The 1980 Parliamentary Election was a mid-term election held following the collapse of the Janata Party led governments led by Prime Ministers Morarji Desai and Charan Singh. It was also the first election that the Indian National Congress fought from the opposition. The party had suffered a split, with the faction led by former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi (Indian National Congress (Indira)) asserting its electoral popularity by winning 353 seats and forming a majority government of its own..
This was the first election fought in Kerala since the two coalitions, the Left Democratic Front (LDF) and the United Democratic Front (UDF) came into existence. These elections were held in the backdrop of growing political instability in Kerala. The previous Legislative Assembly (1977-79) had seen four Chief Ministers come to power- K. Karunakaran, A.K. Antony, P. K. Vasudevan Nair and C. H. Mohammed Koya, The Communist Party of India, the INC (U) and KC (Mani) split off from the United Front coalition led by the Indian National Congress to form the LDF, a coalition with the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the principle opposition party in Kerala. On the other hand, the INC (I) along with the Indian Union Muslim League, KC (Joseph) and the Janata Party formed the primary components of the UDF.
The LDF registered a comfortable victory over the UDF by winning 12 seats over the 8 seats bagged by the latter. In the assembly election held a fortnight later, the LDF came to power with senior CPI(M) leader E. K. Nayanar assuming the office of Chief Minister.
