Thiruvananthapuram, Feb 9 Kerala politics is perceived as centred on ideology and class struggle, but this week, it found itself floundering in murkier waters concerning a lunch layout, fish varieties, and contrasting memories -- involving Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, no less.
The trigger was veteran CPI leader and former state minister C. Divakaran, who casually disclosed a past "incident" which has now become a fully cooked controversy, that Chief Minister Vijayan once walked out of the home of veteran CPI-M leader Anathalavattom Anandan after discovering that his favourite fish -- seer fish, billed as the costliest and most “A-class” fish available in Kerala -- was missing from the table.
According to Divakaran, the absence of the preferred fish, replaced allegedly by tuna, proved unacceptable.
The Chief Minister, he claimed, exited before lunch could turn into class harmony.
The remark, made with almost anecdotal ease, exploded online, not because Kerala lacks bigger political crises, but because it involved the leader of a party that has historically spoken in the language of austerity, simplicity, and working-class restraint.
A missing seer fish, after all, is not exactly a proletarian grievance.
Divakaran has since attempted damage control, insisting that his comment was not meant to spark controversy, though he firmly stood by his version, describing it as drawn from personal experience rather than political imagination.
On the other hand, Jeeva Anandan, son of the late Anathalavattom Anandan, firmly rejected the claim.
In a long Facebook post — part political memoir, part culinary archive — he argued that food in their household had always been simple, shared, and unquestioned.
Leaders ranging from E.M.S. (former Chief Minister E.M.S. Namboodripad) to (former Chief Minister E.K.) Nayanar, he recalled, ate whatever was served, without fuss, preference or protest.
Vijayan, too, he said, had eaten at their home once, finished his meal, exchanged pleasantries and left happily — with no fish-related fallout.
The post, rich in detail and nostalgia, sought to puncture the image of selective eating by invoking a communist culture where wasting food was taboo and complaining about it was unthinkable.
With no photographic evidence of the lunch menu and no surviving seer fish to testify, the truth now floats somewhere between memory and mythology.
What remains undeniable is that Kerala has once again managed to turn a political disagreement into a debate about fish — premium, proletarian, or otherwise.
In a state where even lunch can become ideology, perhaps this was inevitable, and the question that arises is whether seer fish is still making its way to the Cliff House -- the official residence of Vijayan.
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