’s side, moved her MLAs to a resort near Chennai. Congress too, in August 2017, flew more than 40 of its MLAs to Bangalore.
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