Kerala Chief Minister VS Achuthanandan has expanded his Cabinet on Monday, accomodating three Left allies. Besides hiking number of ministers to 20, Chief Minister is also on a categoric brief from his CPI(M) collegues to step up indusrialisation of the State.

The three new ministers administered oath of office on Monday by Kerala Governor RS Gavai are PJ Joseph (Kerala Congress-J), Kadannappally Ramachandran (Congress-S) and Jose Thettayil (Janata Dal-Secular-Gowda).

It is in a meeting of CPI(M) Secretariat in Kerala captial, attended by party supremo Prakash Karat, that the party told Chief Minister to go gung-ho on the reform agenda.

An investor-meet to pace up the mega-projects (like the Malaysian CIDB investment in Kozhikode, Sobha Developers’ Hitech city in Kochi etc ) has been proposed. After complaints from the high clout Pinarayi faction in the party that Chief Minister was sitting pretty on private investment proposals to the tune of Rs 10,000 crore, the party secretariat reportedly asked the 85-year old Achuthanandan to give goahead to all files cleared by the party.

VS Achuthanandan was also not allowed his way when he advocated denying Cabinet berth to Janatha Dal-Secular-Gowda legistaur quoting ideological inconsistencies. Thettayil is inducted to the State Cabinet following a split in his party JD-S. One faction is led by former Union Minister MP Veerendra Kumar and the other by NM Joseph. Thettayil belongs to the latter and is the one that CPI(M) has chosen to recognise as the official one.

While the crackdown on Chief Minister’s obsessive concern about real estate developers masquerading as industrial investors, is a signal of political upmanship of the pro-reform faction in the party, it is yet to be clear if the move can achieve miracles in rapid industrialisation of the State. CPI, the second largest party in the ruling coalition LDF, also shares many of Achuthanandan’s ideological apprehensions.

Out of the 21 SEZ applications before Kerala Government, only 10 were cleared. At the behest of CPI, LDF Government had to frame an SEZ policy with 13 firm caveats. By this no agricultural land in Kerala can be acquired for industrial purpose. The policy also stipulates that entreprenur should use 70% of land for industrial purpose and in the remaining 30% no flats can be sold to outside parties. This policy is yet to be finalised.