Chennai: MI Shanavas, the working president of the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee and MP from Wayanad, passed away after a prolonged illness on Wednesday. He was 67.
Shanavas, who represented the Wayanad constituency twice in the Lok Sabha, breathed his last at a hospital in Chennai at 1am. He had undergone a liver transplant on November 2.
Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, former CM Oommen Chandy and opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala, expressed their condolences over Shanavas’ demise.
Once a close confidante of Congress veteran K Karunakaran, Shanavas was a member of a trio, along with Leader of Opposition Ramesh Chennithala and the late G Karthikeyan, who formed the ‘reformists’ or ‘Thiruthalvadis’. They were branded so after their revolt against Karunakaran as he planned to make his son K Muralidharan his political scion.
Shanavas failed to win the erstwhile Vadakkekkara Assembly seat in 1987 and 1991, and the Pattambi Assembly seat at 1996. He was defeated twice in the erstwhile Chirayinkizh Lok Sabha constituency in 1999 and 2004. However, he bounced back in 2009 as the first member of Wayanad Lok Sabha seat with a margin of 1,53,439 votes, a state record. However, the margin was reduced to 20,870 votes in 2014 elections.
Shanavas, the son of MV Ibrahim Kutty and Noorjahan Begum of Neerettupuram near Thiruvalla, started his political career with Kerala Students’ Union. He graduated from Farook College, Kozhikode with an MA in English Literature and LLB from Ernakulam Law College.
His body will be flown to Kochi on Wednesday afternoon and will be placed at Ernakulam Town Hall from 3 pm for the public to pay homage. The last rites will be held at the Thottathumpadi Juma Masjid in Kochi at 10 am on Thursday.
The Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) working president is survived by his wife, a son and a daughter.