Angry cop of Malayalam cinema to BJP’s big hope for Kerala Lok Sabha seat — who is Suresh Gopi

Angry cop of Malayalam cinema to BJP’s big hope for Kerala Lok Sabha seat — who is Suresh Gopi

Chennai: Actor-politician Suresh Gopi was the cynosure of all eyes in Kerala Wednesday as Prime Minister Narendra Modi attended his daughter’s wedding at Guruvayur temple, with stars like Mohanlal and Mammootty queuing up to greet him.

From being a leader of the Students’ Federation of India (SFI), the student wing of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) or CPI(M), and later an “apolitical” person who campaigned for both the state’s major political coalitions, Gopi has come a long way to emerge as a big hope for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Kerala.

Modi, who was on a two-day visit to Kerala, also visited the Sree Ramaswami Temple, Thriprayar, in Thrissur district, before heading to Kochi for a party function and the launch of Cochin Shipyard Ltd international vessel repairing centre and a new dry dock. This was his second trip to Thrissur, a central Kerala district, in January.

At the divine Guruvayur Temple, my lovely kids tied the knot, with the esteemed presence of our Honourable PM Narendra Modi ji. Kindly keep Bhagya and Sreyas in your prayers. ❤️🙏 pic.twitter.com/UFr4EucDH3

— Suressh Gopi (@TheSureshGopi) January 17, 2024

Kerala is a state where the BJP has never won a Lok Sabha seat. Its closest finish was in 2019 when it came second in Thiruvananthapuram. The party won 15 percent of the votes in the last general election when the Congress-led UDF swept the polls, winning 19 of the 20 Lok Sabha seats.

Gopi, who became a nominated Rajya Sabha MP in 2016 and joined the BJP later that year,

was fielded as the party’s candidate in the Thrissur Lok Sabha constituency in 2019 and in the assembly seat of the same name in the 2021 state polls, coming third both times. As the 2024 Lok Sabha elections draw near, Gopi appears to be gearing up for another battle in Thrissur, although the BJP is yet to officially announce any candidates.

For people in Kerala, Gopi is not just an actor-politician. Apart from giving the Malayalam silver screen back-to-back hits in the 1990s and early 2000s, he wore multiple hats, from that of a popular TV host to a humanitarian. Some of his notable characters include Kannan Perumalayan in Jayaraj’s Kaliyattam, an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Othello, which bagged him the national and Kerala state film awards in 1998. After portraying versatile roles in his early career, it was action thrillers and cop movies that made him a Mollywood star with hits such as Ekalavyan (1993), Commissioner (1994), Highway (1995), Lelam (1997), and Bharatchandran IPS (2005) to name a few.

However, in politics, even though many agree that his influence among Malayalees as a philanthropist and a popular actor has helped the BJP to increase its vote share in Thrissur, Gopi comes with his own limitations. The foremost of these is a lack of experience in organisational politics and politicking, say experts.

Kerala has only seen a few successful actor-politicians such as former MP Innocent (a Left-backed Independent) and Kollam MLA Mukesh of the CPI(M), as well as the state’s transport minister, K.B. Ganesh Kumar of Kerala Congress (B), currently an ally of the ruling LDF.

According to Mirash Cherian Kurian, a professor of political science at Kerala’s Mahatma Gandhi University, Gopi “doesn’t have much influence” compared to other BJP leaders in the state.

“He is a non-politician politician and doesn’t know how to talk on a public platform in Kerala. His talking style on the stage is similar to that of his characters. The people of Kerala will not accept it, and the state leadership knows it. But Suresh Gopi doesn’t,” Kurian told ThePrint.

The Congress leadership in Thrissur district echoed the sentiment.

“The BJP used Gopi as a trump card in the last polls and they did their maximum work. The election showed how much the party could win using Gopi. But the vote share can’t go up further,” C.C. Sreekumar, the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee’s (KPCC) secretary in the district, told ThePrint.

But the BJP seems unperturbed and confident. According to Suvarna Prasad, BJP media convenor, “The PM’s attendance at the wedding is proof of how much Gopi is respected by the party’s national leadership.”

Expressing confidence that the BJP will win the Thrissur constituency in the upcoming polls, Prasad told ThePrint that, compared to sitting MP T.N. Prathapan, “Gopi is accessible to locals.”

“He is there in Thrissur getting involved in all local matters. He also conducts welfare work for the people. We are making him the candidate considering all the work he has done and his influence in Kerala society,” he added.

His political journey

Gopi began his involvement in politics as a student activist of the SFI in his hometown, Kollam. Many years later, he was seen campaigning for both the state’s major political coalitions — the CPI (M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) and the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) — in the 2006 assembly polls.

Campaigning for the UDF’s M.P. Gangadharan in Ponnani then, the actor had reportedly said, “I am apolitical. I am doing this only because the candidate is my uncle.”

He was also seen at a campaign rally for senior LDF leader V.S. Achuthanandan in Palakkad’s Malampuzha later, according to media reports.

After the 2014 general elections, Gopi heaped praises on Modi. The BJP’s state leadership soon revealed that they were in contact with the actor.

In 2015, Gopi announced his interest in joining the BJP and reportedly said, “It would be decided by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.”

In April 2016, the actor was nominated to the Rajya Sabha by the President in the category of eminent citizens. Later, in October, he officially joined the BJP, which would go on to field him as a candidate in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

The 2019 elections were held in the backdrop of the Sabarimala protests in the state, and the Congress gained from the nomination of Rahul Gandhi in Wayanad.

In the Thrissur constituency, the BJP nominated Gopi, who secured 28.2 percent of the votes — an increase of 17 percentage points from the previous Lok Sabha elections.

