Battle of namesakes for the ballot baffles voters

New Delhi, March 30 (IANS) Sasi Tirur vs Shashi Tharoor, Jose K. Mani vs Jose K. Mani, K. Suresh Kurup vs K. Suresh Kurup... It's the time tested way to baffle people and deflect votes, and nowhere perhaps is this confusion more confounded than in Kerala.

To the annoyance of political parties, be it the Congress or the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), large numbers of candidates find themselves challenged by a namesake in this election to the 20 Lok Sabha seats from the state.

Confusion reigns supreme in Kottayam, for instance, where a bitter fight is underway between CPI-M MP K. Suresh Kurup and Kerala Congress-Mani's Jose K. Mani. But guess what? There is another K. Suresh Kurup and another Jose K. Mani in the fray too.

Party sources said a man who shares Mani's name was secretly brought by air from Delhi and sent back after he filed his nomination from Kottayam. Ditto with Kurup, who finds himself battling another Kurup.

In Thiruvananthapuram, a man called Sasi Tirur is fighting against former UN undersecretary general Shashi Tharoor.

The name game can have a disastrous outcome.

Just ask senior Congress leader V.M. Sudheeran, who was aiming for a hattrick from Alappuzha in the 2004 Lok Sabha polls. He was trumped by a person called V.S. Sudheeran, who managed 8,282 votes - V.M. Sudheeran lost by a mere 964 votes.