As Congress leader V D Satheesan took the oath of office as Kerala Chief Minister on Monday, a look at the 21-member Cabinet (including the CM) shows that five ministers are political heirs, the children of former ministers or legislators.
Congress minister K Muraleedharan is the son of the late CM K Karunakaran, who had straddled state politics for decades. The Revolutionary Socialist Party’s (RSP) nominee in the Cabinet, Shibu Baby John, is the son of veteran leader Baby John, who had served as the national general secretary of the RSP and minister in Kerala. The other three in this list are Kerala Congress (Jacob) legislator Anoop Jacob, the son of party founder T M Jacob, who had also been a minister for four terms; IUML minister P K Basheer, whose father is the late P Seethi Haji, a five-time MLA and once a chief whip when the UDF was in power; and IUML minister V E Abdul Gafoor, the son of the late IUML MLA V K Ibrahim Kunju, who had served as a minister in a previous UDF government.
Besides, the government’s chief whip Apu John Joseph is the son of Kerala Congress (Joseph) chairman P J Joseph. Appu has contested from Thodupuzha, which his father largely held from 1970 to 2026, except for in two terms in between.
The UDF ministers are:
Ramesh Chennithala, who will turn 70 later this month, is a permanent invitee to the Congress Working Committee. He is one of the seniormost legislators in the Cabinet. Chennithala, who was first elected to the Assembly in 1982 and became a minister in 1986 at the age of 28, has served as president of the KSU, the Youth Congress, and the state Congress in his five-decade career. Chennithala was the home minister in the previous Congress regime from 2014 to 2016 and later the Opposition leader during the first Pinarayi Vijayan government.
Former Lok Sabha MP K Muraleedharan, 69, has inherited the legacy of his father K Karunakaran, the late CM. Muraleedharan, a former state Congress president, received a head start in politics when he contested the Lok Sabha polls in 1989 from Kozhikode and won. In 2004, while serving as the state Congress president, he was inducted into the A K Antony Cabinet as the power minister, but was forced to step down within six months when he lost the by-election.
Sunny Joseph is the current state Congress president, taking charge of party affairs in the state a year ago. He has been representing the Peravoor constituency in Kannur since 2011. The 73-year-old Congress leader defeated CPI(M) heavyweight and former minister K K Shailaja this time. Joseph rose through the Congress ranks in Kannur when veteran leader K Sudhakaran was the District Congress Committee (DCC) president.
P C Vishnunadh, 48, is one of the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee’s (KPCC) working presidents. Vishnunadh was first elected to the Assembly in 2006 from Chengannur in Alappuzha district. He was then one of the youngest legislators in that Assembly at the time. He had served in the state leadership of the KSU and the Youth Congress before becoming an All India Congress Committee (AIC) member and taking charge of his current party post. In the last two decades, he has lost one election and has been representing Kundara in Kollam district since 2021.
Bindu Krishna is a first-time MLA from the Kollam Assembly constituency. Hailing from a Congress family, Bindu rose to be one of the party’s most recognisable women leaders before heading the Mahila Congress in the state. The 58-year-old Krishna, who lost three elections in the past, is currently the Kollam DCC president. Her husband, S Krishna Kumar, is a DCC general secretary in Thiruvananthapuram.
T Siddique, 51, is a two-term legislator from Kalpetta, an Assembly segment that makes up Priyanka Gandhi’s Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency. A former Youth Congress state president, Siddique rose in prominence in the Congress with the backing of his mentor, the late Oommen Chandy. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, he was named the Congress candidate in Wayanad, but suspended the campaign midway to make way for Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi.
P K Kunhalikutty, 74, is one of the decision-makers in the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) and a prominent UDF face for the last three decades. He has been part of all the UDF Cabinets since 1991, from the days of K Karunakaran to Antony to Chandy and now Satheesan. The nine-time legislator, who was first elected to the Assembly in 1982 at the age of 29, was the second-in-command in the previous UDF Cabinet.
