The Congress-led United Democratic Front returned to power in Kerala with a decisive mandate, winning 102 of the 140 Assembly seats. Meanwhile, the incumbent CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) fell to 35 seats, its worst performance in the state. The BJP-led NDA won three seats, its best ever tally in Kerala. What explains the results?
First and foremost, they point out that the United Democratic Front’s gains in the 2024 parliamentary elections and 2025 local body elections were not temporary and were part of a larger anti-incumbency wave. They have now moved on to the Assembly elections. In 2024, the United Democratic Front won 18 of the 20 Lok Sabha seats in Kerala, while the LDF was reduced to just one seat and the BJP won its first Lok Sabha seat from the state in Thrissur. The United Democratic Front then emerged as the largest alliance in terms of vote share in the 2025 local body polls, garnering 42.4% of the statewide votes against 35.2% for the UDF. To be sure, the United Democratic Front was ahead of the LDF even in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections, but the latter managed to bounce back in the Assembly elections. The year 2026 ends this nationwide premium for LDF.
At 37.6%, the LDF marginally improved its vote share compared to the 2024 parliamentary body and 2025 local body levels, but not enough to reverse the UDF’s advance. The UDF’s vote share leads the LDF in all districts of the state, at 46.4% in Central Kerala, 48.4% in North Kerala, and 44.1% in South Kerala. More importantly, the UDF improved its 2025 local body vote share in every district, showing that it has effectively built on the momentum from 2024 and 2025.
It is the scale of the defeat that makes this election different from any ordinary election in Kerala. The LDF’s vote share fell to 37.6%, even lower than its 43.4% vote share in the 2001 election, its previous worst since the 1980 election. Its seat share fell to 25% in the 140-member assembly. This is worse than in 2001, when the Liberal Democratic Front won 40 seats and the United Democratic Front won 99 seats. What makes the 2026 result more damaging at the political level is that the LDP’s decline is not limited to the swing seats, but is evident in the party’s strongholds as well. The defeat was also severe at the ministerial level. Thirteen ministers from the Liberal Democracy government lost, highlighting the extent to which anti-incumbency influences senior positions in government. The LDF also failed to retain 36 of the 59 advisory councils it won in the 2011, 2016 and 2021 General Assembly elections.
In Kannur district, the traditional stronghold of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), Bayannur was won by V Kunhikrishnan, the ousted party leader who is contesting as an independent backed by the United Democratic Front, defeating party MLA TI Madhusoodanan. Moreover, Taliparamba won over another former CPI(M) leader turned UDF-backed independent TK Govindan Master. Meanwhile, G Sudhakaran, a veteran leader of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), two-time minister and four-time MLA, who ended his 63-year association with the party in March and contested from Ambalapuzha as an independent, won. Sudhakaran represented the seat in 2006, 2011 and 2016. Even in the seats they won, CPIM’s margin of victory saw a decline from an average winning percentage of 10.46% in 2021 to 6.96% in this election – and Pinarayi Vijayan himself saw his margin fall from 50,123 to 18,437, a 9.7 percentage point drop in vote terms. partner. These findings underscore a two-fold crisis for the LDF and the Communist Party of India (Maoist): anti-incumbency against the government and discontent that has built up within party ranks.
The BJP-led NDA also made its strongest showing in the Kerala Assembly. The BJP won three seats, its highest number in the state’s electoral history. The three seats are Nemo, Kazakoottam and Chathanur. At 14.2%, the NDA’s vote share is also the highest ever recorded in Kerala Assembly elections, improving by 11.3% in 2021 and 10.5% in 2016. The symbolism of Nemom is important.
This was the seat where O Rajagopal opened the BJP’s account in the Kerala Assembly in 2016, before the party lost it to CPIM’s V Sivankutty in 2021. Rajiv Chandrasekhar’s win thus marks the BJP’s return to its most important foothold in the state. Chathanur and Kazhakoottam add to this, demonstrating that the NDA has been able to convert pockets of power in south Kerala into seats. However, the bigger picture of vote shares is more modest than the number of seats suggests. The NDA did not match the support it received in the 2024 parliamentary elections, when it won 19.2% of the votes in Kerala and secured its first Lok Sabha seat from the state in Thrissur. Its vote share in the 2026 assembly is also slightly lower than the 15% it got in the 2025 local body polls. This suggests that the BJP’s gains were concentrated geographically, rather than at the state level. What remains to be seen is whether the CPI (Maoist) is able to bounce back from its current predicament or the BJP will benefit from the harsh shock it has suffered and the strong Muslim polarization behind the Congress.
