The location of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) proposed to be established in Kerala has become the theme of a war of words in the Kerala BJP, threatening to bring out in the open the fissures within the party ahead of civic body polls in November-December and the assembly election due in April next year in which it eyes major gains. When former filmstar Suresh Gopi, the Union minister of state for petroleum, natural gas and tourism, declared that the AIIMS campus must be set up in Alappuzha or Thrissur, it rubbed his party’s state leaders the wrong way as they had not been consulted about it.

“Establishing AIIMS in Alappuzha is crucial for the development of the coastal district that lags behind all others,” Suresh Gopi told the media on September 26 after attending a

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