N Samsudheen, 56, is an IUML state secretary who has been representing the Mannarkkad Assembly constituency in Palakkad since 2011. Shamsudheen joined politics through IUML’s student wing MSF, or the Muslim Students Federation. A lawyer by profession, he served as a member of the Malappuram district panchayat before moving to state politics.
K M Shaji, 54, started his career as the vice president of a village panchayat in Wayanad at the age of 22. Known as a vocal critic of former CM Pinarayi Vijayan, he served the student and youth wings of the IUML before making his way up the party ranks. In 2011 and 2016, he was elected from Azhikode in Kannur, but lost in 2021. This time, he won from Vengara in Malappuram district.
IUML leader P K Basheer, 66, is the MLA of Ernad in Wayanad. He is the son of the late IUML legislator, P Seethi Haji. Basheer rose through the party ranks after serving as a member of a village panchayat. Basheer has been in charge of IUML’s rehabilitation project for Wayanad landslide victims.
V E Abdul Gafoor, 49, is one of the few well-known IUML leaders outside Malappuram district, which is the party’s stronghold. The son of the late V K Ibrahim Kunju, Gafoor, who is a professional lawyer, lost the 2021 election from Kalamassery in Ernakulam district to senior CPI(M) leader and former minister P Rajeeve, but managed to wrest back the seat, which his father represented in the past, this time around.
Mons Joseph, 61, is a leader of the Kerala Congress (Joseph). When his party was with the Left Democratic Front (LDF_ from 2006 to 2009, Mons served as the public works minister for 22 months. He has been representing the Kaduthuruthy seat in Kottayam since 2006. A lawyer by profession, he also began his political career with the student wing of the Kerala Congress.
Shibu Baby John, the RSP face in the UDF cabinet, is the son of veteran leader Baby John, who had served as a minister in the Congress and the Left cabinets. Shibu, 63, was a minister in the previous UDF government.
Anoop Jacob, the lone Kerala Congress (Jacob) legislator in the UDF, is the son of the late Kerala Congress leader T M Jacob, a former minister. After his father’s death, Anoop contested from Piravom and won. He was also a minister in the previous UDF government.
A P Anil Kumar, 61, has been representing Vandoor in Malappuram since 2001. The KPCC vice president, one of the most prominent Dalit leaders in the Congress, served as the minister in the UDF governments from 2004 to 2006 and then from 2011 to 2016.
K A Thulasi, 51, is a first-time MLA from the Kongad Assembly seat in Palakkad and one of the two women in the Cabinet. Thulasi, who started her political journey with Congress student politics, was elected a member of the Thrissur district panchayat in 2000. Her husband is Palakkad MP V K Sreekandan, whom she married in 2004 when he was the Youth Congress’s All-India general secretary. At present, Thulasi is also a general secretary in the KPCC.
C P John, 69, is the chairman of Communist Marxist Party, a CPI(M) rebel outfit that the late M V Raghavan had floated in 1986. John has been part of the UDF since the CMP joined the Congress-led alliance in 1991. Although a senior leader of the UDF, it is John’s first victory in the Assembly. During the previous Congress government, he served as a member of the state planning board. He is also the secretary of the UDF.
O J Janeesh, 37, is the youngest Cabinet minister. Janeesh is the state president of the Youth Congress and was elected from Kodungallur in Thrissur district in his debut electoral contest. Janeesh was tasked with leading the Youth Congress in the state last year after the incumbent at the time, Rahul Mamkoottathil, was accused of sexual assault by multiple women.
Roji M John, 43, is a prominent youth face of Congress in Kerala. He has been representing the Angamaly seat in Ernakulam since 2016. Roji, who has an MPhil degree in political science from Jawaharlal Nehru University, rose to the NSUI leadership during his time in New Delhi. He served as the national president of the Congress’s student wing before returning to Kerala in 2016 to contest the elections and won Angamaly. He has also served as the AICC secretary in charge of Karnataka.
M Liju, 46, is a first-time legislator from the Kayamkulam seat in Alappuzha district. His win this time is the first successful one after three successive defeats in the previous elections. In 2009, he became the president of the state Youth Congress following a talent hunt introduced by Rahul Gandhi. He is one of the KPCC general secretaries.