Gopi, who also campaigned on the Sabarimala issue, came third after the UDF’s T.N. Prathapan and the LDF’s Rajaji Mathew Thomas, who secured 39.8 percent and 30.9 percent of the votes respectively, according to Election Commission data.

Gopi tried his luck again in the 2021 Kerala assembly elections from Thrissur, but he finished third with 40,457 votes, behind LDF’s P. Balachandran (44,263 votes) and Congress’s Padmaja Venugopal (43,317 votes).

The Thrissur Lok Sabha constituency consists of seven assembly segments — Guruvayur, Manalur, Ollur, Thrissur, Nattika, Irinjalakuda, and Puthukkad.

According to the 2011 census, Thrissur district has a 58.42 percent Hindu population followed by 24.27 percent Christians and 17.07 percent Muslims.

Among Hindus, the influential Nair (General Category) community — to which Gopi belongs — and the Ezhavas (OBC) reportedly constitute the major populations, while Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities make up nearly 11 percent of the population.

Gopi has been a constant presence in the constituency since the last assembly polls. In October 2023, for example, he led a foot march there protesting the alleged corruption at the CPI (M)-controlled Karuvannur Service Co-operative Bank.

Gopi’s popularity and controversies

The year was 2020. A snippet from the popular TV programme Ningalkum Aakam Kodeeswaran (regional version of ‘Who Wants to be a Millionaire’) went viral on social media.

In the video, the contestant spoke about how her husband and in-laws had abused her for dowry. After hearing the story, the host, Gopi said, “My heart aches thinking about parents who have daughters.”

Gopi added that he belonged to a family of four sons who decided not to ask for dowry. “What will men do if women decide to not marry and be independent? Yes, I am angry. I do have two daughters. Listen to this before you approach them for marriage. Or else they will live alone,” he added.

This was one of the many instances where Gopi expressed his views on social issues and earned praise from the public. He was also known for lending helping hands to many people in need even before he became a politician.

In 2018, Gopi had given Rs 3 lakh to Viji, wife of Sanal Kumar, who was allegedly murdered by a police officer, according to media reports.

However, the actor-politician has also been in the limelight for a few controversies.

In the run-up to the 2019 polls, Gopi was also issued a notice by the then Thrissur collector and district election officer T.V. Anupama for allegedly violating the Model Code of Conduct by invoking the Sabarimala controversy to appeal to religious sentiments for votes.

At a campaign meeting in the district, Gopi had reportedly said, “If my Ayyan (the deity Ayyappan)… our Ayyan… if that Ayyan is my emotion, the brutal government will get a befitting reply this election. The Ayyappan devotees across India will turn it into a wave.”

In April 2022, a video of the BJP leader sitting in his car and handing over kaineetam (money given as part of the Vishu festival) to women went viral. The women were seen touching his feet after receiving the money.

He also held various Vishu programmes the same year in Thrissur and gave Rs 1,000 to the priest of Thrissur Vadakkunnathan Temple. Later, the Cochin Devaswom Board reportedly issued a statement barring temple priests from accepting money.

In November 2023, Gopi was summoned by the Kerala Police in a complaint by a woman journalist alleging misbehaviour.

Wooing Christian voters?

According to Kurian, the BJP has been using its organisational strength and Gopi’s influence as a philanthropist in Thrissur for years now.

He compared Gopi’s continuous attempts in the constituency to those of Union minister Smriti Irani, who defeated Rahul Gandhi on Congress’s turf, Amethi, in 2019 after an unsuccessful run in 2014.

“The BJP’s aim in Thrissur will be to win rather than just show itself to be a strong competitor in the upcoming polls,” he said.

The political science professor also highlighted Gopi’s visits to a local church in Thrissur, which according to him, “signify his attempts to woo the Christian community”.

Two days before his daughter’s wedding, Gopi and his family had visited Lourdes Church in Thrissur and offered a gold crown to the effigy of the Virgin Mary. “He chose to go to the church in Thrissur only. It clearly shows that the act was part of vote bank politics,” Kurian said.

Not only Kurian, Gopi’s efforts were seen as an attempt to bridge the gap between the BJP and the Christian community by others as well. Thrissur’s sitting MP, T.N. Prathapan, was one of the first to react to Gopi’s move, and reportedly said the BJP couldn’t wash away its “sin” in Manipur — referring to the inter-ethnic violence in the BJP-ruled state — by donating a gold crown.

When asked about the Manipur issue, Gopi had in November reportedly said, “Forget Manipur. There are men out there in Manipur and UP to handle the issue.”

Shortly after this, the Thrissur Archdiocese, in its mouthpiece Catholicasabha, lashed out at the actor for his remarks in an article headlined ‘Will not forget Manipur’, and said, “The country will not forget the violence in the northeastern state as they head to the Lok Sabha polls.”

The article claimed there was a move to cover up the violence ahead of the elections and the party that wanted to retain power at the Centre was behind it. However, media reports later quoted the archdiocese’s spokesperson as saying the article did not reflect its official view.

Terming Gopi’s recent activities in the constituency an “election show”, the Congress’s Sreekumar said that even though he is respected as an actor in Kerala, Gopi doesn’t have acceptance in the district as a politician.

He added that the BJP could secure the votes it did because Gopi was the candidate. “Thrissur is a secular constituency with no relevance for the BJP’s politics.”

According to him, Modi attending the wedding “is also part of the party’s strategy to use Gopi’s influence in its full capacity”.

For Kurian, the BJP is fielding Gopi again because there has been an increase in its vote share. “Thrissur is the only constituency that the party can hope to win after Thiruvananthapuram, where the party won its lone assembly seat in Kerala’s history in 2016 with its senior leader O. Rajagopal,” he added.

(Edited by Richa Mishra)