Kerala: The secret of Pinarayi’s U-turn on PM-SHRI

Everyone is stunned: the Kerala government has signed a ‘secret’ MoU with the Union government to implement the PM-SHRI (Pradhan Mantri Schools for Rising India) scheme—which it had vehemently opposed since its 2022 launch.

For years, the CPI(M)-dominated Left Democratic Front (LDF) stood as a vanguard against the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 and its flagship scheme PM-SHRI—denouncing both as tools of RSS-driven ‘saffronisation’, communalisation and commercialisation of education. The fact that Kerala is headed for assembly elections in 2026 may help decode this latest development.

The Right to Education Act enshrines education as a state and concurrent subject, with assured financial transfers under central schemes such as Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA). The PM-SHRI scheme aims at creating 14,500 exemplar institutions across the country to showcase various aspects of the NEP. It has a total outlay of Rs 27,360 crore (Rs 18,128 crore as central share) for five years.

However, the Union government froze Kerala’s education grants totalling over Rs 1,158 crore over three financial years, linking SSA funds to NEP compliance via PM-SHRI–a strategy fiercely criticised as coercive and against federal principles. Tamil Nadu and West Bengal too have firmly refused to sign the MoU, citing threats to state autonomy in education, secularism, and the protection of a highly-lauded public education system credited with near-universal literacy and negligible dropout rates.

In a strong statement, the leader of the opposition in Kerala assembly V.D. Satheesan said education is in the concurrent list and “The Right to Education Act mandated unconditional release of SSA funds to States. The allocation is not dependent on the Centre’s charity.” Congress governments in Rajasthan, Karnataka and Himachal Pradesh, he asserted, had accepted SSA funds without signing up for the PM-SHRI.

Curiously, the signing of the MoU reportedly took place without the knowledge of the Kerala cabinet. There were no consultations with LF partners either. Even the Communist Party of India (CPI) leaders, who had raised the issue on 22 October, were blindsided. CPI state secretary Binoy Viswam denounced the MoU as a “grave violation of front principles” and a “self-goal” and a “serious conspiracy” to push NEP through the backdoor.

Crossing many ‘red lines’

Observers believe there is more to it than meets the eyes. On 10 October, chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan flew to Delhi for a 30-minute meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi—their first since 2023. While the meeting ostensibly discussed Kerala’s financial woes and need to expedite projects such as the Vizhinjam port, the subsequent events have triggered much speculation.

The CM’s daughter T. Veena and her IT firm Exalogic Solutions, are accused of receiving Rs 1.72 crore from the state-backed Cochin Minerals and Rutile Ltd (CMRL) in 2021–22 without rendering any service. In April 2025, the Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) filed charges under the Companies Act, with the Centre authorising prosecution. It was unusual and rare as the Centre rarely intervenes in state cases.

The SFIO alleged Exalogic was used to channel payoffs linked to environmental clearances for illegal beach sand mining, a scandal echoing the 2020 gold smuggling controversy that had rocked Vijayan’s government.

Vijayan’s son, Vivek, is rumoured to have received summons from the Enforcement Directorate over stakes in liquor contracts—allegations the CM derided as “malfunctioning crackers.” A vigilance court has also entertained a Congress petition alleging favouritism in tender allotments to kin-linked entities. Congress MP K.C. Venugopal summed up the swirling suspicions by saying, “Every controversy in Kerala now reeks of a BJP–CPI(M) deal.”

Kerala’s opposition to the NEP 2020 was nothing short of ferocious. Vijayan thundered in the Assembly that the NEP threatened “the nation’s federal fabric and secular ethos,” vowing Kerala would “never accept it.” Protests erupted across campuses, with the SFI leading demonstrations against the “RSS blueprint to impose Hindi, rewrite history, and dilute state autonomy”.

By 2023–24, the Centre retaliated by freezing Kerala’s share under the SSA. Teacher salaries staggered, infrastructure projects stalled and the LDF doubled down. The then CPI(M) Politburo member, and now the party’s general secretary, M.A. Baby dismissed NEP implementation as “hypocrisy,” even as Kerala selectively adopted features such as the three-language system.

Education minister V. Sivankutty, a loyal Vijayan lieutenant, explained the latest move as a “strategic decision to secure our rightful funds without compromising curriculum control. The state decides what our children learn; PM SHRI is only a technicality for infrastructure”. It is a temporary tactical truce designed to unlock SSA dues and avert a fiscal crisis before the 2026 Assembly elections, he said, adding, “Funds are taxpayers’ rights, not favours by the BJP”.

Others are not quite convinced. Kerala has not outwitted Delhi by signing the MoU, it has simply validated the Centre’s coercive “sign or starve” policy against all federal principles, believe the opposition and allies alike.

If the CPI feels betrayed, the students front of Left parties find themselves at a loss after vociferously opposing the scheme and the NEP. In sharp contrast, the ABVP is understandably jubilant. “A major victory for our stand,” exulted Kerala ABVP, crediting months of agitation for forcing the LDF’s hand. “As many as 336 schools in the state will be upgraded; Sivankutty deserves to be thanked,” the RSS-affiliated students body asserted. The AISF—the CPI’s student arm—has branded the decision a “disgrace,” launching protests in Thrissur and denouncing it as “a betrayal of Kerala’s students to BJP diktats”.

The SFI leaders have fallen silent. “We protested for nothing?” one leader lamented. This dissonance threatens to alienate the youth base that powered the LDF’s 2021 victory, leaving the students’ bodies of Left parties fragmented and demoralised.

Smelling blood, the Youth Congress has accused the LDF of “saffronisation by stealth” and demanded Vijayan’s resignation. As the 2026 assembly elections approach, a divided Left, looking for a third consecutive victory, finds itself at a crossroads.

Renowned Malayalam poet K. Satchidanandan, a long-time Left sympathiser, has called it a "suicidal surrender" to Hindutva forces, accusing the CPI(M) of trading its anti-RSS legacy for fiscal scraps. He warned that legitimising NEP's ‘cultural homogenisation’ betrays Kerala's pluralistic education ethos, echoing his constant plea to resist the RSS's “thought machine”.

(Amal Chandra is an author and political analyst)