THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: On Monday, K. Sudhakaran, the head of the Congress' Kerala unit, changed his mind and endorsed Mallikarjun Kharge as the "official" candidate of the party for president.

All of the significant figures, including A.K. Antony, Oommen Chandy, Ramesh Chennithala, and Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan, have opted for Kharge over their fellow member of the local party, Shashi Tharoor.
As of Monday's official announcement, Sudhakaran maintained that "let the voters cast their vote according to their rationale." With this, it is more or less inevitable that Tharoor won't receive more than twenty votes out of the 300 voters from Kerala. When he was able to convince 16 Kerala Congress leaders to sign his nomination papers, he had pulled off a surprise.

In a statement released here, Sudhakaran lauded Kharge's contributions to the party over the previous 60 years and referred to him as the "ideal" choice to lead and revitalise the party. Intriguingly, Tharoor's victory in his first election in 2009 coincided with Sudhakaran's victory in his first Lok Sabha elections from Kannur.

"The fact of the matter is when people like me stand up in the Lok Sabha, none takes note of it, but the moment Tharoor stands up to speak, there is pin drop silence and all in the house eagerly turns their attention to him to hear what he speaks," he had said when asked how things were inside the Lok Sabha after quitting as a legislator and winning the Lok Sabha elections.

Since Tharoor plays in a different league than most others and has won three games straight from Thiruvananthapuram, even when he hasn't received the full backing of the local party officials, Sudhakaran has always had a soft spot for him.

On condition of anonymity, a media critic said that Sudhakaran's decision to publicly back Kharge is not at all surprising given that it is the law of the land and he is required to do so. The critic said: "Whether Tharoor will win or lose is secondary as more essential is how many votes will he get and if he loses by a mile then it might be tough for him to get the respect that he had in the party and if he manages to put up a close battle then his stock will further grow."

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