BJP appoints Alphons in charge of M’laya polls

SHILLONG: The new tourism minister in Narendra Modi’s cabinet, Alphons Kannanthanam, was appointed in charge of Meghalaya elections by BJP.
This was decided in the meeting of the core committee of the State BJP with central BJP leaders in Delhi on Tuesday.
The meeting discussed the election strategy and other related matters and the central leaders expressed happiness over the progress of organisational work in the state.
The appointment of Kannanthanam, also called KJ Alphons, a member of the Roman Catholic Church, assumes significance as this will boost the image of the party in the Christian dominated Meghalaya.
The former IAS officer quit service in 2006 to contest and win as a Left-supported Independent candidate from Kerala’s Kanjirapally Assembly constituency.
He joined BJP in 2011 and was inducted as a national executive committee member. Earlier, he was named Administrator of the Union Territory of Chandigarh but was not appointed.
He was known as the “Demolition Man” because during his tenure as Commissioner of Delhi, he gave order to demolish as many as 14,310 illegal buildings in the mid-1990s.
Though his wife and children came under attack, he went ahead with the task.
Alphons, who hails from Kottayam, was one of the toppers in IAS in 1979 and he led the literacy movement in Kerala and in 1989, Kottayam was declared the first 100 per cent literate town in the country. Besides, as the Entrance Commissioner of professional examinations, he adopted transparent mechanism.